Smart tracker REDMOND: do not let your child get lost or call yourself on the keys

If your child ever ran away from you on the street, someone stole your suitcase during a trip, you often lose your car keys or the car itself in the parking lot - the REDMOND SkyTracker smart tracker will definitely come in handy for you.

Smart tracker itself is not a new phenomenon: dozens, if not hundreds of models of various Bluetooth-keyfobs at bargain prices are sold in Chinese online stores. How does REDMOND SkyTracker stand out from them? Let's look at our detailed review.

Design

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Smart Bluetooth keychains have the most diverse designs, however, as a rule, they are all quite thick - 7-8 mm at best. The REDMOND tracker has a thickness of 5.5 mm, it is very compact and almost weightless. The body is square, with a side of 37 mm, made of a nice matte plastic. There are several color options - black with a bright color insert or white with a color insert - as they say, "for him and for her."

Nutrition

REDMOND SkyTracker is powered by a “tablet type” battery - CR2032. Considering that Bluetooth LE (“low power consumption”) is used for communication, one battery lasts more than 2 months. The long period of intensive use of REDMOND SkyTracker (from January to March) discharged the battery in the test tracker to only 30%. Trackers and keyfobs using ordinary Bluetooth “eat” the battery 4-5 times faster.

Control

Smart tracker is proposed to use either in conjunction with a smartphone via Bluetooth, or via the Internet. All controls - through the interface already familiar to regular readers of the REDMOND blog Ready for Sky application, which can control any REDMOND smart technology. Requirements of the program - Android 4.3 and newer versions, or iOS 8.0 and newer. To communicate with the Redmond smart keyfob-tracker, Bluetooth 4.0 is required. To control via the Internet, you need an additional gateway device (gateway), which via Bluetooth will transmit commands received from the user to a smart tracker. Read more about how Ready for Sky technology works in this article .



The management interface of a smart Bluetooth tracker is as simple as possible; we’ll talk about it in parallel with a description of functions and usage scenarios.

Like keychain

What can smart tracker REDMOND and in which cases it can be useful? Among the main functions of the tracker - on command from the smartphone (from the Ready for Sky application) to give a loud beep. You can’t find the keys or the TV remote control - just call them. The squeak is long, loud, in the range of Bluetooth it will be heard, even if the room is crowded and noisy. A similar function is in one hundred percent of Bluetooth keyfobs, and in ninety percent it is the only one.

Like tracker

The following features are not found in every Bluetooth dongle. And according to the experience of testing several Chinese models, it is worth noting that in the majority of even advanced smart trackers, software is not brought to mind and is constantly buggy, crashes and gives an error. The Ready for Sky application, at the same time, is quite stable, and it also supports many languages ​​(including Russian). In the case of Chinese models, you will be lucky if the management program is at least in English, otherwise you will have to decipher the hieroglyphs or understand it by typing.


The smart tracker REDMOND SkyTracker differs from Bluetooth keyfobs by using it as a tracker. On the smartphone screen in the Ready for Sky application, something like a “radar” is displayed, showing the distance to the device. This radar works based on the strength of the Bluetooth signal. Only distance is displayed, but not direction. That is, the search tracker is similar to the children's game "hot-cold." The tracker function is useful for finding, for example, cars in a large parking lot. If you come to a mall on a weekend on a “perceptible” car like silver Hyundai Solaris or silver Lada Granta, after 2-3 hours of exhausting shopping it’s hard to find your car among one thousand. And here REDMOND SkyTracker will help you choose the right direction - the application will indicate how far or close you are to the smart tracker and, accordingly, to your car.


Another option for using the REDMOND smart tracker to search for lost / abandoned things is detection by location. By clicking the button with the familiar icon from the Google Maps interface, you can see the exact coordinates of the place where the Bluetooth connection between your smartphone and the tracker was broken. “Where did I leave my travel bag, at home or in the office?” Yeah, at home! "


The function of "anti-loss" (it is also "anti-theft") - the ability to configure the key fob to alert you about the start of movement. The notification comes on the smartphone and is accompanied by a loud signal, something like a steamship beep. Skip again hard. You left a suitcase near the bench in the waiting room, and you yourself went to buy mineral water in the machine. Hear the beep - it means that someone decided to drag off your suitcase (or just kicked it).

In addition, the tracker in the motion alert mode is useful when using over the Internet. REDMOND SkyTracker can be thrown into an envelope with a stash from a wife, put in a box of chocolates that children can not take, or attached to the door of the refrigerator, which can not be opened on a dieter. And as soon as someone “disturbs” the caches, you will receive a notification on your smartphone and you will be able to promptly take educational measures.



Another “anti-loss” option is the notification when the REDMOND smart tracker left the Bluetooth coverage area (about 15 meters indoors, up to 50 meters in the fresh air). This is useful if your child or pet loves to run away while walking. Notice of loss of communication will remind you to be vigilant, and will force the scattered user to look around while the “fugitive” is still in sight. Again, when communicating via the Internet, you will receive a notification when the tracker leaves the location indicated by you. It’s not good to keep track of your loved ones, but if you’ve quietly put a light and small tracker in your jacket pocket or backpack, you’ll know for sure when your children go for a walk without asking. And safety comes first!

Bonuses

As a "bonus" in the smart online tracker REDMOND SkyTracker come with two additional features. The first is a thermometer. You can just quickly find out what the temperature is where you are. And according to the tracker’s testimony, you can understand whether your suitcase is warm (still in the station) or already in the cold (carried outside).

The second function is quite unexpected - when you press the button on the case of the REDMOND SkyTracker, it releases the shutter of the smartphone's camera. That is, he can replace the selfie stick. This is useful if you want to take a picture of the whole family. In addition, pressing the button on the tracker will allow you to quietly remove something to your phone. For example, if you met something in the subway car, as in the photo below, but you don’t want to embarrass anyone and obviously shoot on the phone, you can press a button on the tracker and the phone will take a photo of everything. From the side it will be similar to the fact that you are reading something from the phone and at the same time switching songs on a small mp3 player.

In the dry residue

So why should you buy a Redmond SkyTracker smart tracker for 1,490 rubles, and not a Chinese Bluetooth keychain for 1,000 rubles? There are several reasons.

First, build quality and durability. REDMOND tracker is firmly assembled, high-quality reliable materials are used. Agree, dragging a peeled piece of plastic on the keys or bag is a dubious pleasure. Therefore, quality still plays an important role.

Secondly, the quality of the software. The Ready for Sky app is stable, works on most new devices (gadgets on iOS 8.0 and newer are supported, as well as Android 4.3 and newer), and it is highly localized. The software accompanying the Chinese charms, often buggy and crashes, may not be supported on new smartphones and, as a rule, comes only in Chinese.

Third, the functionality. Yes, some features that are in the REDMOND SkyTracker, are occasionally found among the Chinese. However, buying a Chinese gadget is always a lottery (especially in the case of cheap models), and in the case of a product of a major well-known brand, you can be sure that all the declared functions will work 100% correctly.

And finally: it is worth remembering that for REDMOND SkyTracker there is an official warranty and after-sales service in Russia. In the case of Redmond, all this is guaranteed by the law “On Consumer Protection”, and in the case of a Chinese online store, by the honest word of the seller. And even more about the tracker you can find on the site .