Wyze camera’s quite the deal @ $20.

I have 3 of these cameras, and they are good for the price. As others have pointed out, there are limitations, which are a big part of how they can be sold this cheap. These limitations can make them unsuitable for serious applications.

For me they have been great for keeping an eye on pets in and around the house, but using one as a front door camera has been problematic. First, trees and bushes in the area cause moving shadows when there is wind, which trigger the camera motion alert, so when it's windy I get alerts nearly every 5 minutes. The 12 second clips from these false triggers get uploaded, and then any real events in between get ignored. The other issue I have had is that I have the camera looking out a window adjacent to the door (to protect it from weather and theft/damage) and the infrared LEDs reflect off the glass back into the camera, essentially blinding it to the outside. As a partial work around I disabled the infrared LEDs, which of course means it can't see at night, except when the nearby motion sensing porchlight is triggered.
 
calmloki said:
Thrifty Iphone fans can repurpose old Iphones using
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/presence-video-security/id618598211?mt=8
Free app that doesn't do all Wyze does, but it did allow us to check in on our kitty while we were away.
Click to expand...


I have used this app a few times too while traveling, including with an older iPad, and it works pretty well. Tricky or marginal lighting causes more of a problem than with the Wyze, but that's probably more because of the camera in the device running it rather than the Presence app.
 
Cat-tirement said:
...For me they have been great for keeping an eye on pets in and around the house, but using one as a front door camera has been problematic. First, trees and bushes in the area cause moving shadows when there is wind, which trigger the camera motion alert, so when it's windy I get alerts nearly every 5 minutes. The 12 second clips from these false triggers get uploaded, and then any real events in between get ignored. The other issue I have had is that I have the camera looking out a window adjacent to the door (to protect it from weather and theft/damage) and the infrared LEDs reflect off the glass back into the camera, essentially blinding it to the outside. As a partial work around I disabled the infrared LEDs, which of course means it can't see at night, except when the nearby motion sensing porchlight is triggered.
Click to expand...

In the app settings, you can adjust the sensitivity of the motion detection and sound detection. I would recommend reducing the motion detection sensitivity until you are getting fewer false notifications. I also minimized false notifications by mounting the camera very high on the front porch looking down at the front door. So for the most part, it's not seeing trees and bushes moving around in the wind, just when someone walks up to the front door. And the sensitivity is set so it's not affected by shadows. The only false triggers I get are when the porch lights come on and go off automatically at dusk and dawn. It's also mounted too high to be stolen without a ladder. But yes, it's outside, although it is protected from most weather. So far, there have been no adverse effects from having it outside.
 
Amazon did have them at $19.xx before Christmas, and as a $5 add-on when buying an Echo Show or Spot. Though that was the first sale I noticed.
 
Retiree_Having_Fun said:
Could you verify the model #?

Read some reviews on Amazon - seems to be some issues with these cameras being security issues (snooping) with data being sent outside the USA. I would buy for pointing outside like mentioned above and don't really care if the Russians or Chinese can see my dog in the yard. Any concerns?
Click to expand...
It's not so much the video privacy, although that's something. If there is a flaw in the product that can be leveraged, it's the same as a bad guy being on your home network. That means they have access to your network shares and can pound on anything running on any computer on your network. It's the same as not having a router or firewall between you and the Internet. Has anyone looked up these cameras on shodan?
 
Cobra9777 said:
In the app settings, you can adjust the sensitivity of the motion detection and sound detection. I would recommend reducing the motion detection sensitivity until you are getting fewer false notifications. I also minimized false notifications by mounting the camera very high on the front porch looking down at the front door. So for the most part, it's not seeing trees and bushes moving around in the wind, just when someone walks up to the front door. And the sensitivity is set so it's not affected by shadows. The only false triggers I get are when the porch lights come on and go off automatically at dusk and dawn.
Click to expand...


I have fiddled with the sensitivity and detection area, and to get it to the point of eliminating most false triggers it also then misses many real events.

My consolation is that even if (when) the camera doesn’t give me notification of a real event because it fell within that 5 minute window following a false event, it’s still recorded to the SD card where I can go back and look for it if I suspect something happened. Better than nothing I suppose.
 
Can these cameras provide a live video stream or do they just do "snapshots"?

Thanks in advance

-gauss
 
gauss said:
Can these cameras provide a live video stream or do they just do "snapshots"?

Thanks in advance

-gauss
Click to expand...

Yes, they can do a live video stream with sound on the smartphone app. And it's Alexa-enabled, so if you have Fire TV, you can display the live stream on your TV with a simple voice command.
 
After reading this thread, we ordered Wyze v2 cam via Amazon and got it yesterday. We set up the camera on our living room window (tripod) facing our driveway. The picture quality is really good. We ordered an SD card too, but it's not here yet, so right now, we can just watch our driveway on my iPhone and DH's android tablet real time. Interestingly, there is a slight time lag on DH's tablet while my iPhone has none. (Anybody experienced the delay?)

Also, the night vision is very poor. It's better than having the night vision off (setting), but it's still poor. Reflection from the window glass is not helping the situation any. It's OK when the motion-sensored light outside kicks in. DH will have to adjust the motion-sensor just right for Wyze to be able to capture what we want it to capture.
 
Last edited:
I don't think IR LED's work well through glass. I have one security camera on which the IR lights failed, so I put that one pointing through a window. It works great during the day, and you can see cars going by at night, but not much else unless an outside light is on or a car pulls into the driveway with headlights on. It could show an area illuminated by a different IR camera, although I don't have it set up that way right now.
 
tmm99 said:
Also, the night vision is very poor. It's better than having the night vision off (setting), but it's still poor. Reflection from the window glass is not helping the situation any. It's OK when the motion-sensored light outside kicks in. DH will have to adjust the motion-sensor just right for Wyze to be able to capture what we want it to capture.
Click to expand...


We are using one of these cams as a “baby-cam” in the room where our young grandsons sleep when they stay with us. I find that the night vision is actually quite good.
 
rayinpenn said:
As I recall We turned the infra Red lights off
Click to expand...
By "the infra Red lights off", do you mean you changed the night setting to "off"? With the night setting "off", we can't see at all, and we can see a little better with the night setting "on". If you didn't mean that, how do you turn off the infrared light off?
 
tmm99 said:
By "the infra Red lights off", do you mean you changed the night setting to "off"? With the night setting "off", we can't see at all, and we can see a little better with the night setting "on". If you didn't mean that, how do you turn off the infrared light off?
Click to expand...


Yep IR or night is off ...it well works with our motion floodlight. Ill need to add one of those motion lights to the back of the house...

IR doesnt work behind glass
Last night another raccoon. ..
 
rayinpenn said:
Yep IR or night is off ...it well works with our motion floodlight. Ill need to add one of those motion lights to the back of the house...

IR doesnt work behind glass
Last night another raccoon. ..
Click to expand...

Or maybe you could put up an IR light that would turn on at night and be on all the time. Nobody would see it, but would be brighter than 4 leds on the camera.

I have no idea if these exist.
 
Sunset said:
Or maybe you could put up an IR light that would turn on at night and be on all the time. Nobody would see it, but would be brighter than 4 leds on the camera.

I have no idea if these exist.
Click to expand...

Appears that they do -- and cheap too if this is representative

Invisible Infrared Illuminator 940nm 48 LED IR Lights Lamp for CCTV Security Camera
Click to expand...
$8.11 USD + $1.50 shipping.
 
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