Product review: Prime Pro Spy Camera Pen 720p Video Camera

This is a pretty neat spy camera. Don't expect the results to be as good as a digital SLR, but for taking video and sound in a covert manner it is quite good. In attached video you can see and hear snippets of my evening out with the pen in my pocket. The video the pen takes pretty good quality but since you can't tell exactly where you are pointing the framing is difficult. The video has quite a bit of shake because it is taken while the person is walking or moving. In addition for the ladies the pockets are often on the part of the chest that is not flat so the camera lens will be pointing a bit up rather than straight ahead. In my video I got a lot of ceiling shots. Carrying this pen in the purse might be another option that will work in some situations better than a shirt pocket. Attached video contains the video taken with camera in my shirt pocket, I did not hold the pen in my hand so this is a realistic example of what the video would look like if I wanted to take video in a covert manner.



After I fully charged the camera, I was able to take video for 40 minutes. It is a little difficult to tell if the camera working or not. I could tell it was recording because it got slightly warm. When it stopped recording it got cool so I knew it stopped recording. When I got home I found two video files with a total recording time of 39 minutes. It is also hard to tell when it is fully charged or how long it take for it to get fully charged. When I charge it the indicator light is red, but it continued glow red even overnight when I think it was already fully charged.



The camera has no controls, it operates by detecting motion. The only thing you can control is setting the date to the current date, and this is done by createing a text file which contains the current date. A sample copy of this text file is present on the micro SD card. Just edit it with any text editor and modify sample time to current time. Save the file. The name of the file us userconfig.txt.



This pen camera looks very similar to a normal pen and it even writes well. It has a very short ink canister because most of its body is the battery and the camera.



The camera lens is right above the clip. The clip has a nice mechanism which closes the lens when you don't want it to take pictures. Very thoughtful!



The charging port and the port for Micro SD are revealed when you take off the cap.



The status indicator is a small light on the opposite side from the camera lens. If you are carrying the pen with the camera out then the light is facing you so you know what the camera is doing. To start recording you need to do a short press on the button on top of the pen. Another short press turns it off. A long press while it is on puts into motion activation mode. Note that the instruction refer to the color of the light is amber, but to me it looks like light green light. Do not remove the micro sd card until the pen stops saving the file which is indicated by status light being off.



The camera produces either jpg photos (1280x1024) or AVI videos (1280x720). The camera is 8 mega pixels. It can take TF card up to 32G.



Finally, if something goes wrong it is nice to have an escape hatch. There is a reset to manufacturer's setting pin hole on the camera. I was able to reset the camera by pushing it with the back end of a needle.



Overall, a very good combination of stealth and video.



You can find it on Amazon by following this link.







AshopZones review ★★★★★

Product review: BUREI Men's Date Stainless Steel Multifunction Watch

BUREI watch is an attractive quartz movement watch. The movement is made by SEIKO, the styling is Swiss. It is classy and elegant. That watch is stainless steel with a black dial, silver numbers, and gold color hands.



The band can be adjusted for a large variety of wrists. What is super nice is that the package includes a tool that can be used to remove links from the band, no need to take the watch to the watch maker. The wrist band is 9.25", my husband has fairly slim wrists and we had to take out 2 links for a perfect fit. The tool worked perfectly and I captured how it works in the attached video. The most important thing is to look for embossed arrow on the back side of the band, this arrow indicates in what direction to push the pin. My husband says the band is extremely comfortable.



This watch is made in China but includes an English manual. The manual covers several watches so you need to match your dial to one in the photo to get the details on how to set various options.



The watch is water resistant to rain and splashing, but cannot be submerged into water.



Overall, this is a very attractive classy looking watch.

You can find it on Amazon by following this link.







AshopZones review ★★★★★

Product review: Bags for LessTM Jumbo Sports Duffel Bag on Wheels, 30"

This rolling duffel would have a been a very nice bag if the wheels did not fall off in transit. I saw that another reviewer had the same issue when he took this bag on a trip, so I guess I was lucky to get an early warning. If the wheels do come off I rather have them come off before I took the bag on a trip. This duffel is so large that it would have been super heavy to carry without wheels. It has built in straps but for me it would be uncomfortably heavy to carry as a backpack if it was jammed packed.



