Hands-on with the Tintag rechargeable item tracker
As part of our continuing coverage of the world of connected devices and of crowdsourced projects, I see a lot of item tracking devices. These are usually little Bluetooth tags that connect to something you want to keep track of - keys, backpacks, computers, cats, you name it - that work with an iPhone app to notify you when the tag is over a certain distance away or beep and flash when you want to find the item.
To date, most of the tracking tags have either required a replaceable battery, needed to be charged up via micro-USB every once in a while or simply stopped working once a non-replaceable battery ran out of juice. Now there's Tintag, an item tracker that recharges via a small wireless dock. Tintag is still seeking funding through Indiegogo, but is just about there with 93 percent of funding with over a month to go.
The Tintag team decided that the best way to get the word out about their product was to send out a prototype unit and beta app so that I could really get a feel for how it works. The charging base station and tag are obviously prototypes, with rough edges and none of the product markings we're accustomed to seeing on electronic devices, but Tintag has a lot more technical polish than some item trackers that are currently being sold.
The first thing you'll want to do with a Tintag is charge it. For this purpose, you take the tag - a little 1.5 x 1.1 x .24 inch (39 x 28 x 6 mm) rectangle - and drop it onto the 3-inch (76 mm) diameter charging dock. A series of white LEDs flash to let you know that the tag has been placed in the proper place, and then a red LED on the tag flashes to let you know that charging is underway.
Once Tintag is charged up and the app is loaded on your iPhone, you can begin to have fun with it! The app is surprisingly polished for a beta, and is one of the more well-designed tracker apps I've used. The app prompts you to pull down on a splash screen to add a Tintag, name the tag, and then add a photo of whatever it is that you're going to track - say, a backpack or a tool. Once that is done, the app displays a screen showing your Tintags.
Tap one of the Tintags, and the app begins searching for the device. The location is marked on a map (I found that the beta app had the wrong location by about a quarter mile), and there's an indication of the status of the device. If it's on the charging dock it will show that the battery's charging, and once it's off the dock you get an idea of the charge level in the battery.
The approximate distance to the tag is displayed as well, and there are app buttons to let you make the tag beep (it's quite quiet, like most tracking tags) or flash (it lights up a series of bright white LEDs around the exterior of the tag).
You can also define a safety range for your Tintag. In other words, if you're over a certain distance away, the app notifies you that you'd better go back and pick up whatever it is that you're tracking. That feature seemed a wee bit buggy in this beta software, but then again, it is a beta.
The battery life of the Tintag is about four months, after which you just drop the device on the dock again for a six-hour recharge. One very cool feature is that the Tintag can be attached to multiple phones, meaning that family members can all search for the same tags.
The developers of Tintag expect to send out 500 functional prototypes like the one I tested by November 2014, so beta testers (those who pledge US$65) won't have to wait long at all. From what I see from the prototype, Tintag is the item tracker you've been waiting for.
