Ring, the popular maker of video doorbells, has completely undermined the traditional security-monitoring business with its new Ring Protect DIY security and home automation system. The hub, featuring ZigBee, Z-Wave, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, on-board siren, 24-hour battery back-up and cellular radio, is cheap to begin with. A starter kit costs $199 for the Ring Protect Base Station, one keypad, one door/window sensor, one motion detector and a Z-Wave range extender.
But the crazy-cheap thing is the no-contract monitoring fee: $10 per month. Oh yeah, that includes 60-day video storage for an unlimited number of Ring cameras and video doorbells. Today, Ring charges $3 per month per camera for video storage, which is still cheap by industry standards.
No need to go crunch the numbers yourself. Ring has a nice little chart comparing their pricing with ADT, SimpliSafe and Comcast. There is no trickery in the numbers. They are legit.
Besides the pricing, there’s nothing all that interesting about Ring Protect, although I happen to like the look of the keypad.
The company is using Z-Wave for the keypad and security sensors, and we imagine it will integrate with other Z-Wave and ZigBee devices, including smoke and CO detectors, but we’re not sure if those would be monitored.
By the way, we don’t know yet who is doing the monitoring, and we can't tell you much about the app or home-automation integration at this time. We hope to have more details on the whole system shortly.
Ring Protect is expected to ship in November, with preorders now accepted at BestBuy.com, HomeDepot.com and Ring.com.
Ring Protect Prices
Ring Protect Security System – $199
- Base station
- Z-Wave keypad
- Z-Wave Door/window sensor (1)
- Z-Wave Motion sensor (1)
- Z-Wave extender (1)
Special Best Buy Kit – $300
- Base station
- Keypads (2)
- Door/window sensors (3)
- Motion sensors (2)
- Z-Wave extender (1)
Components
- Base station – $120
- Z-Wave keypad – $50
- Z-Wave door/window sensor – $20
- Z-Wave range extender – $25
- Z-Wave motion detector – $40
- Z-Wave motion detector (2-pack) – $60
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