so I just finished doing some upgrades to the house while I was doing it it occurred to me that
I should make a video you know on some smart home or home automation ideas that some of you guys out
there could you know implements in this video I'm going to be talking about the minor upgrades that
I just completed I'll explain each one and talk about how they could benefit you know your own
home especially if you're looking to make it smarter the first one is motion sensor light
switches so you can install motion sensor light switches throughout the house but you know there's
some places that you'd probably want to have it over other places you can also have them either
smart or not smart I added one non-smart one and two Smart Ones I already had one non-smart one
installed beforehand so I've got one smart switch installed for the front door lights as well as one
for the back door light that way the lights come on automatically anytime you know I open the door
and walk past those switches which are you know right next to the front and the back door respect
so the non-smart ones I installed one in the pantry and one and a bathroom so the non-smart one
is a Lutron Maestro motion sensor light so it's got four different timeout periods you know for
use so if you want the light to turn off after a minute you can set it up that way after five
minutes after 15 minutes or after 30 minutes it's up to you but I set mine to one minute because
I'm never in the pantry for you know more than a minute the smart motion sensor light is from Casa
so Casa's got one that can be controlled via voice control as well as setting you know schedules for
when you want the lights to work like for example if you don't want it working during the daytime
you can set it up that way and you can also set it so it adapts to the light around so when it's
bright the light won't come on and when it's dark then it will the motion sensor will trigger and
the lights will come on which is when you want it to come on which is really good right there
for both of them the installation is very easy if you have you know some electrical wiring knowledge
or some experience with it if not I strongly advise you to go ahead and you know reach out
to a technician to help you get that done all right so the next three devices that I'll talk
about that you know can help you upgrade your smart home are from a company called akiara so
they sent me these devices and you know that's what prompted me to go ahead and you know make
some smart home upgrade but the first thing that I installed were their door and window sensor so
what these sensors do is they detect you know uh if a window or a door or any you know thing is
open you know at any point in time because there's two parts to them one side is a sensor the other
one is a magnet so if you want the sensor to you know identify as close then both of those you know
items have to be close to each other but if you know you keep them apart then it's going to the
sensor is going to read is open which is how it works you know using a magnet which is pretty
cool it's got a really minimalistic design as well like super small and you know very you know
minute school like you won't even notice it there unless you and install it and you know you put it
there most people won't even know that that's why it's there there's got to be a maximum of
22 millimeters of distance between both parts if it's more than that the sensing will not work as
far to install the sensors it's super easy this is probably one of the easiest things you can install
to you know smarten up your home it's pretty much appeal and stick system that's it there's
also lots of automations that you can do with them that you can set up you know things like when your
door opens you want your lights to go on I think I installed about six of them throughout the house
I installed a few on Windows and I installed a couple on my front and my back door that way
I know whenever they're open and if I need to do more advanced automations then I can always
have a sensor you know on the front in the back door the sensors use batteries so you'll have to
change them after about two years because that's kind of like their lifespan right there which is
a lot I'm sure there are other options out there but I can personally vouch for their Cara model
and I love it the only thing that I'll say could be a problem for some people is you'll need to
have a hub to you know kind of set used use the smart features you know to really kind of see
when the doors open or closed you'll need a Cara Hub and there's different kinds but that's going
to bring me to my next uh device on the list in a second here all right so for the next item on the
list we'll be talking about uh a smart security camera so an indoor camera though also doubles
as a hub for all of your Akira devices so there are different options out there for installing a
smart indoor security camera and some people are actually against it and don't want to have that
in their homes but for me personally I've got valuables and I like to know what's happening
within my house when I'm not home especially so having you know indoor security cameras on the
major floors within the house very important to me so I did that and I installed one on the main
floor one in my office just right behind me there and um the last one in my bedroom so usually with
these devices you can set them up so they're not running when you're home and you know when
you're away then they kind of kick into you know action start working the indoor camera I installed
throughout the house is called a Kiara camera Hub G3 so essentially they've got other ones but this
one is honestly my opinion the one that looks the best it's got these cute little bunny ears that I
think makes it look cool and it's very minimal it doesn't take a lot of space So It just fits right
in you know uh to different locations you don't want it you know on a flat top like a surface or
um you know a bookshelf or something like that and what you can do is you can mount it onto
the wall or you can mount it onto the ceiling and you know when you mount it onto the ceiling
if you do it and it's kind of hanging overhead then what you can do is you know within the app
you can switch the orientation of the video that way it appears normal instead of upside down when
you're watching you know on your phone the cool thing about the G3 is that it's not just a hub
and it's not just the indoor security camera it's both at the same time it also takes SD
cards if you plan on you know locally storing your videos that way you don't have to you know
use a subscription plan or anything like that which I find to be you know a huge Plus for a
device like this you know a security camera the camera has a 2K quality so that's pretty good
definitely better than 1080p if you're already used to that cool features like gesture control
which will allow you to control it with different gestures obviously so you can use it with Amazon's
Alexa Google's assistant as well as home kit and series the camera quality while using it
with home kit secure video is only going to be maxed out at 1080p so you can't exceed that the
camera has a full 360 degree pan and tilt you know uh viewing angle so that way you can kind of see
everything happen around you it also has human tracking and animal tracking the only problem
with that though is you can't have both you know running at the same time I don't know why that is
but you just can't you can pretty much set up a bunch of automations uh throughout your home
you know using a bunch of akara devices The Hub and you know the app okay so for the next smart
home upgrade idea or home automation idea you might want to consider installing some smart
light switches so there's different options out there you know different brands you can go for
I replaced some regular switches with some Smart Ones so the ones I replaced them with were from
akara as well so they work with the camera g-hub just like um the window and door sensors and they
also work with like home kit as well as Amazon's Alexa and Google assistant so that way you can
control them with voice assistance or through their respective apps Alexa turn on kitchen
okay the installation process for them is pretty much just like any other light switch you would
install throughout the house so you want to make sure that you have a neutral wire if you're going
to go for light switches uh with a neutral wire because they have some with no neutral wire and
a camera provides two different um models that you can go for a single rocker or a double rocker
depending on how you want to wire your home or your light switches there's two things I don't
really like about them though and the first one is that they have sort of an off-white color and if
you plan on installing them right next to any you know white light switches or where like a
white face plate then it'll probably stand out unless you're installing it by itself like I did
in my room right there then you might not notice that you know it's just going to blend right in
I did change the face plate you know I didn't I wanted something black so I used a Lutron face
plates and you know my room to cover up the light just like the door and window sensor you're also
going to need a our Hub to use this akara works with homekit so if you have Apple devices you're
set if you are interested in picking up any one of them make sure to use the links down in the
description below one more thing that I'd like you guys to note is that today is Amazon Prime day so
go ahead and check out those deals that they've got going on I'm sure you'll find something that
you like uh on the website so anything that I talked about today I'm going to link down in
the description below but that's pretty much it for this video right here I hope you guys enjoy
this one if you did you know what to do go ahead and hit that like button down below subscribe if
you're new to the channel and turn notifications as well um I will catch you guys in my next video
you already know who it is man it's your boy Tomi with Midas Tech and I'm out y'all foreign