Never lose your keys (or phone) again with Chipolo<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p><a href='
http://www.imore.com/never-lose-your-keys-or-phone-again-chipolo' title="Never lose your keys (or phone) again with Chipolo"><img src='
http://www.imore.com/sites/imore.com/files/styles/large_wm_brw/public/field/image/2015/01/chipolo-accessory-spotlight-hero-iphone-6.jpg?itok=9rt269xp' />[/url]</p> <p>As my friends, family, and boyfriend would likely tell you if you asked, I'm bad about keeping track of things. I frequently lose my keys, my phone, my iPad, my wallet, and my bag — all within the small confines of my 400 sq ft studio. (I've got a lot of stuff, okay?)</p> <p>As such, when I first heard about Bluetooth LE trackers like
Tile, I was thrilled — but they all had fiddly bits and pieces that made my excitement wane. No way to replace the batteries. Tiny zones. I ended up resigning myself to the fact that the Tile was not, in fact, the droid I was looking for.</p> <p>
Chipolo, on the other hand, might just be the one.</p> <!--break--> <h2>Bitty little color finder</h2> <p>I learned about Chipolo at CES this year, and it delighted me in ways that Tile and other trackers simply hadn't. It's colorful and looks more like a sporty keychain than random technobob. It sports a replaceable watch battery. It has an auto-loss feature to alert you when you're accidentally leaving one of your items behind — and Quiet Zones to keep that feature from being annoying within your own house. And perhaps my favorite bit: if you've lost your iPhone but not your Chipolo, you can shake it and your iPhone will trill in return.</p> <p>I've been testing a Chipolo on my bag and keys for a few weeks, and I absolutely love it, though there are a few minor kinks in the system that could be better. The thing is dead-simple to pair after downloading the companion app on <a href="
https://itunes.apple.com/app/chipolo-nothing-is-lost/id651447811?mt=8&at=10l3Vy&ct=d_im" title="" rel="nofollow">iOS[/url],
Android, or
Windows Phone; just drop it atop your smartphone screen and let it get to work.</p> <p><a href='
http://www.imore.com/never-lose-your-keys-or-phone-again-chipolo' title="Never lose your keys (or phone) again with Chipolo"><img src='
http://www.imore.com/sites/imore.com/files/styles/large/public/field/image/2015/01/find-chipolo-photo.jpg?itok=drY5VaQG' />[/url]</p> <p>After it's paired, your app displays the name of your Chipolo, a button for making it ring, its current range, temperature sensor, and whether or not you're in a Quiet Zone. The temperature sensor is one of those little extras on the Chipolo that make me smile: It's certainly not the most accurate temperature gauge you'll find on a gadget — not by a long shot — but it absolutely helps when figuring out if you left an item indoors or outdoors.</p> <p><a href='
http://www.imore.com/never-lose-your-keys-or-phone-again-chipolo' title="Never lose your keys (or phone) again with Chipolo"><img src='
http://www.imore.com/sites/imore.com/files/styles/large/public/field/image/2015/01/blue-chipolo-states-screenshot-iphone-6.jpg?itok=xzSlt4C5' />[/url]</p> <p>In the weeks I've had the Chipolo, it never failed to ring when I tapped the button, though depending on the range between the two items, it may take a few seconds for the Bluetooth command to execute. Likewise, a hard shake of the Chipolo rings my phone almost instantly. (I appreciate that it requires a decent amount of force exerted to ping the phone, as the feature could otherwise quickly become annoying on something like a set of keys.)</p> <p>If there's one complaint to be made, it's that the 180-foot range sensor on the Chipolo doesn't always function like it should. If my keys and iPhone are on the bed, it shows full range; if my keys end up under the covers, that range signal decreases by two bubbles. In day-to-day use this wouldn't normally be a problem — save for the auto-loss feature: If you lose contact with the Chipolo completely, it starts to chirp. This happened to me a few times during my testing period until I installed a geofenced Quiet Zone over my apartment, which solved the problem; nevertheless, it's a disappointing quirk to an otherwise fantastic product.</p> <p>If your Chipolo senses it's lost, either by carelessness or quirk, it goes into Lost mode, providing you with a GPS snapshot of where the device was when your phone last had contact with it. Not as good as real GPS, but a nice place to start looking. You can also enable SOS mode, which lets anyone else with the Chipolo app installed pick up on its signal and give you a GPS update for easier searching. Once your phone's within range, the Chipolo app automatically displays a "Chipolo connected" screen.</p> <h2>A worthy little gadget</h2> <p>Even with the auto-loss software bugs, I love being able to quickly find my keys or my phone around the house, and I'm tempted to get a few more Chipolos for other important things I don't want to lose — my bookbag, for one.</p> <p>What about you folks? Do you have a Chipolo or other GPS locator device you adore, or do you prefer to find things the old-fashioned way? Let me know in the comments below.</p> <p>• Chipolo - $29 -
Buy Now</p> </div></div></div><div id="comment-wrapper-nid-29510"></div><img width='1' height='1' src='
http://tipb.com.feedsportal.com/c/33998/f/616881/s/42981acd/sc/4/mf.gif' border='0'/><br clear='all'/>
<a href="
http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/rc/1/rc.htm" rel="nofollow"><img src="
http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/rc/1/rc.img" border="0"/>[/url]
<a href="
http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/rc/2/rc.htm" rel="nofollow"><img src="
http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/rc/2/rc.img" border="0"/>[/url]
<a href="
http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/rc/3/rc.htm" rel="nofollow"><img src="
http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/rc/3/rc.img" border="0"/>[/url]
<img src="[url]http://da.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/a2.img" border="0"/>[/url]<img width="1" height="1" src="
http://pi.feedsportal.com/r/218610914988/u/49/f/616881/c/33998/s/42981acd/sc/4/a2t.img" border="0"/><img src="//feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~4/5tt6Wi1cFco" height="1" width="1" alt=""/>
Source:
Never lose your keys (or phone) again with Chipolo
