Needing outdoor cams. Must be wireless but not necessarily battery powered. Will start with 2-3 cams but would like ability to add at least 1 more.
-Arlo isn’t an option due to the delay after motion sensing.
-I like the free cloud storage with Blink and that I can easily add indoor or outdoor. Cost per camera for this will come out to about $107 each, starting with 3.
-I’m seeing some options on amazon like Zmodo with 4 indoor and 4outdoor cameras, nvr with 1tb preinstaled hard drive, $259. This is 8 cameras for less than 3 Blink. Any reason not to do this?
-I don’t mind viewing cameras through a separate app. I have Yi indoor right now and have been happy with it.
Will any of these communicate with ST? I Was wondering if I could use motion sensor in the camera to trigger a light or something.
There is no delay with Arlo with motion sensing if you have them plugged in continuously-- however I’ve heard there is a delay with motion sensing if they are battery powered.
EDIT:: Forgot to mention a smart app called Arlopilot created by @SteveWhite which can change your Arlo mode from armed to disarmed or to any of your user created modes based on a switch in Smartthings or a presence sensor
Blink can integrate with SmartThings via ifttt a song fat as arming and disarming goes. I like my blink system. I have an XT in an area that can get wet and a regular camera under the front porch awning. Both work well. My biggest beef with Blink is that when it is recording you can’t view a live stream simultaneously.
Take a look at Sighthound Video. It will record cameras to a computer similar to a NVR. The advantages is that it tags motion on the fly, so you can record full-time but then go back an quickly just view motion events. You’ll still have the full-time recordings available if you want to view them. Sometimes motion is to far away to trigger detection, so it’s good to have everything.
I run it on a separate computer but you can run it on a computer you use for other things as well. I use a separate app to view cameras live. If you want remote access to the recordings as well, they have an app that will access your Sighthound recordings.
No clue, would be a question to ask Blink I suppose.
I also wonder about the future of Blink since Amazon has purchased both them and Ring. Ring has the better name recognition. My guess is they will take the great battery technology that Blink uses and add it to the Ring devices moving forward.
Basically what @marktheknife said. I just ran POE for my house and purchased outdoor 6 Hikvision POE 4mp cameras on Amazon for $100 each and one Amcrest for my playroom. I use Synology Surveillance Station as my software and I am very happy to this point.
In addition, I have a Blink in my garage which works very well for that area (I don’t have Ethernet in the Garage) and I have 3 Ring cameras (doorbell and 2 floodlight cams) for outside where running POE wasn’t easy to do.
Nothing beats the reliability and video quality of POE, but it’s more of an effort to setup/run the wiring. Ring has it’s obstacles in regards to video quality and missing a lot of motion events and Blink has software limitations such as mentioned above with recording/viewing and 30 second timeouts to conserve battery life.
It would be nice to have a single camera solution but it’s tough to find a one size fits all as each have their own strengths and weaknesses. None of them of course work with Actiontiles which is a bummer
Well I think the only thing I could do is plug it into a power supply on my porch/deck. I don’t think I could run an Ethernet cord from inside the house.
Check out Genius Vision, you can use any type of camera setup, wired or wireless. You do need a PC for it to work and the Community version is free. I have it setup on a PC with an external 4TB USB drive. Works very well.
I’ve been look at security cameras off and on for the past year, and there’s just too many options to try to keep track of. My wife would just like an easy system with 3-5 cameras with a decent app. I’d like ST notifications at the very least, and perhaps preroll for the motion detection. I have an old desktop computer that I might try to use with these cameras. One question I have is, if I use POE cameras, does each one have to be plugged into a router/switch? If I have 5 cameras, then I need 5 ethernet ports?
And I’ve seen cameras with A/V plugs…but how would I connect multiple cams of this type to a computer? I guess I’d need a breakout box in the middle? Any recommendations for this?
Yes. Since each camera receives both power and data through its Ethernet connection, each camera needs to be connected to a POE port on a switch that can provide that power.
That sounds like an analog camera. I’m sure there’s a way to connect those to a computer but why bother?
Agree with @marktheknfie, but just as a fyi, NVR devices can supply POE. So in this case the cameras would be cabled to and powered by the NVR. The NVR is then connected to the switch/router via a single ethernet cable.
So, I’m looking at the Foscam R4 2K and Amcrest UltraHD 2K. I know WiFi models are easier to set up, but I’m not against running Ethernet if the POE models would be more advantageous. Or are the wifi models also capable of POE?
Also, from what I’ve read, I’m assuming I can just connect these to my router for now, and perhaps get an NVR later. That said, can I use the Amcrest/Foscam app alongside the free software (Smart Vision, Blue Iris, etc), or must I choose between one or the other?
