Today we have had the rare opportunity to review some UK designed and built smart home tech, meet NCube – ‘the brain at the heart of your home’.

What does NCube do?

NCube is an all in one smart home hub, the idea being it takes away the need for multiple apps bringing everything into it one interface. You can then setup rooms and group devices.

NCube also works like a ‘local IFTTT’ (If this then that – https://www.ifttt.com ) allowing you to create interactions between devices. They call these ‘Cubes’. However as local and not cloud based the commands are quicker, we all know how slow IFTTT / Stringify can be sometimes.

NCube came to life from a Kickstarter project back in 2016.

nCube Home Smart Home Hub

How easy is it to setup?

The first thing we must mention is the user guide, sorry to say but this needs work – it’s overwhelming and text heavy!
However that said the setup was quick and easy, it took longer to read and understand the guide than setup the NCube.

Setup is done via the app, you enter the activation number from the unit, oddly placed underneath the rubber base.

Once setup you can add your smart home tech. NCube supports 120 devices and this keeps growing as they do. Sadly a few key players like Ring are missing and at present its slightly limited.

Adding devices was easy and intuitive, most are done via self discovery or as always with Hue, press the Hue hub button button then add.

You can then create your ‘Cubes’, using standard rules. Here is one we made to turn off our outside light.

What’s the connectivity?

In addition to the 120 devices it supports:

• WiFi
• LAN
• Z-Wave
• Bluetooth

Another interesting point is it works offline, still auctioning ‘cubes’ assuming tech allows – for example Bluetooth.

How much does Ncube Cost?

Ncube cost £149 – a good price point for a smart hub!

What’s it like living with Ncube?

Not bad, the app does need some work – the interface at times can be a little clunky and items overlap.

However, this could well be down to the fact it’s not designed for iPhone X.

The functionality is all there and ‘current mode’ is a good feature and something lacking from competitors like Homey. This lets you to quickly set yourself to ‘Home’, ‘Away’ or ‘Holiday’.

Each device has its own interface allowing you to control it, for example Sonos:

A few times the app did appear to fall offline, closing the app and reopening it did fix it.

What are our final thoughts on NCube?

NCube has made a good start, it has a way to go to compete. The biggest restriction is the limited integrated tech and the app needs a little work.

We do however like the idea and the direction they are going in, one to keep an eye on for sure!
As they grow and update we will revisit it.

Homey by Athom is trying to simplify the smart home market making everything work together. It came to life after a successful Kickstarter campaign where they raised €203,918 from 996 backers. Fast forward nearly 3 years and here we are with Homey on general release.

What does Homey do?!

Homey is a smart home hub, made by Athom. It controls all the different smart home tech in your house in one interface and allows you to create rules and actions allowing them to interact. Think of it like a ‘local IFTTT’. As it connects so many different things the possibilities are almost endless!

It also has a powerful insights panel, where you can see exactly how much energy tech is using and what actions have been done. For example when were my lights turned on and off, when was my front door opened.

As well as home automation Homey has a music function, connecting to your Sonos Speakers and Spotify.  Although we can’t help but feel this was an add on feature and not its main purpose. Its nice to have but not what got us excited about Homey.

Homey itself is a beautifully designed orb with a band of lights around it’s circumference. This is a smart home hub that we will happily leave on show!

How easy is it to setup?

Setup was unlike any smart tech we have setup before, instead of using your smartphone you are told you should use a PC or Mac. Setup is done via Homey’s website and then installer.

Once setup you are presented with an ‘empty house’. You need to install apps from their app store website onto your Homey so it can communicate with your smart home tech. As soon as you start to search you will notice the almost crazy amount of tech that it supports! Searching is simple and the user interface is very intuitive.

Once you install the app you can then configure it and add the tech to your house. You can then add it to the room groups.

One very important point is that Homey is a platform, one that anyone can develop on to. Think of it like the Apple App Store, endless developers and possibilities.

However this means those apps you installed to connect Homey to your tech could be created by anyone and not necessarily Homey or an official source. Whilst this is great for vast coverage it can result in sudden discontinued support if the developer decided to stop developing the app.
If you install apps into Homey from their website it is clearly mark who developed it, Install via the PC app and no such signposting. We connected Ring and gave it our credentials without realising it was a 3rd party, this should be clearer and be a cause for concern.

UPDATE:

Athom got in touch with us and wanted to add on this point:

“Every App is reviewed by Athom on a regular base, and community developed Apps have a set of requirements they have to fulfil before being released into the App store.”

