14 DAY TRIAL // The Internet of Things is on the mind of every large technology company, with the ultimate goal being to eventually connect every electronic in a home to the network, somehow.
You would think that a stove, and equivalent appliances, and by extension their owners would not get much use from this.
And yet GE-subsidiary FirstBuild begs to differ. They even created a cooktop that can connect to your smartphone, or rather allows your smartphone to connect to it.
The product is called Paragon, a rather grand name for something that is used to boil or fry stuff, but it's definitely catchy, if nothing else.
The Paragon cooktop
The appliance is not exactly round, but the surface area that you place the pots or pans on definitely is. Its diameter is 12 inches, or 30.5 cm.
It can reach a temperature of 500 °F / 260 °C, which should be sufficient for most recipes, especially since the technique is induction heating.
Traditional electric cooktops don't provide the same heat level all the time, since they constantly cycle the burner on and off to adjust heat level.
Induction heating truly keeps temperature at the same level, with a precision of within 1 degree Fahrenheit (half a degree Celsius).
It even monitors the temperature and employs a wireless sensor to send information to your smartphone via Bluetooth technology.
That means you can literally control it from your smartphone, whether it is an Android device or an Apple iPhone running iOS. The app gives you step-by-step recipe guides too (including burner temperature adjustments).
The sensor will last around three months without needing a recharge, then it needs to be connected to a PC or some other power source via microUSB.
If you don't want to use the phone for this, you can use the touch-based controls on the Paragon cooktop itself.
Availability
The Paragon cooktop is being crowdfunded at present, so you can find it on Indiegogo and FirstBuild. The funding goal has already been exceeded several times over, but you can still get an early bird deal for $149 / €132. The retail price will be of $249 / €220 when shipments start in December.
