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Need to add a video surveillance camera for home or office security but don't want to spend thousands of dollars? The Toucan Outdoor Security Camera might just fit the bill, with its 720p live streaming video, motion sensor notifications and extremely affordable price. It's also easy to set up, fitting into any light socket you have available, indoors or out.
Tech expert Dave Taylor of https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/ installed the Toucan Outdoor Security Camera on the light fixture just outside his front door and found the install surprisingly easy. The "Kona" software works well and the video quality is entirely acceptable. There are a few issues you'll want to know about before making a purchase decision, however...
Check the Toucan on Amazon: https://amzn.to/38DiIGf
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0:00
A security camera that'll retrofit on any exterior light? Let's check this out
0:05
Dave Taylor here and I'm standing outside my house because I'm looking at this
0:17
I just installed this. This is the Toucan outdoor security camera and it's actually two pieces
0:23
So I'm going to talk about the install and then I'm going to talk about the actual product and give you a quick demo
0:29
So it is actually in two pieces. There's a smart socket which you maybe can see in here and basically anywhere you have a light bulb
0:38
you simply take the bulb out, you put the smart socket in, you put the bulb back into the smart socket
0:45
Now that is controllable by the app but there's also a little USB wire and then that wire runs and you might be able to see it here
0:54
to the security camera that you can either mount below or adjacent or wherever it makes sense near the light
1:02
Then the only thing you have to do is leave the light on all the time and let the smart socket manage it
1:09
So let me show you how the install went because it was pretty darn easy
1:13
So first off here you can see here's everything in the box and then here's the second layer of the box and then here's the smart socket itself
1:22
Pretty straightforward. It can take up to a 40 watt bulb and then you can manage the whole thing from the Toucan app which works out great
1:31
because you can do things like set it up to automatically turn on at sunset and turn off at sunrise
1:37
or you can have it turn off at midnight but turn on anytime there's motion detected. So that's pretty cool
1:44
Now the bigger piece of this is the camera and the camera has a couple of different parts that you have to put together
1:50
Most notably there is a mounting plate and the mounting plate I went ahead and just glued on basically one of these faux stones that I have here on my front wall
2:01
using their 3M adhesive and then you just screw the camera onto that and you wind this wire inside as you can see here
2:13
so that you get it to be short enough to work for your situation and if you mount it directly underneath
2:19
you have a small little tube you can put over the wire to protect it. In my situation I didn't need it but that's basically it
2:27
There's a little sun visor if you need it. This is well recessed into my front porch so I don't have any direct sunlight on it
2:34
and let me tell you about the lens. So it's a 116 degree wide angle lens giving you 720p video
2:43
So this is 1280 by 720 and the system has motion sensor and alerts. So for example here's the alert that came on my phone
2:52
and when I tapped to see who it was, surprise, it was me coming back from a walk with my dog
2:59
But you can see it's really pretty clean looking video and you know is it super high resolution? Is it 4K? No
3:08
But what I really care about is the fact that I'll get a notification on motion and then I can immediately tap on my phone
3:15
and get to the video and see what the heck's going on. Super handy. Now in that situation it also has two-way voice so that's really cool
3:24
So I could literally be 10 miles away sitting at Starbucks working and get a notification someone's come to the door
3:30
and then I can say, can I help you? And it would all come out of here and I would see their response because it's a live data feed
3:37
Now how does it do that? It does that through Wi-Fi. It hooks up to your Wi-Fi network and then you control the whole thing inside the app
3:45
It's Android or iPhone app. Super easy to work with. You know all of these all basically look the same
3:52
In fact I was not sure whether this wasn't accidentally some other vendors but it's theirs and you know really straightforward
3:59
Now it has a very durable design. This works perfectly well. You know I don't know that this is a permanent install for the rest of the time I own this house
4:08
but for right now this works really well and I like having the notifications when someone walks up to my doorstep
4:14
And it's IP44 waterproof so there is a rainstorm happening behind the camera right now and if that rain were to hit horizontally
4:23
number one you'd see me get wet and say oh! But number two even if this thing gets wet or even if it gets super hot or super cold it's fine
4:31
This thing is rated from minus 40 Fahrenheit to 131 degrees Fahrenheit. That's a lot of temperature difference
4:39
So if it gets colder than minus 40 or hotter than 131 then presumably you have a problem but honestly presumably you would have other problems because it would be darn cold
4:49
Now one other thing it does have is it does have a hundred decibel siren that you can trigger right from the remote
4:55
I mean right from the app so that's pretty handy. Haven't tested it. Don't want my neighbors calling the police but that would be great right
5:02
If there's some bad guy at the door saying I know you're not in the house man I'm breaking in right now
5:07
Then it's like well let's make this really noisy while I'm calling the police
5:12
So one thing I will say is that it doesn't have any night vision or infrared or anything
5:18
So it turns out that that's okay if you have it hooked up with the light because then the light illuminates at nighttime right
5:26
So it illuminates the shot but if you want something where the light isn't going to trigger and you still want infrared because I don't know maybe you want to see the animals on your front porch or something
5:37
Then this isn't going to work for you. It doesn't have night vision and it also has a sort of goofy model of subscription
5:44
So you get a two hour window of video so in other words when this triggers it catches two and a half minutes
5:52
And then for the next two hours that's available through the app and I can watch it and then I can download up to three of those videos a month
6:03
Or I can pay for a five dollar a month subscription and I get a lot more flexibility, a lot more downloads, I get a lot more storage
6:10
But I got to say I really dislike these subscriptions. I feel like these companies sell these products and they should just give us all the features
6:19
I mean you know I've spent a hundred bucks or more multiple hundred dollars on security and surveillance systems
6:26
I don't want to be nickel and dimed for the rest of time. So I challenge all of these companies to step up and give us a better free service because it's not free
6:35
We just bought your product. So that's about all I have for the Toucan outdoor security camera
6:42
You've seen some demos. I showed you a little bit about how the install went. It was really fast
6:48
I think the biggest challenge with the install was actually figuring out how to get the camera onto the mount plate once I put the mount plate in the right place
6:56
That was oddly a little tricky. I'm not sure why. But you know again once you get that all figured out you're good
7:02
And it's really super easy. The app you know all paired perfectly. In fact I actually got the app to pair from the other side of my door
7:10
So that actually worked out well because I didn't want to stand out in the cold for all that time
7:14
So really the only thing we need to talk about is the price and this is pretty darn affordable
7:19
But before we get there I want to ask if you can subscribe to my channel. It really helps me for me to have subscribers
7:25
And it helps you because I'm obviously very honest and very straight with all my reviews
7:30
And that's a blessing here on YouTube and on the internet. So please click that subscribe button
7:35
Now one more thing before we go is I want to say I don't have an opportunity to run this for three to six months before I do the review
7:43
But check reviews on Amazon and other sites because a number of people have concerns about the longevity of this device
7:51
So that is something you want to take into account. I can't verify whether that's true or false
7:57
But just go and look at other reviews and see what they say. So having said all of that I like it. You know it was easy to install and I really think that they nailed the features
8:08
Other than that requirement for subscription to have a little more flexibility that feels a little lame
8:13
But generally speaking getting an instant notification when there's motion and then being able to immediately go to the video
8:20
And then being able to go live and talk to the person. All that off of this. Pretty sweet
8:26
Now this is the Toucan outdoor security camera and it is $102.99 at Amazon.com
8:35
So if you're looking for an easy relatively affordable way to add some more video security to your home
8:41
This is a definite option that you should be checking out. And with that I will catch you in my next video
9:05
Thanks for watching
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#Home Alarm & Security Systems