The canvas bag construction is very nice and the duffel bag itself is very large, it fits as much as a large suitcase, except it is built as a duffel bag with two large compartments one on top of another. Its dimensions are 30" W x 14" H x 15" D. However, the plastic that holds the wheels is very flimsy. One wheel totally came off in shipment and another one had cracked plastic and was hanging on by one sliver of plastic. You can see the bag itself and the breakage in the attached video.



I received this bag with a request for a fair and honest review. If you are looking for a large duffel on wheels this is not the one to get.



You can find it on Amazon by following this link.





AshopZones review ★☆☆☆☆

Product review: Wireless Motion Sensor Spotlight by Hallomall

I test each product I review for at least a couple of weeks before publishing a review. My opinion of this spotlight change after 10 dasy. Initially, I liked it because it is produces a good amount of light and I can aim it in many ways. However, in 10 days four "D" batteries ran out of juice. The spot light is motion activated and light sensitive so it only was turned on briefly every day. I have a similar spot light I purchased a few years ago and it goes on the same set of batteries for more than 6 months. Both spot lights were mounted near each other as I thought the new one might be a replacement for the old one. But I don't want to replace 4 "D" batteries once a week.



The light has waterproof rating of IP65, which means it can withstand rain but not submersion if water. It has all plastic construction.



The light produces a reasonable amount of light. The lux meter reading at a distance of 12 inches shows 220 lux. It produces good light but it is not as bright as a 60 fluorescent watt light. For comparison, a 60 watt fluorescent bulb at the same distance produces 1119 lux.



There are things about this spotlight that I like, but the battery life is a deal breaker.



You can find it on Amazon by following this link.





AshopZones review ★★☆☆☆



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Product review: VonShef Professional Fully Automatic Ice Cream Maker With Built-in Compressor

I enjoy making home made ice cream because I can control the ingredients and experiment with different flavors. My old ice cream maker required the bowl to be frozen for 8 hour prior to making the ice cream. This meant that I either had to dedicate it a permanent place in the freezer or never able to be totally spontaneous about making it. Having an ice cream maker with a built-in cooler totally solves this problem.



The ice cream maker is well built and easy to use. In addition to the main body it has only three parts (the bowl, the cover with a paddle, and the paddle motor). When it works it is quiet. You can hear it in the video, it is a little quieter than the dishwasher and a little louder than the refrigerator. The top of the unit has a digital display which shows the temperature (in Celsius) and the time remaining. If the ice cream is not hard enough after 60 minutes (which is the default) it is easy to add additional time.



When the ice cream maker is operating it has two modes: mixing and cooling, so every 10 minutes it stops mixing for 10 minutes. Once the ice cream maker is done it enters the extended cooling period when keeps the ice cream cool without mixing. This means you don't have to rush to remove the ice cream from the bowl as soon as it done mixing. The ice cream can be either served immediately or stored in the freezer in an air tight container.  It comes out softer than I like and I usually freeze it for a little bit of time to get it harder.



I am very pleased with it: great ice cream, easy to use, easy to clean.





You can find it on Amazon by following this link.







AshopZones review ★★★★★

Product review: Floor Robot Sweeping Robot Loomin A325

Who haven't dreamed of having a robot that does all the cleaning? I have. Loomin Robot is neat, does a nice job cleaning, but not perfect. It cleans fairly well but it was not able to handle all the challenges of my house.



Having a cleaning robot feels a bit like having a pet. Cute, does its own thing, sometimes does not behave perfectly. But you still like it. That's how I feel about my Loomin Robot.



Loomin Robot is 14" in diameter and 3" tall, which means if it cannot get into areas which are more narrow than 14". On auto-clean it meanders around the house in what seems like a random pattern (unless you select a mode where it does spot cleaning or edges). The first few times it cleaned I observed it very carefully. It got most of the dust but I did find some accessible to it areas which still had dusty spots after 1 hour progress check. Given enough time it does get those areas eventually. In a zig-zag mode it seems to cover more areas consistently. The edge mode is very good for getting dust from under the baseboards. Loomin Robot has long thin whiskers-like brushes (in addition to the regular brushes under the unit) that get things from corners very well. The spot cleaning mode works well for small areas. In the spot cleaning mode the cleaning stops as soon as it bumps into two obstacles.



