STM+ video baby monitors

ashaw512

I never had a video baby monitor, so I'm looking to buy one this time around. Sorry if this has been posted already, I tried to search and found nothing.

What are your favorites? Pros and cons.

glitterfish-2

FTM here, but I have a motorola one thats on wifi and I like seeing it from wherever I am from my phone.
I've been using it to check up on my dog for over a year!

chiquita928

I have a summer infant one that I can see from the app on my phone. It doesn't move remotely, and it doesn't let me talk back, but I like it. I'm actually not even sure I know where the official monitor for it is, since I always just use the app.

JmUDuuuukes 07

I like the foscam. It is a security camera and you can get it for like $70 on amazon deals. 
Pros:
-Accessible through free apps on our phone.
-I can have different logins for us, my inlaws, the babysitter, etc. So I can control when people can access- the grandparents loved being able to see our dd when she was sleeping, because they lived 12-15 hours away.
-I can secure it (secure WiFi for the house plus secure password on the unit, plus secure password for each user)
- it's easy to add new ones and see all in one app
- pan/tilt
- can both listen and talk though it
- can set it up as security cam when we're out of town- will send picture of any motion detected

Cons:
-can't take it with us when we don't know the WiFi owner
-no zoom
-sometimes the voice isn't clear when we talk, so it can sound choppy.

supermom83

I had the Summer Infant one. I got it 5.5 years ago so I am sure the technology has advanced greatly since then, but mine still works and I plan on using it with this baby. I loved it and highly recommend

Pros:
-It was in color
-You could zoom in and out and move the camera from side to side
-It was not linked to any wifi or network. This was a huge pro to me since I am a bit scared of having the camera hacked into. I've obviously scared myself by reading baby monitor hacking horror stories, so take my advice about hacking safety with a grain of salt or google and join me by scaring yourself too lol
-You could wall mount it for better visibility (though I think most can be)
-You can add another camera in another room an monitor two rooms at once if needed.
-Never experience reception issues and the battery life was great.

Cons:
-No phone app (though maybe more recent summer infant models have this feature available now)

satsumasandlemons

Ditto the foscam - it was awesome! 

This is time around we're going to get the nest indoor cam since we already have the nest in our house.

LuLiLaEv

We have a summer infant one. I wish I would've just gotten a double set to begin with cause now we'll need another one, we still use it for DD. And I'll have to carry around 2 monitors vs being able to have 1 and switch back and forth or have both screens up.

The wifi ones/app ones scare the crap outta me, with people hacking them and all. Ours is fine. Nothing fancy.

caribbeanmama-2

satsumasandlemons said:

Ditto the foscam - it was awesome! 

This is time around we're going to get the nest indoor cam since we already have the nest in our house.

After intensive research we bought the iBaby monitor M6 - I hate the thing -worst baby purchase ever!  If I could have a do-over I would have gotten a dedicated video monitor on its own network i.e. not over wifi. Baby never slept more than 20 minutes at a time and screamed loud enough to shatter glass, so turns out we didn't need it.  He also was in our room every night until a couple months ago, so we didn't rely on it.

Now, our house has the Nest: playroom, nursery, living room/kitchen.  I can see the baby anytime I'm away, which I like.  We will likely just get another Nest camera.

chiquita928

Maybe a stupid question...idk.
I caught a lot of shit for getting the baby monitor with WiFi because of the hacking scare (which didn't happen to us).  Isn't the Nest sort of the same thing?

Edited for clarity.

egm2015

Third vote for the Foscam. We had two, but I felt creepy bc we had one set to watch the nanny in the living room. I'm glad we have 2 now bc we can set the other one up in the new baby's room. Love the phone app....I even checked in when we were in Jamaica. Also love the night cam, very clear. Our friend that recommended it came over to set it up so that the IP address and passwords were protected to prevent the hacking business.

caribbeanmama-2

chiquita928 said:

Maybe a stupid question...idk.
I caught a lot of shit for getting the baby monitor with WiFi because of the hacking scare (which didn't happen to us).  Isn't the Nest sort of the same thing?