That is good to hear and does reassure us on the concept of the App store.

The apps also add functionality not just connectivity, for example there is a Soundboard app that allows you to play sounds via a Flow.

For example if door sensor is triggered and we are not home play MP3. This is brilliant functionality and can easily be setup to make it appear someone is in when they are not.

Once setup on desktop you can install the phone app and allow it to track location for location based triggers. An odd omission from the app is any ability to administrate your house like adding devices or flows.

You can also manage your Homey via the website, the interface is exactly the same as the installed app. This is handy for when your not at home.

Athom Homey

How much does Homey cost?

£269 from Amazon or direct. The price tag might put some people off but as it supports so much and does so much we think it is fair but would be good if slightly lower.

What’s the connectivity?

Homey has the most connectivity and support we have ever seen on any smart home tech!

It supports….

• NFC — 13.56 MHz
• RF — 868 MHz
• ZigBee — 2.4 GHz
• Bluetooth — 2.4 GHz
• RF — 433 MHz
• Z-Wave — 868 MHz
• Wi-Fi — 2.4 GHz
• Infrared — 430 THz

It even has the ability to learn from remote controls.

Homey has a built in voice, you can select from a list of voices, as well as a ‘in development’ voice recognition. We decided to connect it to Alexa as we use her for most things. This is easily done by adding the Homey Skill in the Alexa app.

You can then use the microphone input in flows to trigger flows. As always with Alexa you need to refer to the skill, for example:

“Alexa ask Homey to Sleep”

This turns off all our lights and closes the blind, very impressive.

As if that was not enough Homey supports IFTTT so you can connect it to anything IFTTT supports.

Finally homey has a very active online community where new integrations, idea and apps are discussed.

What’s it like living with it?

This is a helpful, useful and exciting addition to our smart home.

We have managed to connect things we never thought possible and activate them via a single command, for example our Somfy blind, Philips Hue and TV.

However this is new tech and it did have a few little hiccups, for example it suddenly one day asked us via voice

“I’m sorry I don’t understand what you are asking of me”

One time we tried to use it it was not responding and we had to reboot it. That said even ‘market leader’ Alexa has bad days and quirks.

What are our final thoughts?

It is very refreshing to find one device that works with so many different technologies and from every price point.  As the tech supported is so wide supported tech includes simple doorbells, that cost £25,  as well as low cost sensors and monitors. This suddenly makes the smart home much more accessible.

If you are looking for a smart home controller and are prepared for a little geeky setup, flows and reporting this is for you!

If you are looking for an off the shelf, plug and play and forget home automation solution, this is not for you. However as Homey develops we would not be surprised if it does become the solution of choice.

Homey just need to cater for these users a little more. In a similar way to how an iPhone will work out of the box as a phone, yet you can install apps and setup additional features if you want too.

Definitely one to watch!

For more information you can also check out their website: http://www.athom.com/

This is a We Own It review of Foobot!

What does Foobot do?!

Foobot is a home air quality monitor, it also connects to your smart home tech to control it, adjust your room and alert you of any problems.

It monitors in real time:

• Fine particles
• Volatile compounds
• Carbon Dioxide – eq
• Humidity
• Temperature

This then gives you an overall air quality score in the app as well as tips on how to improve each reading and the overall score.

Foobot itself is designed well and looks great, care has also been taken with the packaging – think Apple meets Innocent Smoothies, with text like:

“This Foobot likes you already” and “Don’t look at my bottom” printed on it.

Foobot Indoor Air Quality Monitor

How easy is it to setup?

Initial setup is quick and easy!

We set it up in our bedroom in under 5 minutes. This is done in a pretty unique way rotating the Foobot upside down until the Foobot changes colour.

You then follow the normal smart home tech process of connecting to its own ‘WiFi network’ and enter your WiFi password.

However after initial setup it does take 6 days to ‘settle’ into your room and start giving you notifications about the air quality.

Foobot is controlled by the app, it also has an Apple watch app – a nice touch and often missing from smart home tech.

What’s the connectivity?

Foobot works with an impressive range of smart home tech!

• Nest – an official ‘works with nest’ integration
• Amazon Echo
• LuxGeo
• Ecobe

This adds extra features like being able to ask Alexa what the room quality is like in a room. This is good for quickly checking before bed how the room is.

It also works with IFTTT allowing you to create rules and alerts.

For example we set up an IFTTT rule to change our room light red if the Carbon Dioxide levels were not in a good range.

How much does Foobot cost?

£254 from Amazon, although at the time of writing it’s on special at  £179!

