14 DAY TRIAL // Raising a child is no easy task, but modern technology has helped a lot in making this whole process a lot less stressful for parents, who can now keep an eye on their kid's whereabouts and behavior even while he/she sleeps, one of the latest solutions enabling such a level of functionality being the BabyVIEW Baby Monitor lineup from Samsung.
Although the Korean company is not exactly a traditional manufacturer of such surveillance solutions, they still have the technology and know-how to come up with such products, targeting a previously untapped market segment (ruled by companies such as Philips).
Anyway, back to the devices at hand, it's interesting to mention that they bring a whole new social media-enabled component to this family of products, since they enable parents to share audio and video of their baby or infant with friends and family via social networking web sites such as Facebook and Twitter using the built-in SD card (video is saved onto SD cards, then transferred to a computer connected to the Internet).
Beside the video recording capability, the BabyVIEW systems also feature night vision, two-way talk, sound and vibration alerts, remote nightligh and expandability up to four cameras.
The BabyVIEW line starts with the EZVIEW model, featuring a high resolution Samsung monitor with 2.4" screen, a temperature sensor and alarm, followed by the RemoteVIEW (that adds USB for remote view on Skype and MSN and remote lullaby functions) and the SmartVIEW model, that sports a 3.5-inch screen, Digital zoom and AV out for TV viewing.
The lineup is completed by the SecureVIEW model (adding USB for remote view on Skype and MSN and temperature sensor and alarm to the SmartVIEW) and, finally, the top-range BrilliantVIEW model, that, beside the features of the SecureVIEW model, also offers remote lullaby and a docking charging cradle.
The new BabyVIEW solutions will hit the shelves in Spring 2011, pricing being set in the $199 - $299 range, depending on the specific model.