Edited for clarity.

Yes, the Nest is over wifi.  You have to take measures inasmuch as you can to keep your network secure.  There is still the risk of hacking either of your personal network or of the corporation itself (they keep your history), so if you are nervous, then a dedicated local video monitor is the way to go.  We have had multiple nannies in our home since I had my son.  So we are willing to take the risk and like being able to monitor our home and check in on the baby.  My husband watched our baby fall backwards and hit his head on the hardwood floors due to one nanny's negligence.  I drove home and fired her without choking her out.  (She did not tell me that he had had an accident.)

I'm more worried about the stupid voice/video activated Xbox my husband has our cable tv connected to.  I feel there is more of a risk or potential for misuse of your private information there.  There has been no nookie in the living room since installing the cameras though...  

born2runrn

We had a motorola one that crapped out after 5 months of use. Total POS. We bought an Infant Optics one and we love it. We can talk into it and it's so much more clear. We did not want a wifi one due to hacking risk. 

yellow1daisy

We have the infant optics dxr-8 and love it. I also did NOT want a wifi monitor just out of pure paranoia so that was a pro for me. I read a lot of the reviews on amazon and was pretty much sold. As PP mentioned you can also talk through it which is cool. You can also move the camera around and zoom and it is SUPER quiet so you won't wake your baby moving it around. 

chiquita928

caribbeanmama said:

chiquita928 said:

Maybe a stupid question...idk.
I caught a lot of shit for getting the baby monitor with WiFi because of the hacking scare (which didn't happen to us).  Isn't the Nest sort of the same thing?

Edited for clarity.

Yes, the Nest is over wifi.  You have to take measures inasmuch as you can to keep your network secure.  There is still the risk of hacking either of your personal network or of the corporation itself (they keep your history), so if you are nervous, then a dedicated local video monitor is the way to go.  We have had multiple nannies in our home since I had my son.  So we are willing to take the risk and like being able to monitor our home and check in on the baby.  My husband watched our baby fall backwards and hit his head on the hardwood floors due to one nanny's negligence.  I drove home and fired her without choking her out.  (She did not tell me that he had had an accident.)

I'm more worried about the stupid voice/video activated Xbox my husband has our cable tv connected to.  I feel there is more of a risk or potential for misuse of your private information there.  There has been no nookie in the living room since installing the cameras though...  

No, I'm not really concerned about the WiFi thing. That's why we got that one. I was more interested in checking on him than not. I was confused because you said you would have preferred a monitor that had its own network (not WiFi), but you would be using the Nest instead this time. I wanted to know if the Nest was somehow different.

rojita-2

We have the summer infant with wifi and we're initially drawn to it for the benefit of being able to see DS from an app on our phones. I love the monitor because it has great range (I've been able to mow the lawn, chat with neighbours on the street, etc and still get signal); the video is great as there is something reassuring in being able to see him; and you can zoom and move it around. The phone feature was honestly used most pre-baby when we watched in on our dog (like @GlitterFish) but i found it not very useful otherwise because we always had the monitor set up in his room so I'd only see him during his naps. The talking feature was also appealing but totally useless for us as it scared the crap out of our little man (still does). Like PP, in retrospect I kind of wish we had gotten a system that had multiple cameras with one monitor but all in all it was a good purchase for us.

caribbeanmama-2

chiquita928 said:

caribbeanmama said:

chiquita928 said:

Maybe a stupid question...idk.
I caught a lot of shit for getting the baby monitor with WiFi because of the hacking scare (which didn't happen to us).  Isn't the Nest sort of the same thing?

Edited for clarity.

