Well...
After months and months of paying off little bits we finally managed to pay off our Mothercare baby plan at 36 weeks pregnant. Buying the baby monitor was one of the hardest choices we had to make because we're such tech-y people we wanted the best. Looking at review after review we decided that one that comes with a little monitor wouldn't be a good idea, we would only lose it around the house.. (we lose remote controls now as it is, never mind with a child around!)
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| An example of one with a monitor... |
We are such an Apple family, with an Apple TV, 2 iPads, 2 iPhones, a Macbook and a Mac mini along with a few other old generation iPod's and iPhones, it would be stupid not to get the one that Apple sold and raved about, the iBaby monitor by iHealth.
We were a little weary at first, because it was a lot of money and the reviews said things such as;
"It says it will alert you when your baby moves or cries, and it does, sometimes." and " It only seems to work on some wi-fi networks, which is hopeless and you can't view it on 3G like it advertises." However, the good reviews kinda counter balanced it all, so we decided to bite the bullet and give it a go.
Even though baby Charlie wasn't here yet, we couldn't resist but to give it a go! Esteban set it up with ease, you have to know what you're doing with IP addresses and such though and set up an account. I don't think the people on the review's did this properly, hence their problems with 3G access etc.
I signed into the account he created and it worked like a dream. The app was free to download from the app store and asked you to sign in and viola, the image was there, in colour. You have the choice of 'HD' as well, which is very nice and clear. There's a screenshot mode too, so you can take pictures and capture that cute moment without hunting for the camera!
Other features include physically moving the camera by swiping your finger across the screen. This works really well although it's quite creepy when you're in the room and the camera suddenly moves! Also it has sound and motion alert which is very handy. If the baby moves or cries (and you can adjust the sensitivity) a notification will come up on your iOS device screen and a sound will play, alerting you that the baby needs you. The picture quality is really clear and it doesn't seem to lag too much like an old school webcam would, also it comes with a wall bracket, which could be helpful in some nursery environments.
The only thing we were expecting that we were a little bit disappointed with is the fact it doesn't have 2 way audio. We can hear the baby from our iOS devices but the baby can't hear us. We thought it would use the microphone from our iOS devices so we could comfort the baby while we made our way to his nursery, but no, there doesn't seem to be this function, or we haven't found it yet.
Due to some crafty price matching, we managed to get the camera down to £120. Don't be put off by the price tag though, it is truly worth every penny. The technology is outstanding and the quality exceeds my expectations! We have yet to try the night mode or the 3G mode while Esteban is at work yet, but I will do an update once we have tried it...
So far? A tech mum rating of...8/10!
EDIT: We found out that you need to connect a speaker in order for the two way sound to work. It works like a dream! :)
