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Dave Miller – Tech Enthusiast & Security Expert – November 17th, 2022
Lowe’s Companies, Inc.—often abbreviated to Lowe’s—offers home security equipment for home remodeling, is it worthwhile to invest in their Iris Home Security? They are the second-largest hardware retailer in the U.S. and have an extensive selection of products. They began supplying home security solutions as part of their line of smart home safe and secure kit that comes with everything you need to start protecting your house right now.
Homeowners may be able to protect their properties with Iris by Lowe’s when combined with round-the-clock monitoring, alarms, and the capability to alert emergency services when needed. However, are Lowe’s products still functional, given that a significant innovation emerged only a few years after the product’s introduction? Let me make it simple for you to avoid choosing home security products from Lowe’s.
Note: On March 31, 2019, Lowe’s shut down IRIS Home Security. Customers will no longer get charged for services rendered, can no longer purchase the product from their store, and receive payment for any purchased devices that can only be used with Iris by Lowe’s.
Read on to learn how they entered the home security market from the standpoint of smart home systems and then withdrew to maintain their focus on those systems.
One of the greatest home improvement businesses in the world right now, Lowe’s began as a small-town hardware store in North Carolina. Both then and now, they get dedicated to assisting pros, tenants, and homeowners in enhancing their residences and enterprises. With $96.3 billion in sales in 2021, the firm transacts with approximately 19 million customers weekly. Furthermore, Lowe’s Companies, Inc., a FORTUNE 100 firm, employs more than 1,745 home improvement stores across the country and serves almost 15 million people weekly.
Lowe’s also introduced Iris after seeing great success with every product they attempted to provide to customers. With a free basic level of service, it is the newest cloud-based smart home solution that enables homeowners to monitor and control their house from any location using a smartphone, tablet, or computer. Iris is a component of Lowe’s ongoing commitment to employing innovation to make home renovation simple for customers. The plans for Iris got first revealed at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2012. Users could access it through Lowes.com‘s website as well as 500 stores at first.
Iris by Lowe’s redesigns, which use Microsoft Azure cloud services, were aimed at their platform and hardware to enhance and expand their range of smart home products. Iris intended to revolutionize the game by providing clients with straightforward, cost-effective, and personalized solutions that make their homes safer, more effective, and tailored to their requirements, hobbies, and stage of life.
The Iris platform and Hub were created in collaboration with AlertMe, a British smart home technology startup. Lowe’s saw the potential to make cloud computing, broadband, and smartphone technologies work harder for consumers to provide creative solutions.
Thus, the U.K. smart home startup and this home improvement behemoth introduce goods for their planned smart home line. Their first available commercial items got introduced six months after they originally revealed their ambition to make sophisticated home controls accessible to anyone. So, when the Iris was released, it came in three packets.
Iris Safe & Secure: The entry-level kit allows homeowners to use motion and touch sensors to keep an eye on their homes while they are away. This way, if an alarm occurs at home, they will get notified through email, text, or phone calls. This package comes with their primary Iris Hub, motion sensors, a keypad, and other door and window sensors. The total cost of this equipment was $179.
Iris Comfort & Control: This kit is likewise $179, but it differs in that it combines home automation’s ease with the capacity to reduce energy expenses in the house. As a result, the Iris Hub package comes with a thermostat that has an easy-to-use interface and remote management of home settings via the Iris app. The customer receives a smart plug to view previous energy use data and remotely manage home appliances.
Iris Smart Kit: This kit integrates the characteristics of the two packages above into a single kit to provide a complete smart home solution. It costs $299 and also comes with a smart thermostat and a range extender.
Additionally, customers could add extra smart devices and sensors to suit their unique requirements. Since Lowe’s already has a large network of vendor partners, they are working to develop even more Iris-compatible products with them.
Modern home security systems offer powerful protection since most plans include expert monitoring, which notifies a distant station of any alterations to your system. Similar features described below were also available with the Iris Home Security when it was first released.