Yes, the Nest is over wifi.  You have to take measures inasmuch as you can to keep your network secure.  There is still the risk of hacking either of your personal network or of the corporation itself (they keep your history), so if you are nervous, then a dedicated local video monitor is the way to go.  We have had multiple nannies in our home since I had my son.  So we are willing to take the risk and like being able to monitor our home and check in on the baby.  My husband watched our baby fall backwards and hit his head on the hardwood floors due to one nanny's negligence.  I drove home and fired her without choking her out.  (She did not tell me that he had had an accident.)

I'm more worried about the stupid voice/video activated Xbox my husband has our cable tv connected to.  I feel there is more of a risk or potential for misuse of your private information there.  There has been no nookie in the living room since installing the cameras though...  

No, I'm not really concerned about the WiFi thing. That's why we got that one. I was more interested in checking on him than not. I was confused because you said you would have preferred a monitor that had its own network (not WiFi), but you would be using the Nest instead this time. I wanted to know if the Nest was somehow different.

Sorry yes that is confusing.  We had so many network jamming issues with iBaby that I just wanted an independent monitor at the time.  That was before we got the Nest.  If it were up to me and we got one of those babies that sleep, then I would feel best about an independent video monitor since you would not have to worry about the wifi going out.  So, I would recommend that route before the more expensive Nest option for just a baby monitor.  (I have never had a problem with the Nest.)

chiquita928

@caribbeanmama Got it, thanks! I've been curious about the Nest for a while. We need to replace some smoke detectors, and I was think of theirs.

Mrs.EmmaLouise

We had the motorola one, I really liked it. The on/off button broke after 2 years (well, was difficult to use) so we just left it on all the time. It didn't connect to wifi, which I was concerned about with hacking, like others said. Also, I had a friend whose wifi one would sometimes pick up her neighbors monitor instead (creepy). The screen was bigger than the others on the market at the time. It had where I could talk to DD on it when she got older. And could play songs- which my DD liked to turned on for fun, but we never actually used. Oh, and it has a thermometer, which was nice because DD's room was upstairs and ours was downstairs and I always worried about her overheating. 

I just looked, they don't make that model anymore. But, you probably can't go wrong with any of the choices. 

Kelsey813

We have a nest camera and will just buy another camera for the next baby. I also put a regular sound monitor in there for next to my bed since the phone alerts didn't wake me up and DS wasn't a great sleeper/nursed a lot overnight as an infant 

dancegurl1118

We had a levana one. It was realitively cheap ($140) at target. Pan/tilt, night vision, can talk through it and zoom, option for multiple cameras. The charging port crapped out at a year but we loved it. Will look into these others if we don't end up getting another for this one! After it crapped out we just stopped using any monitor. 

morgarita

I have a Motorola one, maybe the one mrs.emmalouise is talking about. We got it as a gift from buybuybaby. Where you plug the charger in kept getting lose and wouldn't charge and we would have to take it back and exchange it. We've taken it back like 4 times, never had a problem exchanging it tho. We kept the box every time. But something to consider with Motorola, otherwise it was nice. 

abmommy15

We have both the Levana Astra and Levana Shiloh.  Astra is amazing with clear picture, huge range, great battery life.   only downside is the screen turns on each time baby makes a noise.  Not a big deal to me but if small light wakes you up it could be an issue.  I despise the Shiloh.  Range sucks, quality of video sucks but it has a temp sensor and a large screen.  
I stay away from the Wi-fi monitors because they can be hacked and that freaks me out.

chelseag-2

I have the Vtech one that was $100. It has a zoom function and you can talk into it and it gives you the temperature in the room and will tell you if it's too hot in the room. Battery last a long time and the only thing I wish it did was move around remotely. It doesn't have Wifi but I didn't want it for fear of hackers and what not..

Pricelessmommy3

We got a Motorola cam 5 Years ago and used with with my 3rd. We prob used it 4 years straight between my 2 younger ones and it never went out on us. 

The power cord  needed replacing but we contacted the manufacturer and they sent us a new one. I know now they are prob so much better and updated.
but I had a great experience with the Motorola brand.
It was about $200+ when we purchased it but we had our second boy so we didn't need to buy much else.