What’s it like living with it?

Interesting – things we never thought about like how does spraying deodorant and hair spray impact air quality. The answer is it changes it a lot, something you can rectify by opening a window or turning on a fan.

We are also getting into a habit of checking air quality before sleep and making adjustments to ensure its good quality before bedtime. It could easily be psychosomatic but it does seem to be having a positive impact! We will update after 4 weeks of use.

The only annoying issue is on our iPhone X the week view in the app cannot easily be pressed as the buttons are now where you tap to go home, due to the new iPhone X UI design.

What are our final thoughts?

After only using it for a few weeks this is a very handy bit of smart home tech. Making us think about what we breathe in and what the air quality is actually like in the room we sleep in. Foobot marketing makes a very good point “you spend 9% of your time indoors” yet have never thought about what the air INSIDE is like.

Having it connected to Hue via IFTTT and giving us visual clues is very interesting, as is being able to quickly ask Alexa. If we had a baby this would be an addition to the baby’s room without question.

This is a great addition to any smart home,

This is a We Own it review of the Kiwi Design Alex – an Echo Dot battery base.

What does Alex do?!

Alex is a is a battery base for a second-generation Echo dot.  It is only for the second generation because the Amazon Echo Dot fits perfectly inside Alex.

Alex has an impressive 10,000 mA/h battery – this means it can power the Echo Dot for 12 hours play time and 24 hours standby time. Standby is when it is just listening and waiting for you to invoke her.

Alexa is the super smart home assistant by Amazon, our favourite voice assistant in fact.

Until now Alexa has been stuck to where you have power as the Echo Dot requires mains power. Kiwi Design have just released Alex to fix that problem with their portable Alexa battery base.

It has four LED’s on the front to show how charged it is:

• LED 1 – Low
• LED 2 – Medium
• LED 3 – High
• LED 4 – Full

When empty it takes 8 hours to fully charge.

Once the Echo Dot is turned on the functionality of Alexa is the same, surprisingly music plays the same with no ‘muffling’ or distortion from the case. This is probably as the case is solid and doesn’t vibrate to the music.

To charge Alex you use the original Echo Dot cable and it can be on charge when in use.
The case does not cover the 3.5M audio jack so you can still use that when using Alex.

Dot 2 Battery Base, Charger for Dot 2nd Gen. 10000mah 17 Hours Continues Playing Music by Kiwi Design

How easy is it to setup?

Very easy, you place your dot into Alex – making sure they are aligned.

Connect the power connector.

Press power button and done. It comes partially charged, LED 2 lit, so it can be uses straight away.

How much does Alex cost?

The RRP is £59.99 and can be purchased via Amazon, we have an exclusive Amazon Discount code to save 20% SJLG4TQO  

What’s it like living with Alex?

Alex is handy as you now have a portable Alexa you can easily take from room to room without worrying about wires.

It was also handy to take to the garden to use as a voice control for the garden tech. However, neither Amazon Echo Dot or Alex are waterproof or at all IP rated so it cannot be left outside or used in the wet.

What are our final thoughts?
Alex is a well-designed bit of kit, care has been taken with the build and the design. Its handy now being able to take Alexa with you.

Alex the Amazon Echo Dot Battery base can be purchased from Amazon

This is a We Own It, review of the home WiFi solution Google WiFi

What does Google WiFi do?

Google WiFi is a new mesh solution, the idea is it covers your house in a mesh network (see our article what is mesh WiFi). This is designed to prevent black spots and the headache of having to change network when you move between floors of your house, as you often do with extenders and repeaters.

PS. You can buy Google WiFi from Amazon from under £140.

Google WiFi

How easy is it to setup?

Super simple!

Connect the primary point to your router, in our case a Virgin Media Super Hub.

Power up the primary point, install the Google WiFi app scan the code on the primary points base. You then choose a name for WiFi network and its live!

We setup two additional points, so 3 in total. To do this it prompts

During setting ours up we received the message saying the connection was poor.

After a third location we found the perfect spot to get strong signal throughout the house.

We found the best location was the room above the primary point in the server room downstairs.

To give a bit of background it’s a large 3 bedroom house with very solid brick walls and just near the server room is a very large RSJ – yes not the best design but required unfortunately.

Once it was setup it installs the latest firmware, ours took less than 2 minutes.

Once setup you can see the features within the app, this includes:
Priority Device – This is a great feature and allows you to quickly priorities devices. For example, if you are streaming a film you want to give the TV maximum bandwidth.

