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Tactically Inept

Home Security (IP cameras, NVR, sensors, etc.)


kuhla
Message added by kuhla,

This thread was created from posts split off from another thread.

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On 11/13/2020 at 1:28 PM, kuhla said:

product page - https://www.eufylife.com/products/variant/indoor-cam-2k/T84001W1

Saw somebody link this randomly talking about them as a possibly Wyze alternative. The feature that caught my eye was the local storage only is a feature so you don't have to upload to the cloud like Wyze requires. I'm not replacing anything yet but I will keep an eye on this.

I may have to start thinking up a plan to replace Wyze. The v2camera+ v1sensors+lights combo I have right now is working well but the future roadmap looks bad. Wyze is not selling the v1sensors at all anymore. The v2sensors they do sell now are only compatible with the new Sense Hub in the Wyze Home Monitoring Service which is a paid subscription service.

I think it is still easy to recommend a cheap Wyze cam v3 to people if that is the only thing they are buying.

I will be doing a bit more research into eufy and other available options.

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  • 1 month later...
On 11/13/2020 at 1:28 PM, kuhla said:

product page - https://www.eufylife.com/products/variant/indoor-cam-2k/T84001W1

Saw somebody link this randomly talking about them as a possibly Wyze alternative. The feature that caught my eye was the local storage only is a feature so you don't have to upload to the cloud like Wyze requires. I'm not replacing anything yet but I will keep an eye on this.

 

On 12/18/2020 at 10:13 AM, kuhla said:

I may have to start thinking up a plan to replace Wyze. The v2camera+ v1sensors+lights combo I have right now is working well but the future roadmap looks bad. Wyze is not selling the v1sensors at all anymore. The v2sensors they do sell now are only compatible with the new Sense Hub in the Wyze Home Monitoring Service which is a paid subscription service.

I think it is still easy to recommend a cheap Wyze cam v3 to people if that is the only thing they are buying.

I will be doing a bit more research into eufy and other available options.

So I am dipping my toes into this.

I have bought one camera and actually set it up at my mom's house replacing a very old Samsung IP camera. She will trial it for a week and I will see if it would be a good fit for me too. The key feature is that it supports geofencing out of the box for arm-and-disarm negating the need for a fixed schedule or manual changing of modes. This would be very close to feature parity to what I have current setup with my Wyze+IFTTT combo.

I have not made a decision yet and yes this would not integrate with my sensors+lights setup.

For my mom, if it's a good fit for her, I may invest her in the ecosystem along with outdoors camera and doorbell camera (to replace RING which she is not happy with).

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On 1/31/2021 at 5:16 PM, kuhla said:

I have bought one camera and actually set it up at my mom's house replacing a very old Samsung IP camera. She will trial it for a week and I will see if it would be a good fit for me too. The key feature is that it supports geofencing out of the box for arm-and-disarm negating the need for a fixed schedule or manual changing of modes.

....

I did not take people's complaints too seriously about geofencing being buggy on eufy's software but it is. It's not user error. Not sure where to go from here. May not return the camera for other reasons that may still make it useful but need to research what options there are.

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39 minutes ago, Jedi2155 said:

I haven't been following your IP camera needs, but based on your research you think the Eufy is still the best compromise of features/price for an IP camera? (Neighbor needs some)

Depends a lot on what he/she wants to do.

  • If he/she wants to do fancy automation stuff and use an Android platform, Wyze has the IFTTT option.
  • If he/she wants to do fancy automation stuff and use the iOS platform, Eufy has the HomeKit option.
  • They have a lot of feature parity if you are comparing the Eufy 2K indoor camera and Wyze's v3 camera (which is often out of stock).
  • If Eufy's geofencing worked reliably, I would be 100% recommending that option. I think geofencing is fantastic feature that carries a lot of value.
  • If he/she is going to invest in the wider ecosystem, Eufy does actually offer a lot more cameras, sensors, etc. than Wyze does.
  • The mobile apps for both of them are "good".
  • Eufy does allow you to keep a bit more of your data "off" of the cloud by supporting NAS/RSTP or sdcard storage.
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  • 2 weeks later...

