$299 Mini Sim Cam Grown up security camera or $99 Levana baby monitor? You decide

Yesterday, View Systems, maker of grown up security devices for police and prisons introduced a particularly useful security camera called the Mini Sim Cam that sounds ideal as cheap night watchman particularly at a job site that has no electricity. I remember a “Flip this House” episode when the contractor kept having materials stolen at night so he just decided to sit in his truck with his flashlight until someone showed up. Comedy ensued. The new Mini Sim Cam would have been a more convenient alternative, but might not have been as much fun as chasing the criminals off the property. On the other hand your survival rate is higher.

The Mini Sim Cam for $299, has night vision and is activated by motion or body heat. This leaves me to question what kind of body heat motionlessly appears, but I am no professional in such matters. When activated it snaps a picture and - this is the cool part - sends an email or a text message to your phone to show you what is afoot. Cool huh? I have not found any other system that does this but I may have tried hard enough. While this will plug in, I find it particularly useful for the job site that does not yet have electricity or a storage shed, as it will run twelve hours on a battery. And you do not pay a service provider. You can even change camera settings via a text message. The company is targeting owners of the “one million vacation homes, over twenty million foreclosed houses and millions of storage spaces in the U.S.”

This reminds me of a story about a friend (who grew up in the Bronx so is particularly paranoid) that has a security camera in the living room. It went off one December and the alarm company ($30 a month) called to say something set off the alarm but they didn’t know what, because the camera only intermittently scanned. Turned out the Christmas tree fell over.

Now I have to say this camera sounded vaguely familiar, and aha it sounds an awful lot like the Levana LV-TW500 Digital Wireless baby monitor for $99.99 on Amazon. It also has night vision, but lets you watch video online on your internet connected computer. It can also be set to send you an email when it detects movement (or has lost power) but no text message. I guess because it is pretty dull watching a sleeping baby. It can also run on batteries so you can put it outdoors (playpen) but it is going to need a live internet connection thus electricity. But this is cheaper that the Mini Sim Cam if you do happen to be using it when you are on vacation and just want to keep an eye on the front door.

Alternatively, you could leave your computer running the web cam, and just check in once in a while. Or use the app iCam for $4.99 that will stream your webcam video straight to your iPhone/iPod Touch, and/or take still pictures of what it sees and can be set to record on motion. Just the right price for watching the dog while you are at work.