CellGate Mobile Connect

Our HOA replaced a gate in this became the app we had to use. Don’t ask me why they chose it with a two star rating, but the company lives up to it stars. The app ghost-launches no matter what you’re doing on your phone even when nowhere near the gate nor wanting to use the app. It is very interruptive this way. Videotaping your kids volleyball game Cellgate is gonna get you. Trying to call 911 Cellgate is going to launch in the middle of your call. When you actually want to use the app, there are no less than four taps to get the gate to open, based on how many steps you have to get through before the gate (our HOA) then exit or entry, then something else, then open. We’ve basically come to launching our app more than 500 yards away from the gate to have it open by the time we get to the gate. Lately the app hasn’t been working well and gate Internet is down. The only thing I like about it is that I can let anyone and everyone through if I launch my app 1000 yards before I reach the gate so I do not have a line to wait on. I will open the gate repeatedly until I get to my turn. The other thing I like is I can do this remotely so if there’s a service person waiting at the gate, they don’t ever use the keypad. They just call me and I buzz them through. I’m sure the HOA loves me for it but then we love them for putting in a gate with a low star app.

For our home use it works OK. It is painfully slow to use. Every time you open the app, it want’s to go to the main menu and it takes a few seconds, then you can click the button to go to the gate and again it takes several seconds to display the next menu where you can trigger the gate. This happens every time you open the app or even if you switch apps for a second you have to go through the whole painfully slow process. This is so annoying that we ended up getting another gate trigger to open the gate with a remote from our cars and use the gatecell device only for guests. I don’t know why the app has this behavior, perhaps it is authenticating with their cloud service every time you use the app and this is extremely slow. If for whatever reason the app switches from wifi to Celular then the app just sits there thinking for a long time, usually several minutes so the best is to kill it and open it again or like we did just buy a remote. Overall, the app works well for home use, it is just super slow.

I have installed several Cellgate systems for both multi family and single family applications. This is a very simple to use and functional entry system which allows the user a lot of flexibility in obtaining information regarding usage. The system is perfectly capable of telling the user whether the gate is open if magnetic sensors are installed on the gate. This works good on slide gates but due to movement of swing gates by the wind, the system will show the gate being open when it is closed. This is not the fault of the Cellgate system but a function of slop in the gate hinges and gate operator connections. The app is easy to use and easy to understand. The photo of the person at the gate is crisp and clear and comes to the user's cell phone very promptly and allows clear voice communication. The ability to roll from one unanswered phone to several others is a very good feature. These units can be set up with standard 120 VAC or solar so they can be installed anywhere there is cellular service.