Family WiFi – This feature allows you to group devices, for example Kids PlayStation and set automatic pauses to allow focus on homework

Guest WiFi – As the name suggest you can setup a guest WiFi, this is best practice from a security point of view, rather than letting your guests access your main network and what is on it.

House Control – This allows you to control your smart home from one simple interface, for example Hue lights.

One silly tip when setting up, the plug is expandable. If like me you quickly try and plug it in, it won’t fit as you need to extend the earth pin out. It just pulls open.

What’s the connectivity?

Brilliant it fully supports IFTTT and Alexa, we have set ours to allow voice prioritising via

If we are streaming a 4K film we simple ask Alexa to prioritise the TV to ensure a buffer free movie night.

How much does Google WiFi cost?

It depends how many units you need.

1-pack is £129
2-pack is £229
In our house we setup 3 units so the total cost was £350 – most houses will be ok with 2. We only got a 3rd to ensure the garden was fully covered.

What’s it like living with Google Wi-fi?

Google WiFi has dramatically improved the speed and stability of our WiFi.

What are our final thoughts?

We have tried nearly every Internet/WiFi solution on the market from Power Line to Access points and this is the best solution we have used.

So much so this is our first ever 5* review!!

PS. You can buy Google WiFi from Amazon from under £140.

This is a We Own It review of the Fingbox network security and troubleshooting box.

Fingbox is an extension of the successful Fing application, that allows you to trouble shoot your network from your ios or Android device. The app has over 20 Million users so even if they only get 5% using the box this has huge potential.

It was created after an impressive Indiegogo campaign where it received 1,744% of its funding!

We were lucky enough to get our hands on one of the first Fingboxs in the UK at their London launch event.

Size wise the device fits in the palm of my hand, its a little bigger thank we imagined .

What does Fingbox do?

The Fingbox box connects to your router, or any part of your network. It then monitors your network offering:

– Network Scanning & Digital Fence

It lets you know in real time as devices join and leave your network. One cool thing about this is you set users and it alerts you when they enter the network – for example if your child comes home or your cleaner comes. This is all done behind the scenes, they don’t even need to join your network just be in range and you get an alert. Also you get the alert where ever you are no need to be on the home network.

It also shows all the channels every device is on allowing you to find the best channel for your wifi.

– Parental controls

Based on users you can limit internet on any device, great for bedtime or when someone is supposed to be doing homework.

– Identifying network hogs

This is a very interesting feature as you can quickly see where the bandwidth is going on your network. For example, has your camera decided to upload photos to the cloud whilst your trying to stream a film on a Saturday night. Once you have found the hog you can pause its internet access.

– Wifi analysis

This test the actual speed of the wifi coming from your router to your device. As you walk around you can see it change. It also shows if this speed can stream SD, HD or 4K.

– Speed test

This is the speed of the internet coming into your router.

– Hacker Threat Check

Unfortunately this didn’t make it into the version we received they told us its because they are reworking the feature to include even more threats and insights.

How easy is it to setup?

Very easy! We already use the Fing app and had an account setup, if you don’t you need to install the free app (ios / Android). Create a free account.

Plug Fing into your network, it does need power but a micro usb cable with plug adapters comes in the box.

One plugged in open the app and scan the network as normal, Fingbox is detected.
Few easy configuration questions and its all setup.

Once setup you can start creating users, one nice touch is it can read your phonebook and pull in people and photos from your phone, to save you entering names.

What’s the connectivity?

Fingbox at present does not work with any external connectivity however at the launch event one of the founders, Carlos Medas, told us that they are looking at IFTTT and an API to allow connectivity.  They wanted to launch the product first and get feedback on what users wanted.

From us it’s a big we want IFTTT integration.

Fingbox does have a USB port at present its for debugging but potential for log files later in life.

How much does Fingbox cost?

The retail price is $99 – take a look on Amazon.co.uk

Fingbox Home Network Monitoring & Security

What’s it like living with Fingbox?

Great! Never have we had this level of control or information about our network in one place.

The app is very intuitive and good to use, this is probably due to the fact Fingbox is integrated into the proven app rather than starting again.

After only using it for a few minutes we identified a few issues with our network we could easily fix and improve stability. We have also set alerts for other smart home tech, for example our Ring Doorbell so if it falls offline we know.

What are our final thoughts?

This already is a good addition to our smart home, excited to see where it goes and what more this magic little box can do in the future. The founders told us the firmware can be updated very easily in minutes, being sub 3MB.

We would give this a higher score if it worked with IFTTT, Stringify or had an API – but as we said hopefully that is coming soon.