Security Camera Suggestions

[enisthemenace]

Most of the cameras discussed here have IR LEDs that "light" things up so the camera works at night. The light isn't visible to us but makes the image quality good at night.

With the Arlos I have outside I do a combination. None are floodlights, but in some instances I use motion detected by the camera to turn on smart lights. For example the camera on the front of my garage turns on the lights on the front of the garage so there is light when we get home. The light in my back yard does that sometimes depending on the time of day etc. (I don't really want the neighbors complaining about my lights coming on and off every time a stray cat passes through). That all requires some kind of smart home system, but I mentioned it because the image quality seems fine at night with or with out the light.

One note I have heard is if you are planning to use IR/night vision the camera needs to be outside. If you try putting it on the inside of a window pointed outside the glare off the window will ruin the image. I thought about using some lower cost indoor cameras until I read that.

Great info. Thanks.

I want to catch these sons of ******* so bad...

 

[NickTheGreat]

I've suggested this before on here, but if you want more control over your system (and not have Amazon/Google watching your video feed), I'd suggest BlueIris. It's a roll your own type of system, so you can purchase nearly any brand camera you want and connect to it. The other upside is that if your internet is down, you don't lose anything, because it all resides internally.

https://blueirissoftware.com/

I'm about a year or slightly less into my Blue Iris setup. I'm a DIY type of guy, so this is right up my alley.

It's hard to explain why this type of setup is better than the Nest, Ring, etc types of cameras until you get into it. But my setup has HD video, locally hosted with no backdoor Chinese spy issues. I have a just a couple Wifi cameras, with the rest being wired.

 

[somecyguy]

I'm about a year or slightly less into my Blue Iris setup. I'm a DIY type of guy, so this is right up my alley.

It's hard to explain why this type of setup is better than the Nest, Ring, etc types of cameras until you get into it. But my setup has HD video, locally hosted with no backdoor Chinese spy issues. I have a just a couple Wifi cameras, with the rest being wired.

I'm about three years in with my setup. A mix of wifi and wired. I've already updated a couple of the cameras during that time. I use the scheduling feature a lot so I can place a couple cameras inside, but they don't do anything until overnight. That's come in handy a few times while busting my 12yo for sneaking down stairs in the middle of the night to watch TV. I'm still using version 4. The UI looks much nicer in the new version, I just haven't had the urge to go through the update process yet.

 

[twojman]

We flip houses and have dumpsters in our driveways...lets just say they fill up much faster than they should. I was looking to get some sort of camera system I could install to ID folks that do that and share with the police. I'd heard of Wyze from others. What are everyone's thoughts? Is there a way for cellular connection to my phone without subscription fees? I'd probably want to mount indoors to view the dumpsters.

Any ideas or advice?

 

[aeroclone]

I don't own them myself, but I have seen several videos from neighbors who own the Arlo cameras. The quality looks great and the owners seem happy with them.

 

[fsanford]

Avoid Vivent, too many issues

 

[iahawkhunter]

I'm about three years in with my setup. A mix of wifi and wired. I've already updated a couple of the cameras during that time. I use the scheduling feature a lot so I can place a couple cameras inside, but they don't do anything until overnight. That's come in handy a few times while busting my 12yo for sneaking down stairs in the middle of the night to watch TV. I'm still using version 4. The UI looks much nicer in the new version, I just haven't had the urge to go through the update process yet.

With BI can you set different recording retention policies between cameras? For example, save Camera 1 recordings for a week, but save Camera 2 recordings indefinitely? The Ubiquiti software only lets you set a single global policy, and I have a use-case that would benefit from a more-granular retention policy.

 

[Cydewayz]

I just got a system from Arlo and it works great. I have the Arlo Pro 2. I researched the others here and went with Arlo for a couple of reasons.

1) For up to 5 cameras and 7 days of cloud storage for recordings there is no monthly fee. I have four cameras set up and you can download the clips if you want them for more than 7 days, so that gave me everything I needed.

2) I recently set up a smart home system using SmartThings and the integration into that system is really good with Arlo. The other ones mentioned integrate as well, but the Arlo looked like the simplest to tie in for what I wanted.

Haven't had any issues with the cameras. They motion sense and have good night vision. Also a good wide angle view. Get notifications on my phone and can easily view from anywhere.

Note since they are tied into my SmartThings system I use that for turning cameras on/off and cycling through various modes. (For example the camera that I have inside the house I shut off when I'm home). The Arlo system has the ability to change modes like that, but I don't have experience with it since I have it integrated into SmartThings.

Concur.....i have Arlo and have liked them. I wanted no wires and ability to move around if needed. I've found the battery lasts for a long time (if not high traffic area that turns on/off all the time).

 

[2forISU]

We flip houses and have dumpsters in our driveways...lets just say they fill up much faster than they should. I was looking to get some sort of camera system I could install to ID folks that do that and share with the police. I'd heard of Wyze from others. What are everyone's thoughts? Is there a way for cellular connection to my phone without subscription fees? I'd probably want to mount indoors to view the dumpsters.

Any ideas or advice?

I can relate on many levels concerning dumpsters and people's **** just ending up in it or around it. We have used trail cameras to catch people and to be honest, the city could give 2 F's, so we just chained up our outdoor dog and problem solved. He loves being outdoors, we put his temporary dog house out there with water/food and problem solved.

We also had people stealing from our multi-unit properties while fixing them up, so we just tossed him in the units that we are working on and nobody has broken in.

