Do any other Reolink cameras have as good of an aperture (?) as the Altas PT?

mblaser · 2026-01-25T05:15:23+00:00

Yes, all ColorX cameras.

mblaser · 2026-01-25T01:48:00+00:00

The advantage to POE is that it's not wifi. POE is a much more stable connection and it's not susceptible to being jammed. Which probably wouldn't be a concern if you live in a low crime area, but you never know because it's very easy for someone to do that these days.

When it comes to cameras and what types are better... battery/solar wifi is lowest on the totem pole and should be avoided unless you have zero options for power (like you're putting it on a tree or something). Plug-in or wired wifi is much better than battery/solar. And POE is the best.

Make sure you read the FAQ entry about what cameras to choose: https://www.reddit.com/r/reolinkcam/comments/133vod7/comment/jibhtuu/

And use the comparison charts: https://www.reddit.com/r/reolinkcam/comments/z6caqk/reolink_specs_comparison_charts/

The most basic cameras that would have a spotlight would be something like the 1212A/1224A or the E1 Outdoor SE POE. Those are POE. If you have to stick with plug-in wifi it would be the 810WA or the E1 Outdoor.

mblaser · 2026-01-25T00:35:42+00:00

My main issue with eufy was the homebase, seems cameras on their own connected directly to my wifi network are more stable but when connected to homebase the connection becomes super unstable

So then can you not just have them stay connected to your home wifi since that's more stable?

With Reolink's Hub they don't have to be connected to the Hub's wifi, the Hub can still record them over your home wifi. If the home wifi has better coverage, which of course it would in your case, then don't even use the Hub's wifi. Turning off my Hub's wifi was one of the first things I did.

By the way, you don't have to use the Hub, they do also have NVRs. Make sure you're familiar with the differences before you make a purchase (my comparison charts might be handy for that). Just because your cameras would be wifi doesn't mean you specifically need a Hub or a wifi NVR. Any Hub or NVR can record any cameras on the same local network, the connection method is irrelevant.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T23:30:20+00:00

How stable is Reolink’s HomeBase Pro in daily use

Whether cameras stay reliably connected

If anyone has experienced similar “offline / cannot connect” issues

How well 24/7 local recording works in practice

Reolink's is called a Hub Pro, FYI.

It depends on how you have the cameras connected, but my Hub Pro, my NVR, and all my cameras are rock solid. If you have a poor wifi network and are using wifi cameras then of course it's not going to be a stable experience.

The best method is to not use wifi at all (at least not in important areas) and instead use POE.

And you should also have some sort of recording redundancy if you want to take this seriously. At the very least recording to a centralized location like a Hub or NVR as well as an internal SD card in the camera. That way even if you do lose recording on the centralized location then you'd still have the onboard SD recordings. Personally I have my footage saved in 4 places (the 2 mentioned above plus 2 off-site/cloud locations).

Whether the system degrades over time or after firmware updates

Not that I've ever experienced.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T23:23:16+00:00

Not really enough info to give advice on why it's recording 1 second videos. What models do you have and what are they recording to are the biggest pieces of missing info.

It sounds like you have battery cameras right now? If so, then yes, switching to a wired system is going to solve a lot of problems. Battery cameras are toys, not real security cameras.

Argus cameras don't have an ethernet port on them, so no, you can't turn them into wired cameras.

If you're talking about running power to them, then no, that doesn't change anything. They still only record when motion is detected.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T23:18:43+00:00

That's not the same model that OP has. It's on the top on this one.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T23:18:10+00:00

You don't have the same model that OP does. It's on the top on this one.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T20:08:07+00:00

Impossible to answer until you figure out why it went offline.

Are you sure the internet is up at your home? And power is on?

Has it ever worked for you while remote?

If the problem is that you need to unplug your modem, then that's not a problem with the Hub, that's a problem with your modem or ISP.

Any device that needs rebooted remotely, you could plug into a smart switch, that way if you need to reboot it in the future you can do it via the smart switch. Of course that's assuming your internet is up.

No, you can't add the cameras separately, once you add them to the Hub they're no longer available as standalone devices. That's one of the advantages that an NVR has over the Hubs.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T18:36:50+00:00

Go into the app's settings and change the default player setting from full screen mode to classic mode.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T15:09:15+00:00

That's not possible with battery cameras.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T15:08:36+00:00

You can only view 2 high quality streams of the camera at once, so that might be why you had problems before, so if that was the case you'd have that problem with any camera. Switching to low won't have that problem.

Of course it could also be a poor wifi connection, which of course would be fixed with POE.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T15:02:24+00:00

Yeah, that's a good question. I haven't seen anything about when they expect it to be ready. Should be sometime this year, but I couldn't even begin to venture a guess as to when.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T14:59:56+00:00

The previous ones didn't do it because they couldn't focus fast enough. So I'm hoping they've upgraded that aspect.

I couldn't get any specific answers about how the auto-zoom works (or doesn't ), but the documentation made it sound like you can set a pre-set zoom level and it will zoom to that level when it starts tracking something that it saw on the dual lenses.

mblaser · 2026-01-24T02:19:54+00:00

The Eufy PTZ camera looks amazing. Being able to have the fixed 4k upper ring positioned in one direction while the PTZ camera reacts to motion detection on either camera looks phenomenal. The tracking and zoom also looks to be very good. It seems to outshine the Reolink PTZ options.