Customers of Iris home security got granted independence with no long-term commitment restrictions and a premium service for $9.99 per month. With this, you can focus elsewhere as you won’t need to check your phone.
Users of this premium service receive extra notifications for household events and have a unique function called Iris Magic. With pre-designed home modes and personalized home management rules, customers may program their homes using this function. It is easy for homeowners to control their homes when they move about the house at night or on vacation and want to turn on lights and other gadgets.
Since the Iris may get installed by the homeowner, who also receives a free basic level of monitoring service. As a result, this gets referred regarded as self-monitoring, as there is no monthly subscription. If you had chosen to receive them, you would receive SMS notifications as a homeowner whenever an alarm gets set off.
All the linked gadgets, including thermostats, locks, and cameras in the house, may be controlled remotely from a computer or smartphone.
Note: Self-monitoring is more affordable than paid monitoring. Because it involves the least amount of effort from the organization, it will be the least expensive plan tier. Additionally, your system won’t often be connected to your neighborhood police station if you’re self-monitoring. You won’t be hit with a hefty fine if your system triggers a false alert.
Since a strong app is required for every home security system to succeed; just for this, iOS and Android users may download the Iris app for free. Customers may also examine their homes online using the simple web user interface by logging in to manage their homes online through their website
As I previously informed you at the beginning of this post, Iris home security is no longer available since the manufacturer has discontinued selling it to businesses. The company made the statement after Lowe’s abortive attempt to sell up Iris in 2018 as part of a restructuring drive headed by new CEO Marvin Ellison. IRIS stood out from its rivals thanks to its user-friendly interface, task-driven rules engine, home automation, and security integration.
On the other hand, Iris got outfitted with all the necessary gadgets, including cameras, detectors, alarms, and more. Due to its relatively restricted environment, Lowe’s made it too difficult to add items that Lowe’s did not endorse.
Even though Lowe’s discontinued the IRIS smart hub service, if you had purchased one and completed the requirements, you may be eligible for reimbursement. The IRIS-enabled variants of the first Alert will still provide smoke and CO detection for your house, even if you do not qualify. The main change will be that you won’t get remote notifications since Lowe’s shuts down Iris Hub and doesn’t operate.
The models ZSMOKE & ZCOMBO will function as premium standalone battery-powered photoelectric smoke and CO alarms and cannot get disabled by Lowes or Iris. You also have additional choices for this outside the previous IRIS clients. If you wish to combine the ZSMOKE and ZCOMBO models with another kind of smart home hub, I would strongly advise you to consider the Ring Alarm Security Kit or SmartThings Hub.
Contact Lowes at 1-855-469-IRIS if you have any queries or worries regarding the IRIS shutdown.
Even yet, a growing number of individuals are attempting to incorporate home security as an extra layer of safety. But even after years, Lowe’s Iris Home Security was not up to par, lagged well behind its rivals, and ultimately ended. You can no longer purchase it, but it was a fantastic idea that may turn out differently and provide us with more possibilities.
IRIS got initially hosted on Apache Marathon. However, following the project’s end of life, the settings for Marathon got included in the open-source release. If you’re interested, you may learn more about the Arcus Smart Home project, which got designed to be compatible with IRIS products, by clicking here. Numerous parts of the code for this project’s unmodified original IRIS offering were usage barriers. And WLNet is currently providing a limited number of users with Arcus with a comparatively high level of availability.
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Dave Miller is an IT Consultant for Online Cloud Security and has over 7 years of experience in the Information Technology space. He also specializes in repairing laptops & computers. In his spare time, he loves to talk about new technologies and hosts monthly IT and Cyber Security meetings in the Houston area.
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Online Cloud Security is here to recommend you the most secure devices, from laptops to smartphones, we only want to provide you with products that we have tested and used ourselves for online security. Every product that we recommend is heavily inspected and tested for security against hackers, viruses, malware, and any other intruders that may want to steal your information.
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