 

[heitclone]

Are there any wireless options that don't use wi-fi,? We are limited with our internet choices and I'm afraid a camera would really bog us down. Do I have options? Am I overestimating the data needed?

 

[GrindingAway]

Concur.....i have Arlo and have liked them. I wanted no wires and ability to move around if needed. I've found the battery lasts for a long time (if not high traffic area that turns on/off all the time).

I've also noticed being outside in the cold drains the batteries much quicker. Still not bad. I get a couple months with decent traffic. The ones inside look the will last months. I don't know if the Ring doorbell would be comparable to the Ring camera battery, but that one I have to recharge pretty frequently.

For those looking to mount outside though do keep in mind batteries with where you mount them. Recharging every 6-8 weeks isn't bad unless that means climbing onto a roof with a ladder in the middle of winter. Note it is possible to wire them and I even saw a solar panel charging kit.

Are there any wireless options that don't use wi-fi,? We are limited with our internet choices and I'm afraid a camera would really bog us down. Do I have options? Am I overestimating the data needed?

How much data they use is really going to depend on the traffic. Arlo's website says on average is it records for 5 minutes a day it will be 850MB a month.

I am pretty sure the Arlo system can be set to not record to the cloud and you can record to a thumb drive instead. I haven't used it that way, but seems like I read it in the instructions. They also have a camera that can upload using 3G/4G and a data plan through Arlo. No idea the cost.

 

[Cydewayz]

I've also noticed being outside in the cold drains the batteries much quicker. Still not bad. I get a couple months with decent traffic. The ones inside look the will last months. I don't know if the Ring doorbell would be comparable to the Ring camera battery, but that one I have to recharge pretty frequently.

For those looking to mount outside though do keep in mind batteries with where you mount them. Recharging every 6-8 weeks isn't bad unless that means climbing onto a roof with a ladder in the middle of winter. Note it is possible to wire them and I even saw a solar panel charging kit.



How much data they use is really going to depend on the traffic. Arlo's website says on average is it records for 5 minutes a day it will be 850MB a month.

I am pretty sure the Arlo system can be set to not record to the cloud and you can record to a thumb drive instead. I haven't used it that way, but seems like I read it in the instructions. They also have a camera that can upload using 3G/4G and a data plan through Arlo. No idea the cost.

Great additional points....yeah, a door that we let the dog out often drains much quicker that one that gets less traffic, but like you said it's usually well over a month.

I too have seen those solar chargers (and I'm sure you could buy something on Amazon that would do the same thing) if the camera is a bit out of reach.

I bought some aftermarket mounts on amazon for my soffits that work great (screw in back of camera.....i was paranoid if someone would try to take one...this would give me more footage of them unscrewing it, lol) but also picked up a suction cup one (if I wanted to put in a window, etc).

Again, i've been pleased with the simple plug and play style, app/web access, notifications, and overall camera quality. I also didn't want to pay for a monthly service and the 7 day video window is enough for me (as you can download videos as needed) and I have a usb drive hooked up to my hub for more back up.

 

[FallOf81]

Are there any wireless options that don't use wi-fi,? We are limited with our internet choices and I'm afraid a camera would really bog us down. Do I have options? Am I overestimating the data needed?

THIS
We moved rural and don't have hard wired, ie Charter, etc. ADT rep. came to house awhile back and they WILL NOT install cameras with their system on homes that aren't hard wired. Have had issues with subscribers getting massive bills from their internet provider as the camera swallowed all the data, quickly. IE, 600-700 bucks worth of data in a month. Told us even a simple Ring doorbell could push us over data limit which is 200 something. We have AT&T Fixed Wireless Internet and really like it. Wicked fast. Thanks!!

 

[somecyguy]

With BI can you set different recording retention policies between cameras? For example, save Camera 1 recordings for a week, but save Camera 2 recordings indefinitely? The Ubiquiti software only lets you set a single global policy, and I have a use-case that would benefit from a more-granular retention policy.

I'm one version behind the current and I believe you can, but it's a little tedious. It involves configuring the backup settings to different folders each with its own retention policy. The current version may have a simpler way of handling it.

 

[MustardTiger]

I've been really interested in getting security cameras as well. My sister has Arlo and loves it.

While doing my "research" I came across a few instances where footage from Arlo was not admissible in court because there is no timestamp on the video (as is the case with most of these systems).

Does anyone know of a system that has an embedded timestamp on the video footage itself?

 

[MustardTiger]

I've been really interested in getting security cameras as well. My sister has Arlo and loves it.

While doing my "research" I came across a few instances where footage from Arlo was not admissible in court because there is no timestamp on the video (as is the case with most of these systems).

Does anyone know of a system that has an embedded timestamp on the video footage itself?

I literally answered my own question:

https://reolink.com/timestamp-on-cctv-camera-footage/

See the link for anyone that needs a better explanation for what i was talking about.

Edit: Has anyone used or know of anyone thats used reolink?

 

[Cy94]

Unpopular opinion. Avoid security cameras. We are becoming a surveillance state locking ourselves into a digital prison.

 

[nfrine]

Smith & Wesson makes some good security equipment...

 

[dosry5]

Unpopular opinion. Avoid security cameras. We are becoming a surveillance state locking ourselves into a digital prison.

 

[keepngoal]

Okay. I misspoke.
We have ring, not nest cams.

TIL that we can adjust the motion area. Which is great, as the highway 1/2 away, was getting picked up and sending alerts.

Our rural broadband is nearly unlimited and fast as hell. Not worried about data caps so I didn’t look into that.

so far so good.