The biggest problem I ran into is that I need to prep the house for the cleaning. It means I cannot just have Loomin Robot clean on a schedule (which it has a capability for) and forget it.



Why do I need to prep?



➀ I have hard wood floors with some area rugs. These area rugs have tussles (see video). Every single time Loomin went over the tussles it got trapped or the rug got trapped and dragged. I was able to easily disengage the brushes. However, I need to roll up my long runner and remove all small rugs (like the door mat) for Loomin Robot to clean without me needing to rescue it.



➁ I have a couple of leather chairs with metal bases. The metal bases are about 1 inch high. Loomin managed to climb into the metal base and clean within it (I was very impressed) but as it climbed in and out Loomin heavy metal body was hitting the floor and created small moonlike indentations on my oak floor. Unfortunately I did not notice them right away, so there are areas with small indentations around the base of my leather chairs.



Loomin comes with one virtual wall dome, which creates a 4 foot barrier which Loomin avoids, this way you can keep Loomin from entering certain rooms or keep it away from cleaning certain areas. I wish the package included several virtual walls. I could have used at least 3 of them: one to close off the room Loomin is cleaning and 2 to close off a corner I don't want Loomin to get into like the area with the leather chairs.



A couple of words about the virtual wall: It runs on two "C" batteries which are not included. The expected polarity of the batteries are specified on the cap. I have a house full of AA rechargeable batteries and I am happy to report that the virtual wall works fine with AA batteries in a "C" battery jacket. The virtual wall should be turned off when not in use otherwise it will use up the batteries quickly.



Loomin Robot is very easy to use. No assembly or set up is needed. All I had to do was hold down the charge button on remote and then turn on the unit. The remote immediately paired with the device. The remote allows me to turn the robot on and off as well as control its movements via a joystick like control. The remote runs on two AAA batteries which were not included. The home base re-charger plugs into the AC outlet with a pretty big adapter that takes up two slots. Loomin can do 2 hours of cleaning on one charge. If it can detect the charging station it will return to it on its own to recharge. It can locate the charging station from a few feet away, otherwise it continues to meander looking for it. Of course, if it is cleaning on another floor from the home base then it will just eventually stop.



The user manual included in the package is quite good, the instructions were clear and it has a lot of pictures.



Loomin Robot is definitely doing cleaning. I have been using it for 2 weeks now, each day I pick a room for the robot to clean and its dust pan gets filled up with dust every time. If Loomin has it that means it is not on the floor! I like it! Does it do a perfect job? No. In attached video I go over the area where Loomin Robot did spot cleaning with a swiffer cleaner and show the results. The swiffer did pick up some stuff left on the floor but visually it looked quite clean.



You can find it on Amazon by following this link.





AshopZones review ★★★★☆

Product review: AUSDOM Dash Cam Recorder, All-in-One Automobile Car DVR

We own a couple of dash cams and this one does pretty well compared to the others:



1) video quality - decent during the day day and during the night. You can see the video it took during the day in the sun and at night. The colors are a little bit washed in the sun, and at night the oncoming lights are slightly overexposed in order to capture video in the dark. Both are acceptable for a car dash cam, although I would not use it to capture a special occasion as I would want the colors captured better.

2) This camera has an excellent suction cup mount, stayed on even on rough roads.

3) The dash cam uses stands micro USB cables, the package includes two cables long (47") and longer (138").

4) The cam has an LED display so I can tell that the cam is aimed correctly, the displays does turn off while I am driving and so far I have not found an option that would allow it to stay on permanently.



Ausdom cam records video, GPS, and audio. It has an auto turn on/auto turn off feature. It turns on as soon as it gets power so you don't have to remember to turn it on. It can be turned off manually if desired.



This video recorder has many options: video quality, recording in a loop or stopping when disk is full, recording all the time or only when motion is detected, and so forth. The camera records full HD 1080p video, the clarity of the video is very good.



In attached video I show video of the Ausdom cam as well as the video recorded by the cam.



The Ausdom package includes the camera, two mini USB cables, and cigarette lighter USB adapter.



The user interface is straightforward and even though the manual does not contain details for each button and each option, it contains a picture where each button's function is labelled. I found the manual sufficient to configure my video cam. All defaults were very reasonable.



Overall, I was impressed with the camera and the video it captured.



You can find it on Amazon by following this link.







AshopZones review ★★★★★