The reviewer has been compensated in the form of a Best Buy Gift Card and/or received the product/service at a reduced price or for free.
Last week, we had the chance to visit the Best Buy Tech Home at North Point Mall to see the latest in smart home technology that Best Buy has to offer. If you’re not familiar with it, the Tech Home is a home like environment set up inside North Point Mall, showcasing Best Buy’s smart home technology in a real life setting. It’s one thing to see smart tech in the store, but it’s another thing entirely to see it in action. I’m definitely a “try before you buy” type of person, so being able to tour the Tech Home with a Blue Shirt or Geek Squad agent and having everything pointed out and explained to me was a great experience.
One of the thing we loved the most throughout the house was the Samsung SmartThings technology, which seamlessly connects most of the devices in the Tech Home and let’s you control many of them through the Samsung SmartThings app.
It starts with the Samsung SmartThings Hub. This is the technological brain of your smart home, and it connects wirelessly with hundred of smart devices. This ranges from thermostats to outlets, from lights to locks, and more. Once you have the Samsung SmartThings Hub in your home, you can use the SmartThings app to monitor, control, and secure your home from just about anywhere. With the SmartThings app and the Samsung SmartThings Hub, you can add as many devices as you want in your smart home. Although it seems obvious that it works with Samsung brand devices, it also works with many other brands, such as Honeywell, Schlage, Yale, First alert, D-link, OSRAM LIGHTIFY, Leviton, Bose, Cree, and others.
While touring the Tech Home, one of the products compatible with the Samsung SmartThings Hub that we were introduced to is the Samsung SmartThings Water Leak Sensor. We recently had some trouble with our water heater, and since we didn’t have this sensor, we didn’t notice that anything was wrong until water was literally pooling on the floor. If we had placed this sensor near the water heater (or any other area prone to water leakage), we would’ve received an alert on our phone at the very first sign of excess moisture. A little leak can turn into a big headache pretty quickly, so being able to get an alert at the first sign of excess water would’ve made a big difference.
Luckily for us, Best Buy is now offering free In-Home consultation with an In-Home advisor in their Atlanta market. We can schedule a consultation and talk about our smart tech needs, and get expert advice. Then, Best Buy’s Geek Squad Agents can bring the smart home to OUR home by getting our tech connected and up and running. That means when we buy a sensor, we can get it installed without our lack of technical knowledge holding us back.
The Samsung SmartThings Water Leak Sensor is now on our smart home wish list, but that’s not the only thing. We’re also eyeing the Samsung SmartThings Multi-Purpose Sensor. This sensor lets you know if doors, windows, cabinets, or your garage are open or closed. You can receive an alert if your windows or doors are opened unexpectedly, and check whether the doors, windows, or garage are closed. This sensor can also detect vibration and temperature in your home.
Once, someone didn’t close the back door to our house very well. I don’t know. Someone must’ve been in a hurry. It could’ve been me. Imagine our surprise when we arrived home and our impenetrable slab of a back door had been pushed in by our excited dogs, who were playing outside? Our indoor cats were scattered around the neighborhood, terrified and puffed up, realizing they had made a bad decision by switching places with the dogs. Although we’ve never made that mistake again, keeping everything dead bolted down, the Samsung Smart Things Multi-Purpose Sensor could’ve saved us the headache of hunting down escapee cats by letting us know as soon as the door was unexpectedly opened. I’m sure it’s great for detecting burglaries too, since that’s the most common cause of unexpected door openings, but luckily we’ve never had that issue.
If you’re like us and want to step into the realm of smart homes, the easiest way to get started is by purchasing a Samsung SmartThings Home Monitoring Kit. This convenient kit contains the Hub, a motion sensor, 2 of my coveted Multi-purpose sensors, and a smart outlet. It’s got to be the easiest way to turn your home into a tech home! Once you have this kit, you can continue to customize your smart home by adding on devices from any of the Samsung SmartThings Hub compatible brands.
If you need a new smart phone to control your smart home through the SmartThings app, Samsung is also featuring some of their newer mobile products at the Best Buy Tech Home. Just about every employee working there had the Samsung Galaxy Note7, which is the perfect place to control your smart home while on the go. The Samsung Galaxy Note7 features the S pen, which lets you write, draw, and record your thoughts so you can get more done. It also has room for a microSD card to expand your storage, which means no more deleting priceless family photos to download the SmartThings app. You know what I mean. You’ve seen that “storage almost full” bubble pop up at the worst possible time.
If you’re ready to visit the Tech Home at North Point Mall and see the smart home technology for yourself, you’re in luck. There are two sweepstake opportunities happening at the North Point Mall Tech Home! Visit and learn how to win a $10,000 Best Buy gift card, a Samsung SmartThings Smart Home Collection, a Samsung Dream Kitchen, a Samsung 55″ SUHD 4K TV, and more. If you’re one of the first 250 at the Tech Home each day between 9/27 and 10/14, you could also win one of many prizes made with Qualcomm technologies, such as Samsung Gear S2 , Sonos Play:1 speakers, and more. You can find all the details here.
Are you ready to hit the Tech Home yet? What do you most want to see there?
Being able to interact with all these devices through one app is huge, I agree with you! It’ll be fun to see what they come out with next.
I absolutely love Best Buy and trust their techs very much. Its wonderful that they do a free consultation for your home. Its just amazing how much technology has improved just in the last decade. Next time I stop in Best Buy I will need to check this out.
Wow, that fridge is a must-have for us. Our family needs a bigger one than what we currently have.
I am drooling over the high tech fridge! When we buy our house, I am getting one for myself!
I have a ton of Samsung products that I love. I could have used the Samsung SmartThings Water Leak Sensor a few years ago. We had a flood while on vacation and had no idea.
This is so cool! It reminds me of what the Jetsons showed us the future would be like. 😉
I think I need to head over to Best Buy and see what I’m missing. These are all really interesting and worth checking out!
This is so awesome! I love how technology transforms every piece in our home! Genius!
These are interesting features. Is that a legit computer in that fridge? I’m so out of the loop.
I wanna know how I missed this event…oh maybe I was out of town. I live in Atlanta I wish I was here for this technological epicness and I love how the world is enhancing to technology more in the homes!
Do you think Best Buy will let me move in? Because I keep going through all the stuff I can’t live without there and it might just be easier to ditch this house.
Oh my gosh, so neat! My husband and I have been drooling over the fridge lol
That refrigerator looks amazing! I love that Best Buy offers all of these products.
It is mind boggling how far we’ve come in technology. I’d love to incorporate more “smart home” features into my home. How convenient it would make life!
We have been looking into ways to upgrade and improve our home. I love that Samsung makes the process easy and convenient.
I think a trip to Best Buy is in my future. I have a Samsung S5 and could use an upgrade.
Best Buy is a great store, I always find so many products that I’d love to have when I go there. I want to see the fridge. It looks really fun to use. I like that SmartThings Water Leak Sensor, that’s very helpful, we could have used that service a few months ago.
First, I love Best Buy. They have all the innovative brands. Second, what a great way for them to showcase how to put all of these great tech items throughout your home!
I am not surprised that all of this is from Samsung. Those guys know their tech!
That’s so cool! I can’t believe how far technology has come. This type of thing used to be a movie idea.
Although our rural home will never have this kind of technology, I enjoy learning what’s new. It’s exciting to see how innovative a smartphone can be.