Performance:
The video performance of this camera is quite impressive, especially for its size. While its 130 degree FOV can’t quite match the D-Link DCS-2630 it is still very wide and allows you to catch most of what’s going on in just about any room. In the screen capture below you can see from the windows in the living room to about mid-way through the dining room. And it does so with no visual abnormalities and great resolution. Motion is always very smooth.
What is even more impressive is the night vision on this thing. Having only two LEDs I wasn’t expecting much, but this has some of the best night vision I have seen yet. While many manufacturers claim up to 25 feet this one actually delivers with super sharp images as you can see below.
What maybe even more stunning is how good the image looks with the IR source shut off. As you can see in the images below you get a little more noise but you can still see everything, this really is a very efficient lens. For comparison I also have screen caps from the D-Link DCS-2630 which has very good night vision, with IR source on and off.
The audio quality on this camera is also very good. I didn’t hear any background noise to speak of in live viewing or in the recordings. The mic was fairly sensitive, allowing me to hear a text alert on my wife’s phone about 40 feet down the hallway and in the bedroom. Two-way audio also worked well with both parties being easily heard and understood.
WiFi performance was also equally good. I appreciate the ability to place this on a 2.4GHz or 5GHz network depending on location. This device appeared to have similar signal strengths to other mobile devices independent of the frequency chosen. Because of this signal strength I was able to place this camera in any room of my average two-story home with similar results.
While there are no specs on the type of motion sensing used I suspect it is a PIR. I say this because the sensing appears to be very good and with relatively few false alarms. Typically the video based systems are OK during the day but as the picture noise increases with decreasing light you get a lot of false alarms. Also as mentioned earlier the camera can be set up to provide a tone when motion is detected. This is either a short beep or a long one. Some may question the usefulness of the beep but eventually this camera will end up in my garage with the long beep set. Sometimes we forget to close the garage door so having an audible alarm might help scare off people or the occasional bear that might wonder in. If you enable push notifications they are basically instant upon sensing motion. The only thing I don’t like about the push notifications is you can’t swipe them away. In order to close the notification I have to select it. This automatically opens the app to your push notifications folder, selecting the picture will open the viewer with a screen cap of what it saw and give you the ability to playback the clip. In the end I shut this off because a typical day yielded dozens of alerts between my wife and son. One thing missing is the ability to create motion zones.
This camera offers both cloud and local recording. Cloud recording is optional and costs $5.99/mo or $59.99/yr for 7 day back up, and $10.99/mo or $109.99/yr for 30 day. This is pretty pricey and about double the fee charged by Ring. But you can also use the included microSD card to record locally or swap it out for a larger one (up to 128GB) if you need more back up. What you can’t do is record directly to your NAS or other network device. That is a bummer for sure. But if you want to review your clips this app is among the easiest to use. Simply tapping the Video History icon on the bottom of the app brings up a timeline bar. At the top you can jump through days and below that you can drag the red cursor to the time you’d like to playback. Once there, playback starts instantly. While it is playing you can grab screen caps or short videos of what you see which can later be viewed under My Album. I just wish there was a way to directly download each motion clip to your mobile device. Also there appears to be a little bug in the system. When you go to My Album it reports the space available as 0.3GB, this was the same amount free just after I initialized the card so I don’t think this reports properly.
EZVIZ is IFTTT compatible and allows you to link some other devices to their cameras. For instance you can have it change your Nest temperature setting if it senses motion. You can also use Alexa to enter and exit sleep mode. But in my case I have the camera set to sleep when my phone arrives and wake when it leaves. This seems to work quite well and affords some privacy while I am home. That sais, when I mount this camera in my garage I will disable this feature as I always want it on.
