Broad Array of Home, Lifestyle Gadgets Showcased at New York Tech Events

Israel-based Vayyar Imaging launched its second electronic stud finder, the Walabot DIY Plus ($89), this month. The electronic handheld device uses RF signals to “see” into drywall and concrete walls to identify wooden studs, pipes, wires, and movement, Malcolm Berman, director-product and marketing, showed us. The device, which works with an Android app, connects to a smartphone via USB and maps patterns to indicate studs, wires and movement, such as mice and termites behind the wall, which are all represented graphically via the app. The original device showed objects as “red blobs” similar to radar on a weather map; the second-gen device uses more advanced processing and algorithms to identify objects as wood and metal studs, pipes and wires, Berman said.

Vayyar has extended the movement-sensing technology to a fall detection system, Walabot Home ($149, $5 monthly monitoring fee), a wall-mount device designed initially for bathrooms, where 80 percent of falls occur, Berman said. In the case of a fall, the two-way device calls an emergency contact the user can communicate with. The company is expanding the system to multiple device bundles geared to apartments and homes but hasn’t set pricing for hardware or multi-device monitoring fees, which will go up “in a modest way,” Berman said. Future system upgrades will offer pattern monitoring, which could show that an elderly parent hasn’t entered the bathroom for a certain time period, he said. The device works via RF signals only, with no camera, for privacy reasons.

Cool Runnings, which originally designed a “cooling cuff” to provide relief for overheated athletes during workouts, is using the same technology in a wristband marketed to menopausal women. The Kulkuf band ($199), developed by a retired physician and a biomechanical engineer, incorporates principles of the Peltier effect, using a thermoelectric unit with a geometrically optimized heat sink to regulate body temperature, said the company. Testing of 120 women with hot flash symptoms showed “complete resolution” of in less than a minute when turning on the band, CEO Elaine McShane told us.

Faucet company Moen showed a whole-home water monitoring and leak detection system ($499). The device sits on a home's main water supply line and can detect a leak “as small as a single drop of water” in a pipe behind a wall, from a sink left running or a leaking shower head, a spokesperson told us. The device, which detects water using a flowmeter and temperature and pressure sensors, runs a “pressure decay” test daily to monitor leak status, he said. An optional $5-per-month flow protection service shows via app the percentage of water usage by source: shower, sink or spigot, so homeowners can see where they can conserve, he said. They can get a 4-12 percent discount on homeowners’ insurance through some providers if they use the Moen system, he said.

Thirty-year-old OttLite launched an LED table lamp designed to bring natural daylight indoors through the company’s ClearSun technology, designed to approach the smooth balanced spectrum of natural light to help users be more alert and productive, Jessica Kremkau, vice president-marketing, told us. Most LED bulbs have a color rendering index of 83, but the OttLite delivers a 97 CRI vs. 100 for natural daylight, she said. The Shine ($49) has three color temperature settings, including a warmer setting for a more relaxed evening mode, Kremkau said. The Command ($79) adds voice control via Google Home. Both lamps include a Qi wireless charging receiver in the base.

Pocketalk showed its touchscreen language translator ($299, including two-year data SIM card). It works over mobile data networks or Wi-Fi to pull from the internet language processing technology from Google and others "to give the best translation," a spokeswoman told us. She positioned Pocketalk, with 74 languages, against the 40-language translator included with Google’s Pixel Buds earphones, saying, “While Google’s really great at translating English to Spanish, it’s not as good as translating certain dialects of Mandarin into English.” Pocketalk translates into voice and text, stores conversations and has a store-to-favorite feature for often-used phrases.

Mobile accessories company Gear Beast showed several Android and iPhone holders that frame a smartphone in lanyards users can wear around their necks ($8-$15) when skiing or taking a walk. Different versions are designed for phones based on positioning of a phone’s camera, Partner Jonathan Magasanik told us. Apple cameras are in an upper corner of the phone, while most Android cameras are positioned in the middle, he said. The company hasn’t found a solution for phones with a fingerprint sensor on the back, he said. Magasanik also showed thin wallets that attach to the back of phones to store ID and credit cards and include RFID blocking. The $10 device can be used as a stand.

Magasanik told us the company hadn’t been affected by the Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods “until last night,” referring to the Trump administration's May 10 hike of the List 3 tariffs to 25 percent. The company had been saved “by the last digit” in previous tariff codes: “They stopped at 0 and we end in 9,” he said. Gear Beast studied moving manufacturing to the U.S. to avoid tariff exposure, but "it would still be more expensive for us to manufacture here -- even with 25 percent,” he said. The company brought in a “significant amount of inventory” at the end of last year with hopes it would carry through a trade resolution, “but we just haven’t gotten there yet.”

Caavo added to its Control Center TV this month Sonos controls, parental monitoring tools, an app for TV control “from anywhere.” and it dropped the price of the set-top box from $99 to $59, a company spokeswoman told us. Using the TV interface, users can skip, pause and play music on a home’s Sonos speakers via the TV interface. The Telescope parental control feature provides a picture-in-picture view of what’s showing on TV in another room: an alert appears on that screen saying the screen is being shared, and the feature can be disabled in settings, she said. Users can set notifications triggered by certain events: viewing of an “R” rated movie or a report that an elderly parent’s TV hasn’t been turned on. Parents can send a message to a TV that it’s time for kids to go to bed using the app, she said. Service plans are $4 monthly, $40 per year and $130 lifetime.