Quick summary on my security camera research:

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  • You really want that PTZ don't you? It's only useful if you use it. I really question the value of paying a lot more for this feature.
  • You want higher resolutions recordings because you allocated so much data to it? Isn't this a chicken-and-egg scenario? If a camera image quality is poor then it doesn't matter if it's 1080p or 4k. That being said, I feel that shooting for higher than 1080p is fair but I think limiting yourself to 4k could be a mistake.
  • I would be careful with the field of view. The Reolink RLC-410 you linked states it is only 80 degrees. Reolink has a relatively easy to read comparison page: https://reolink.com/comparison/#poe  the RLC-811A looks nice with color night vision.
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10 hours ago, kuhla said:
  • You really want that PTZ don't you? It's only useful if you use it. I really question the value of paying a lot more for this feature.
  • You want higher resolutions recordings because you allocated so much data to it? Isn't this a chicken-and-egg scenario? If a camera image quality is poor then it doesn't matter if it's 1080p or 4k. That being said, I feel that shooting for higher than 1080p is fair but I think limiting yourself to 4k could be a mistake.
  • I would be careful with the field of view. The Reolink RLC-410 you linked states it is only 80 degrees. Reolink has a relatively easy to read comparison page: https://reolink.com/comparison/#poe  the RLC-811A looks nice with color night vision.
  • PTZ: I'm aiming for PTZ because of the location of the outdoor camera does not cover my door entrance and I would set it to a "patrol" mode and hopefully there is some type of motion trigger in the software to allow it "follow" objects. I have not done appropriate research in this area yet.
  • I am not limiting myself to 4K, ultimately image quality is what matters which is why 2 the indoor cameras are 5 MP 1440p. More importantly the outdoor camera 4K matters more because its a type of "image zoom" while indoor I don't need to zoom.
  • FOV, I have not done any type of research here to see what area is actually needed to be covered....it'll be in a corner so optimally 80-110 degree would be sufficient.
  • I do not need optical zoom on the indoor cameras so these ones might be better but I haven't figured out the differences yet:

https://reolink.com/product/rlc-820a/

 

Based on your latest feedback, I think the 811A + 2x 820A or 822A would make sense.

image.png

 

My question is the 822A actually provide a wider FOV at 94 degrees, (with unneeded zoom capability?) That's worth $10 to me.

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Let me take a step back and ask this: What is the overall plan?

Event flow: (1) cameras are armed + you are not home ⮞ (2) motion is detected and you are alerted ⮞ (3) you check the alert to verify if it is a real problem ⮞ (4) you take action

  1. How are the cameras armed/disarmed? Almost every product nowadays supports setting a time based schedule and a manual arm/disarm. Both of those options are inflexible and the manual arm/disarm is prone to human error. This is why geofencing or some other automation based on my physical presence is a really big deal for me right now; to remove the human error.
  2. If you have not done it before, you will have to spend a few days tuning the motion alerts to avoid excessive false alarms which leads to alert fatigue (related to item 3). Motion zones, "sensitivity" setting, audio+video alerting or just video, etc.
  3. An alert has no value if no one looks at it. Do you generally check what you received when you get phone notifications?
  4. What are we talking about? Burglary? Most of that time those happen very fast. By the time you have checked the alert, gone out of the app, dialed 911, told them your address and asked for them to send someone, the thieves are half way done. At that point your video (assuming they didn't steal the NAS*) is possibly only useful to hand over to the police, insurance, neighbors, youtube, etc. Does that make the whole system worthless? No but just anticipate the best/worst case scenario in security event before you spend $500+ on a whole setup. If you cannot prevent the robbery would it be possibly better to spend the money on something else like cloud backups of your important data or a small safe, attached to the wall/floor for small valuables?

