this post was submitted on 26 Nov 2023
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Home Automation

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Home automation is the residential extension of building automation.

It is automation of the home, housework or household activity.

Home automation may include centralized control of lighting, HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning), appliances, security locks of gates and doors and other systems, to provide improved convenience, comfort, energy efficiency and security.

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Hi,

I am looking for a decent doorbell camera with:

  • No subscription.
  • Pre-recording locally, 5+ sec duration.
  • Event recording (locally) total duration of 15+ sec.
  • Smart detection: people only is ok.

I just got Wyze v2, but just found out it doesn't do pre-recording for the event, nor event recording. Only event snapshot.

Note: What I meant by pre-recording is sometimes called pre-motion recording, or pre-buffer.

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[–] WindowsEnjoyer 2 points 9 months ago

It's probably called Frigate of what you are after. Just not sure about being able to speak back (it's doorbell camera after all).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I haven't got into this yet, but the approach I was going to look into was using an IP camera and CCTV style software, which gives me my buffered recordings. I can then choose to process the image for motion, or use a PIR or push of the door bell to trigger the save (which is less intensive processing).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Iirc, Blue Iris is the software a lot of people use to manage their IP cameras.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Good to know.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Thanks for the idea.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (2 children)

If you find this I would be very curious! I have a ring and it does this... But only with the subscription

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I setup an Amcrest 4mp doorbell cam 9 months ago to meet the same need. It required cloud access for initial setup, set the WiFi, admin password and enable RTSP, then my Synology NAS took over recording from there and I blocked it's access to the Internet.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Thanks for sharing.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

From reading the comments and digging deeper, I think I lean toward Reolink. Just need to find the info about event recording duration before pulling the trigger.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

UBIQUITI doorbell cameras. A bit costly compared to others, but there is no subscription. Pays for itself after a few years.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I've been using a DBI Pro from EZVIZ for about two years. The pros have been: It supports up to 256 GB of onboard SD card storage. No subscription required. Includes onboard person and vehicle detection. The prerecording time is not customizable but has generally adequate. The recording time is limited to the duration of the person, vehicle, or motion event, and is generally adequate. It has been very reliable (with the proper power supply). The app is reasonably good, but not great. Playback away from home has been good; decent load times and playback smoothness. At 2K, day and night image quality has been good. The 176 deg. field of view is great.

Cons have been: Software customization is very limited. Integration with Blue Iris worked intermittently for a year then completely stopped (I suspect I need to change the firmware to a custom flavor). I expect integration with other 3rd party hardware may require some off-label customization as well.

If I had to start over, I would research the Amcrest AD410 4MP WiFi Doorbell Camera in hopes that it would play nice with with third party hardware and software. For me, integration with Blue Iris is critical as I have had excellent experience with Blue Iris which offers an excellent feature set, is very customizable, and is very reasonably priced.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Thanks! Very comprehensive!