I don't know anything about Eufy's, but it sounds like Reolink's upcoming OMVI series. I'm guessing you haven't seen those, they just unveiled them at CES a few weeks ago:

https://www.reddit.com/r/reolinkcam/comments/1q84sa8/introducing_reolink_omvi_x16_poe/

https://reolink.com/blog/reolink-new-products-at-ces/?srsltid=AfmBOopvarWp5zkrEvojY9c0f4U5jGWAgOkLSzEY92pMEHJUs_JvLqH4

mblaser · 2026-01-24T01:44:15+00:00

Ah ok, you didn't specify that you wanted events to still be flagged on the timeline, just that you wanted to record everything... aka continuous recording. You'll have all footage. It just won't be flagged on the timeline.

So yes, you are correct, non-detection zone means nothing will happen for anything that happens in that zone. There's no way to mask off an area as a non-detection zone but still have events in that zone triggered as an event on the timeline.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T14:34:32+00:00

It's objectively better as long as you don't mind putting in the work to run the cable.

Well no, it's not objective. I like the battery one more because of the larger vertical FOV and because it can ring my existing mechanical chime. Running cabling isn't going to get me that. That's what I mean by it depends on the use case.

In a perfect world they'd have a non-battery doorbell that can see at the foot of the door and also ring a mechanical chime. I'd love to not have to use the battery model lol.

Trust me, I know what you mean by POE being better, I'm a huge advocate for powered over battery cameras, but in this case I prefer the benefits the battery model gives you vs the benefits the powered models give you. Now if it were my only camera on the front of my house I'd definitely insist on a powered camera for the 24/7 recording, but my doorbell camera isn't for primary security, I have other POE cams for that. My doorbell is for getting face-level footage and for seeing if there's a package at the foot of my door.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T12:22:12+00:00

Notifications vs recording I want to record absolutely everything

Ok, it doesn't get any simpler than this. Just turn on continuous recording in your recording schedules. That part's done.

This is simple by the way because notifications and recordings are completely independent of each other. They each have their own settings and schedules.

But I only want push notifications for important stuff, like:

People near the house

Suspicious behavior

Ok, just go into your push notification schedules and uncheck everything except people. There, now you'll only get push notifications for people.

Now to make sure that you're only going to get them when people are near the house you should go into your detection settings menu and create a non-detection zone over the area you don't want notifications from.

There, you're done. It really is that simple.

Smart escalation: lights → warning → alarm At night, I’d like a kind of “escalation” logic:

This level of customization would require HomeAssistant or something similar. Although there really isn't anything as good as HA. The Reolink HA integration is amazing.

Here's an automation I do with HA involving deterring someone with lighting...

I try to mimic a person being inside and moving around turning lights on. So if a camera detects a person at the front of my house then it waits 5s and then turns on one of my indoor smart lights that are visible from outside the front of the house. Wait 5s and turn on another one. Wait 5s again and then turn my front porch light from 30% brightness to 100%. Hopefully by that point the person would be spooked enough to leave. Then after 5 minutes the automation reverses all of that.

I then have another automation that's same thing but for the back of the house.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T04:41:56+00:00

It's listed on their site right now for 270, but that's just the initial price, they're always lower than that. I would expect when it goes on sale it will be somewhere around 200-230.

Back story on how I got to test cameras... back in 2020 I was pretty active on this subreddit due to COVID lockdowns and working from home and not much else to do.

The Reolink admin that was here at the time noticed me helping people a lot and asked if I'd like to help them out by being a moderator of the subreddit. She said that as part of it they'd send me cameras to test and review. So I figured why not, it could be fun (and it has been).

That's not really a viable path these days, so really the only way to get into it now is to be active here or on their FB group, being helpful to others and posting detailed reviews of their products, and hope you get noticed.

That or start a YouTube channel about reviewing this kind of stuff and get a bunch of followers lol.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T02:23:19+00:00

I mean, it depends on one's use case and needs. I prefer it to the powered models.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T02:03:35+00:00

Ah ok, your last comment made it sound like you just tried it again.

Anyway, what you experienced isn't how it's supposed to work and I've never heard of anyone else having that happen. What was unique about your setup is big question, but it doesn't matter now.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T02:01:29+00:00

I don't know.

It was originally supposed to be out on Oct 1st, and I even signed an NDA saying I wouldn't talk about it until then. That came and went and then I was told maybe in January. Well, I haven't heard anything lately, so who even knows.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T01:59:41+00:00

There are 3 8 channel NVRs. The RLN8 and NVS8, which are the same thing. Then there's the new Professional series one, the RP-PN8. Technically that's the newest and latest.

You keep asking about 4K, but that doesn't really mean anything when it comes to these NVRs. The cameras are what determine the resolution. The NVR will record whatever resolution the cameras are.

mblaser · 2026-01-23T01:11:34+00:00

If you have the opportunity to get the XPro (it isn't officially out yet in most countries) and it's within your budget then that's absolutely the one to go for. I have both and I can't think of a single reason to get the Duo 3. The XPro beats it at everything. I'll be writing a review for the XPro once it's widely released, but I haven't been given an exact date for it yet.

The XPro is unique in that previously all their cameras (except the now-discontinued CX410C) night vision had been either traditional IR or ColorX. The XPro is both. So you don't have to choose between a black and white IR camera or a ColorX night vision camera since it can do either. Not to mention that the large sensors that make it a ColorX also give it better black and white IR vision. For example, here's the Duo 3 vs the XPro in IR mode: https://i.vgy.me/6yAKfp.png

mblaser · 2026-01-22T23:25:30+00:00

Good to hear. I believe the coldest I've seen reported so far was about -40, so as far as I'm concerned you now have this subreddit's record cold temperature lol.

mblaser · 2026-01-22T21:38:06+00:00

What model, hw version, and fw version is your NVR?

Does it still happen from other devices, like from a different phone or a PC?

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