*Note: I think there is a decent chance they would not steal the NAS. The burglary videos I have seen show the thieves grabbing stuff they could carry. Laptops, game consoles, tools, tool boxes, firearms, jewelry, cash boxes, etc.

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  • 2 months later...
On 3/2/2021 at 9:29 AM, kuhla said:

Let me take a step back and ask this: What is the overall plan?

Event flow: (1) cameras are armed + you are not home ⮞ (2) motion is detected and you are alerted ⮞ (3) you check the alert to verify if it is a real problem ⮞ (4) you take action

  1. How are the cameras armed/disarmed? Almost every product nowadays supports setting a time based schedule and a manual arm/disarm. Both of those options are inflexible and the manual arm/disarm is prone to human error. This is why geofencing or some other automation based on my physical presence is a really big deal for me right now; to remove the human error.
  2. If you have not done it before, you will have to spend a few days tuning the motion alerts to avoid excessive false alarms which leads to alert fatigue (related to item 3). Motion zones, "sensitivity" setting, audio+video alerting or just video, etc.
  3. An alert has no value if no one looks at it. Do you generally check what you received when you get phone notifications?
  4. What are we talking about? Burglary? Most of that time those happen very fast. By the time you have checked the alert, gone out of the app, dialed 911, told them your address and asked for them to send someone, the thieves are half way done. At that point your video (assuming they didn't steal the NAS*) is possibly only useful to hand over to the police, insurance, neighbors, youtube, etc. Does that make the whole system worthless? No but just anticipate the best/worst case scenario in security event before you spend $500+ on a whole setup. If you cannot prevent the robbery would it be possibly better to spend the money on something else like cloud backups of your important data or a small safe, attached to the wall/floor for small valuables?

*Note: I think there is a decent chance they would not steal the NAS. The burglary videos I have seen show the thieves grabbing stuff they could carry. Laptops, game consoles, tools, tool boxes, firearms, jewelry, cash boxes, etc.

 

Honestly, I do not have a comprehensive security plan as I never valued security greatly as part of my mental energy. Its bad I know it, and I need to get better which is why I'm finally investing in such a system now. My security in the past was to always have someone home via roommates, but I'm not sure I would be able to rely on that still, that plus I believe I'm in a slightly greater risk neighborhood than before.

1. No idea about geofencing, something to investigate down the road. I'll be using the Synology's system with my own cloud, there won't be a 3rd party involved in storing my data.

2. I've adjusted motion zones for my doorbell camera but I'm sure the exterior cameras will catch much more. No idea on the settings until I get it.

3. I check all my notifications.

4. I have a home security system as well that will auto-dial a 1st responder upon an alert.

 

My original plan was 822A for indoor, and 811A for outdoor. I think I may just purchase the 2 822A's and mount them outdoors for now since the 811A is still out of stock. Get something up and running now rather than later.

https://reolink.com/us/product/rlc-822a/#video

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1 hour ago, Jedi2155 said:

3. I check all my notifications.

You are not worried about alert fatigue?

1 hour ago, Jedi2155 said:

4. I have a home security system as well that will auto-dial a 1st responder upon an alert.

I'm guessing it's connected with one of those private security companies for them to send someone to do a drive-by? I found an old LA Times article that states the LAPD reported their average response time of like 5-6 minutes for emergency calls (much longer for non-emergency). Thinking about some of the videos I have seen........

On 3/2/2021 at 9:29 AM, kuhla said:

*Note: I think there is a decent chance they would not steal the NAS. The burglary videos I have seen show the thieves grabbing stuff they could carry. Laptops, game consoles, tools, tool boxes, firearms, jewelry, cash boxes, etc.

