Why such big difference in outdoor camera price?

Happy Hopping

Happy Hopping

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The cameras on ali, ebay, etc, might not have English firmware, or the latest firmware for that matter. Flashing English firmware can be problematic on some models.

The stuff on ali has essentially no warranty, if it dies after the return period, good luck.

I imagine Amazon's stuff has compatibility with their automation stuff, if that matters to you, for better or worse. Likewise, the ali cameras are compatible with their camera apps, if the app hasn't been abandoned. They may have backdoors as well, so best to keep them isolated from the internet and maybe the home network as well (I would do that with the amazon cameras also, if I got them)

Edit: oh, the ali product you linked is gone btw. Poof! :/
 
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I have this model from a few years ago works pretty good.
1710022674023.png
 
I got my sister in law Ampviz cameras to use to watch animals in the barn on the farm.. but I don’t think I would put one in the house. If someone manages to hack the camera there only exiting thing they could see is ole Nessie giving birth
 
I can buy the Blink,
Zepher said:
I have this model from a few years ago works pretty good.
View attachment 640588
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1) how many times you have to change the battery in a year?

2) are you still using the same set? i.e., it has already last you a few year?

3) and the battery that c/w the box is lithium 1.5V. Have you try simple rechargable at 1.2V? although I can buy rechargable at 1.5V now at ebay in the worst case scenario

4) where are all the video sent to? At the USB stick or does it has to send to your cellular phone? Can I have it only to go to my USB stick?
 
Happy Hopping said:
I can buy the Blink,

1) how many times you have to change the battery in a year?

2) are you still using the same set? i.e., it has already last you a few year?

3) and the battery that c/w the box is lithium 1.5V. Have you try simple rechargable at 1.2V? although I can buy rechargable at 1.5V now at ebay in the worst case scenario

4) where are all the video sent to? At the USB stick or does it has to send to your cellular phone? Can I have it only to go to my USB stick?
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I am still on the same set of batteries, it came with 8 AA Lithium batteries, each camera uses 2, so it comes with an extra set of batteries for the 2 cameras.
If you have a lot of traffic and the cameras get activated a lot, the battery will not last as long.
I have it save to a thumb drive attached to the Blink Sync Module. The other option is to subscribe to the service and the videos are uploaded to the cloud.
Depending on your environment, lithium batteries will be your only option as Alkaline and Nickel Metal Hydride batteries don't like the hot and cold, they will discharge faster. Also not sure if the cameras will work at 2.4 volts.

This is what mine looks like

 
I've had 4 of the Blink v3 cameras & 2x doorbells for over a year now, and they are still running just fine on the lithium batteries that came with them. They claim they will last 2 years under normal use, so we'll see how that goes...

I have my footage stored on a flash drive attached to the Sync module also, nottaproblemo....and I get an alert on my phone whenever motion is detected, which I can immediately see as a live view (with 2-way audio) or wait to look at later from the drive. And I have them conntected to a separate, hardware-based firewalled networking system from our other networks, with their own UPS & backup power supply, so security of the footage is not a concern IHO...

However, I won't and never, ever will buy a bag of fried dog poo from AliE, let alone anything else:)
 
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Depending on your environment, lithium batteries will be your only option as Alkaline and Nickel Metal Hydride batteries don't like the hot and cold, they will discharge faster. Also not sure if the cameras will work at 2.4 volts.
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Zepher, you mean 1.2V? anyhoo, I can get:

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006321191257.html?spm=a2g0o.productlist.main.3.729f5c05rypFD7&algo_pvid=a64f0ee3-6757-498a-9d02-67f40657711b&aem_p4p_detail=202403101834545197860267001500006105535&algo_exp_id=a64f0ee3-6757-498a-9d02-67f40657711b-1&pdp_npi=4@dis!CAD!28.46!10.53!!!148.77!55.04!@2103094f17101208944758934e6422!12000036751949919!sea!CA!702226845!&curPageLogUid=SXRlndklmdIs&utparam-url=scene:search|query_from:&search_p4p_id=202403101834545197860267001500006105535_2

these are Li Ion rechargeable
 
 
well, 1 way to reduce Li Ion batteries usage is to use them in the cold winter, and regular battery during the spring summer, fall months. Due to global warming, in the past few winters, there is very little cold temperature and snow in this neck of the wood.

1 quick other question: another friend just told me he's also using Blink from amazon, he said nigh time recording is not good. Have you ever look at any of your own night time recording? is the quality any good? or is it grainy?
 
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I have setup my Amazon Blink the other week and it works fine. Although I am surprise that bestbuy drop the price of 1 camera set from $130 or so to $60

A non-profit animal rescue organization, would also like me to do a free install for them. But the owner doesn't have a cellular phone that has a OS support by Blink, nor a Chrome notebook

https://support.blinkforhome.com/en_US/f-a-q/system-requirements

so I wonder, does she absolutely has to have a cellular phone AFTER the system is setup? Because once it's setup, if there were a break in, all she needs is to pull the flash drive out, and put it in her PC to view the camera footage. The cellular phone is only needed for the initial setup. Fro those who uses Blink, what do you think?
 
Happy Hopping said:
I have setup my Amazon Blink the other week and it works fine. Although I am surprise that bestbuy drop the price of 1 camera set from $130 or so to $60

A non-profit animal rescue organization, would also like me to do a free install for them. But the owner doesn't have a cellular phone that has a OS support by Blink, nor a Chrome notebook

https://support.blinkforhome.com/en_US/f-a-q/system-requirements

so I wonder, does she absolutely has to have a cellular phone AFTER the system is setup? Because once it's setup, if there were a break in, all she needs is to pull the flash drive out, and put it in her PC to view the camera footage. The cellular phone is only needed for the initial setup. Fro those who uses Blink, what do you think?
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I'm pretty sure you only need a phone to set up the cameras. You can pull the drive and read it in a computer if needed.
 
Zepher said:
it uses 2 batteries in series so 1.2 x 2 is 2.4 volts

you can try those Lithium Rechargeables, it says low temps and shows devices that are low drain so should they may be LSD type batteries.
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I know this is old, but do not use rechargeable lithiums. I tried it once and it killed a camera.
 
wizzi01 said:
I'm pretty sure you only need a phone to set up the cameras. You can pull the drive and read it in a computer if needed.
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that's what I thought. After I setup my own, I no longer need the Chrome book to view the setup. I can view the photo from the flash drive directly
 
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