Traditional mechanical lock vs Smart electronic lock?
This is a time when we are abandoning physical mechanical locks and keys, and embracing biometric keys and electronic locks. But the revolution will obviously take most people to get used to, especially for those who are used to traditional lock-picking ways. First let’s agree on one thing: the mechanical keys are needed, but definitely the last thing that we want. An excellent option that we recommend here is the Elemake Keypad Deadbolt Smart Door lock, which could be the one that will cost you the least learning and adaptation costs for your journey into the age of electronic locks.
What’s Inside & Design
The size of the whole package is surprisingly small with a wide range of accessories inside to help users with any installation problems. All you need is to make sure every single part presented in the User manual is included. You can easily check them all from the Parts Illustrations and the Assembly Drawing on Page 3. The component pack includes an Outside Escutcheon with a Gasket, a mounting bracket, a bolt, a strike plate, 2 keys with suction cups for removing Key Hole Lid on the outside escutcheon, a Door position sensor, a WiFi-gate module, two more RF cards and a bunch of screws. The door lock offers two color variants – black and silver. Both of them are well-built and mainly made of solid zinc alloy.
The Trivex anti-aging touch panel of the outside Escutcheon is a wise design that prevents fading from exposure to sunlight and supports IP65 waterproofing. Since Trivex regularly tested their products for over 10 years, there is credit that the panel can serve outdoors for years without aging issues.
Easy Installation
But before buying the Smart Lock, let me make it clear: it fits most standard residential doors with 2-3/4’’ or 2-3/8’’ backset and thickness from 1-1/2″ to 1-7/8″, regardless of left or right opening. So basically, it fits all kinds of wooden and metal doors.
The assembly is pretty easy even for someone who never installed any door locks. And users even can click the link where they made a detailed installation video for guidance. The whole assembly was done under the guidance of the official video. The good news is that the video helped a lot and there’s no problem for a single adult to install the lock.
Just pay attention to the first step you make sure the backset of the bolt gets adjusted to fit the door (2-3/4’’ or 2-3/8’’).
To help you install the bolt in the correct direction, there is an ‘up’ mark on the bolt. Then turn the spindle of the outside escutcheon in the vertical position and put it through the backset and fit the door hole (2-1/8” diameter), where you also need to route the cord through the hole and go under the bolt. And connect it to one slot of the inside escutcheon, while the other is left for connection with the included door position sensor.
Then just attach the inside escutcheon in the right position and fix the escutcheons on both sides of the door.
4-in-1 Unlocking Experience
The 4-in-1 entry smart door lock supports passwords, RF cards, keyed, and Bluetooth remote access, which widely covers most scenarios and the customary access for different people. For those who are used to traditional keyed access or card access, there’re 2 metal keys and 2 RF cards included. For someone who likes keyless access, password entrance is a great option. Last but not least, internet remote access is the most flexible and smartest way that meets different scenarios, where all you need is a smartphone that connects with Bluetooth or just the internet.
To have remote internet operation, you can connect the smart lock with a separate WiFi-gate module, which actually is a smarter design to prolong the battery life of the smart lock than most other WiFi-built-in models. It can be placed at any location where it’s available for wireless connection with both a WiFi signal and the door lock. It’s easy to set up the phone operation thanks to the Smart Life App.
Download and install the App from App Store (iOS devices) or Play Store (Android devices), and follow the setup steps to add the wireless gateway and the door lock. You can add passwords, add and capture RF cards, directly tap to remote unlock, view unlocking records and monitor entrance, check the door state and battery life, and so on.
With the door position sensor, users can check if the door is closed and locked in the App along with an automatic locking feature that makes sure you keep the house or room safe. Before living with smart door locks, I often struggled with returning to reconfirm the door after leaving and being unsure if it was securely closed. Most of the time this was futile. But at that time, it had to be done for safety. Now the Elemake perfectly solved the problem that has been bothering me for a long time, and thankfully, saved much time for me.
Connect With Third-Party Voice Assistant
The smart door lock also supports third-party voice commands to unlock, such as Alexa and Google Assistant. For example, you can link the Smart Life with Alexa first, and move to the Alexa app to add the door lock and activate the ‘unlock by voice’ feature. Of course, for security, Alexa would also ask you to set up a voice code. Even though it’s really convenient, users should still use the voice unlock with caution. After all, the voice can be easily overheard.
Low Power & AA battery
All the electric components apply Low Power Consumption Design. As of the time this review was written, we’ve tested it for over a month and it has worked well without battery replacement. After we saw the official claim that the batteries can support the lock to run for over a year, no matter with the separate WiFi hub or not, I realized that our test looked ridiculous. The battery box loading 4 replaceable AA batteries is a smart design. It’s widely seen that chargeable batteries are applied on most electric products, but for a door lock, no one likes to wait for the charging time. Fortunately, replacing the batteries for the Elemake Door Lock takes no more than a minute.
Verdict
As a reviewer, I really like their user-friendly attitude and the detail they show on the smart lock. The lock is nice with decent built quality. And most importantly, it is super easy to install following the clear and straightforward installation video. The fact is that no paper user manual is as informative as a good assembly and setup video. Once it got ready to serve, managing the door would be much easier. The tiny complaint is that it would be perfect if it came with a handle regardless of left or right opening, aesthetically pleasing without having to buy an extra one. If you are interested in the Elemake smart door lock, the official website here will offer you more information like free shipping and warranty services.
