Motorola Homesight Remote Access, Key Management and Cameras
Possibly the most disappointing aspect of the Motorola homesight system is its complete lack of integrated remote access for the system. There are third party solutions, of course, from the integrated remote access available in Windows XP Pro, to the recommended affiliate I'm Touch remote access service (which incurs a monthly service fee of $8.95 or yearly fee of $89.95 for a single PC). While I'm glad that Motorola does indeed direct users to a third party solution, it would be even better if they had an integrated software and central server solution to meet this need. I would also like one very important option that seems to be missing from the system - the ability to upload security logs, photos and video to an Internet server.
In fact, without the use of a server you have a unique scenario: if thieves come in and steal the computer on which the Motorola homesight system resides - they also take all proof and evidence captured by the system. Oops. If that information is able to be uploaded via FTP to a server, however, then you have something that is securely storing your data on an off-location machine and you will be able to grab that information should a worst-case scenario occur.
I believe Motorola at this point is targeting those who would like to have an in-home monitoring system. This is not a completely secure suite of tools designed to fully protect against intruders, but rather a solid first line of defense that can enable you to do a measurable amount of home monitoring as well as out-of-town automating.
Key Management
As I mentioned, the Wireless Keypad is the coolest part of the
homesight system. Simply come home (or leave), press your key into the
Keypad and the system arms or disarms with ease. No confusing passwords
or access numbers to memorize and each key is assigned to a specific
person or function. In this way, the arm/disarm logs and events are
tracked by the system and you always know who is responsible for
activating or disengaging the system.
Each key is uniquely serialized, so when you add it to the homesight system for the first time it can be renamed and designated for use by a family member, babysitter, guest etc...
Macros
Macros simply allow you to enable an Event Schedule (macro) immediately. This includes arming or disarming the system, or running a record-on-event/sensor command.
Comprehensive Help Menu
The Help menu consists of a searchable index of help topics, organized by task, device and product. It includes a Quick Start Guide as well a step-by-step "how-to" guides for typical tasks undertaken in setting up and using the homesight system. There is also a significant amount of detailed information on each device and feature within the system. Overall I found it easy to use, though I preferred to search topics rather than use the linear navigation
Video Camera Performance
The video camera performance on the Motorola homesight, unlike their pristine website graphics, is not as good as I would have hoped. While I would assume that daylight video with perfect lighting would be much better, I had hoped that interior shots would have been at a higher resolution (video appears to be at around 320x240 pixels, 8-12fps. The wired cameras do not fare any better than their wireless counterparts, with rather choppy video and only 1/4 NTSC resolution. With a wide angle lens, such as the cameras feature, you would have a very hard time identifying any "suspects" (or even the pizza delivery person at your front door) at the resolution provided. In order for identification to take place it seemed as if the subject had to be within 3-4 feet of the camera itself. It would be nice to see better performance out of the wired cameras at least and I would love to see an option for higher-quality cameras (we'll pay for them) with selectable resolutions up to the capabilities of the Motorola's 802.11g network.
The camera quality is adjustable to some extent in that Brightness, Contrast, and Quality can be adjusted from 0-100. The default settings are about the best you will get, however and I did not see any difference between Quality settings of 75 and 100. In fact, on further experimentation with both the wired and wireless cameras, I didn't see any difference between a setting of 1 and 100, indicating to me that this function doesn't alter the real-time video settings.
Camera audio was rather disappointing, with most cameras having a very clear and present buzzing and being easily affected by any nearby magnetic interference (for example a fan motor). Periodically, audio would pop as the video camera (both wireless and wired) would glitch and jump. While they were certainly sufficient for capturing any needed audio in terms of getting something on disc, the quality could be much improved. It seemed as data flow increased (more motion and greater signal to noise) the video jumpiness increased as did the frequency of dropouts and audible pops.