.......by the time you receive the alert, recognize bad activity is occurring, make the call, somebody arrives at the house, the thieves are already gone. At that point the video is more valuable as evidence to provide to law enforcement and insurance. That brings me back to what I stated previously that if you cannot prevent the robbery would it possibly be better to spend the money on something else like cloud backups of your important data or a small safe, attached to the wall/floor for small valuables? Mitigation vs prevention.

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I've also asked myself if I have anything particularly valuable, and the question goes back to....do I? Besides my PC and raw data itself, I feel like most things are readily replaceable. I do not own anything non-technology that is particularly valuable other than my data, and I share that freely.

That being said, what i don't find tremendously valuable doesn't mean thieves don't find value (tons of stuff they'd take) especially since they're willing to saw a catalytic converter for $75, so my previously point is valid, but in terms of luxury goods, not particularly, and replaceability, is easy. I'd say the single most expensive thing I own that is not my car/house is my TV and that's pretty hard to move. I bring my laptops everywhere I go as well (and I've one before lol, and that was painful).

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have to give props to Reolink since I ordered from their website, it went on sale during prime day and I was able to get their customer service to refund me $30 price difference. It was even cheaper directly from Amazon so I ordered a 3rd RLC-822A (for $70) since I don't think I need the 5x zoom and flood light system, and 2 way audio in the back yard.  In retrospect I probably should have kept the 511A since I really want 2 way audio so I can speak to my dog while I'm away at work.

I just got the Blink $10 camera during Amazon Prime day and enjoying a simple camera in the mean time in my living room in the mean time. The 2 way audio is really fun to play with my dog with though. Too bad the Blink is pretty terrible in general.

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  • 2 months later...
On 9/1/2021 at 9:51 PM, kuhla said:

Not that it changes anything I am planning but I was a little surprised to see Wyze add geofencing in their latest update. I may experiment with it to replace IFTTT in the short-term.

Yeah so this feature is pilot (beta) for a reason. I already turned the geofencing rules off. Sometimes it triggered and sometimes it didn't. No pattern to it that I could figure out. Back to IFTTT for now.  Still laying ground work for Home Assistant project I mentioned earlier. Only a few more things to do.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 6/16/2021 at 5:32 PM, kuhla said:

This post is mainly as a note to myself.

Not so impressed with Eufy anymore.

 Reolink E1 Zoom + Home Assistant maybe
 
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Z841XYD/
https://reolink.com/product/e1-zoom/
https://www.home-assistant.io/ + https://www.home-assistant.io/getting-started/presence-detection/

Docker running.

Home assistant running.

Bought the E1 zoom. No cloud connectivity or reolink account needed for initial setup. Had a hard time getting it to join 5ghz until I went and found in their documentation that it does not support all 5ghz channels ( 1 , 2 ). Had to change my wifi settings for 5ghz to a fixed channel. Did not leave a good taste in my mouth. Once it is on the network, it runs a web console where you can modify settings.

Now I need to join the camera to home assistant (it's not one of the "officially" supported integrations) and then start experimenting with triggers.

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https://reolink.com/product/reolink-duo-poe/#compare

I have a FOV issue in my backyard where I can only cover half my yard and I have a very short throw. This camera seems to solve an issue in my backyard because someone could climb over my fence and come through the other side leaving a wide blind spot. Very interested in this model (POE version of course).

 

reolink-duo-duai-band-wifi-pc.png?v=1631

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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 3 months later...
On 12/18/2020 at 10:13 AM, kuhla said:

I may have to start thinking up a plan to replace Wyze.

......

I need to re-engage on this project. Wyze has announced that individuals who do not subscribe to one of their paid cam services will soon no longer get any cloud video storage. Only a still image from the motion alert. Any video recording of the event will just be locally on the sdcard or via RTSP to some network storage.

I do have home assistant running in docker but it's on the server which (already explained in other thread) is not something I want running all the time. Will research if I want to set it up a different way. They have a semi-dedicated device (runs off an rpi+board) but it's still months away and I'm not sure if I want that.

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