CONCLUSION

   When TP-Link gave us the NC450 my eyes almost immediately fell onto its pan/tilt capability since it’s not something we see very often. This feature can be very handy if you’re away from home and you have to watch over a large room or your pets for example. During our tests we did experience a slight lag between the time we gave the “order” to pan/tilt and when it actually happened but not serious enough for us to consider it a significant drawback (still it’s there). Video quality is nothing special as you can certainly tell just by looking at our pictures and although for use via smartphone it will be “ok” for the majority of people we were expecting more. I don’t know why TP-Link is using such a low bitrate even via wired connection so I truly hope they will make it possible for people to increase it with a future firmware update. The 2 way communication feature works very well although I have to admit that I’d like to see a slightly higher output speaker than the one used. As for the wireless feature we didn’t spend much time testing it but from when we did I can’t say that we were impressed with signal quality even when just 2 rooms away (pretty much the same results as most Wi-Fi capable IP cameras in the market today).

   With a price tag currently set at USD89.99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and 90.89Euros inside the EU (Amazon.de) the NC450 HD Pan/Tilt Wi-Fi Camera is certainly not what we’d call expensive. The only question is whether or not it lives up to its price tag and we feel that it does. True it’s not aimed towards people looking for impressive video clarity but we really doubt that anyone looking for a 720p model would also be looking for that. Overall the NC450 offers more than one would expect from one such camera and that’s why it gets our Golden Award.

PROS

- Pan/Tilt (360/150 Degrees)
- Night Vision (26 Feet / 8 IR LEDs)
- 2 Way Audio
- Cloud Access
- Control Via Smartphone App / PC Software / Web Interface
- Wired And Wireless Use
- PoE Compatible
- Motion And Sound Detection
 

CONS

- Video Quality (Limited Bitrate)
- Pan/Tilt Command Lag