D-Link Komfy DKZ-201S Switch with Camera Review

TweakTown's Rating: 87%

The Bottom Line

D-Link's Komfy Switch and Camera is a great device for those wanting to monitor their home more closely without having the obvious camera hanging from the ceiling. On the flip side, the price is a stunner with an MSRP of $369.99, so you may want to start saving now.

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D-Link has seemingly doubled down on the internet of things over the past year, bringing to market an entire range of smart home solutions. These solutions range from switches to motion and water sensors and even include cameras. Adding to their rather impressive lineup is a new line of products that will be covered under the Komfy umbrella.

The introductory solution coming out of the Komfy product line is the DKZ-201S or in English, the Switch with Camera. This solution takes from many prior products D-Link has brought to market including its 130-degree wide-angle and Full HD lens. The Komfy can sense air quality, temperature, and humidity and alert you via push notifications. Cloud services are made available with an 8-day recording with the option for local recording via the microSD slot although the capacity tops out at 64GB.

Compatibility is rather narrow with this solution, as it is limited to iOS devices only with iOS 7 a minimum.

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Packaging for the Komfy Switch is quite inviting, to the right an image of the switch and camera can be seen, while below, the features are listed.

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The scope of delivery includes, for the most part, everything you should need to install. To the left, we have the instructions while the right shows the wall plate and switch cover.

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Wiring the Komfy Switch is pretty straight forward but if you live in a relatively old home, you may want to check your electrical wiring is up to par. With the Komfy Switch, you must have a ground or bare copper for it to work, so tube and knob need not apply.

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Above, we have the back of the switch with all of the wires laid out. The first thing I did notice was D-Link chose to use a rather solid 12AWG wire though they did choose aluminum over copper for this application.

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There is quite a bit going on, on the front of the switch. From the top down we have the Wi-Fi status light above the red setup button. To the right of those we have the gang selection switch and below that several IR LEDs. In the center, we have the 1080p lens with a bubble level to the left.

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Above, we have the large wall plate that will cover quite a bit around the actual switch and the switch plate itself.

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The application side of things is quite simple. After downloading and installing, we start by choosing which device we are setting up. A few questions later we have a working switch and camera.

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The landing menu includes options for viewing the camera, turning on the light along with alerts and scheduling the switch. At the bottom right there is a memoir feature that will show you a quick time-lapse video of the entire day.

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Swiping to the left will reveal the one click menu that allows you several presets for the switch along with one customizable.

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Above, we have a closer look at some customizations you can make with the Switch as well as setting up the microSD card.

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In the image above, I wanted to get an idea how well the air quality sensor worked, so I moved one tractor to the center and as you can see it registered quite quickly as "stifling". Also, the image above does have pretty solid quality, especially for a wireless only connection.

I'm quite impressed by the Komfy Camera and Switch in that it has been designed to replace two items, and it has seemingly done so quite easily. On the camera side of things, the 1080p 1/3" CMOS sensor can carry a solid image, and the IR LEDs allow for a rather decent 16ft of night vision coverage.

Build quality was quite good although I would like a more tactile feel to the switch and copper wire used over the aluminum, but alas, I'm just nitpicking at this point. The installation of the switch was quite simple and with the included instructions only took a few minutes, of course anytime you are working around electricity, you will want to turn off breakers/fuses or hire a qualified person.

On the performance side, we have both the app which surprisingly has limited the Komfy range to iOS only. In fact, you must have at least an iPhone 4s or iPad 2 with iOS 7 at the minimum, and it needs to have Bluetooth 4.0. That would seemingly leave out a large chunk of the market, but alas, the decision was made for a reason. The application is quite easy to use with three tabs that allow you to swipe between for navigation and controlling your Komfy devices.

Overall, the Komfy Switch and Camera packs a lot of technology including a 1080p camera, air quality, motion, sound and light sensors all of which operates on 5v DC, so the 110V AC coming into the switch has to be converted within this small package made to fit inside a 3 x 2 switch box and we know what that means.

The MSRP of the DKZ-201S comes in at a whopping $369.99 with a one-year warranty.

Tyler's Test System Specifications

• Motherboard: ASUS Z97-A - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• CPU: Intel Core i7 4770K - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• Memory: Patriot Viper 3 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 1600 - Buy from Amazon
• Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• Storage: Intel 730 480GB - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• Case: Corsair Obsidian 750D - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• Power Supply: Thermaltake Toughpower 750W - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
• OS: Microsoft Windows 10 - Buy from Amazon