General Question

elbanditoroso's avatar

Is anyone familiar with ARLO - security front door camera (like Ring or Blink)?

Asked by elbanditoroso (33521points) August 7th, 2023
7 responses
“Great Question” (0points)

If you are, tell me about them – are they any good? More importantly, are they secure?

(Blink and Ring have a reputation of making pictures available to law enforcement).

If you don’t have Arlo, or aren’t familiar with it, your answer is not relevant.

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Answers

Tropical_Willie's avatar

Owned Arlo system for three years, you control who can see the video.

I have door bell and cameras.

Caravanfan's avatar

I have a Ring. It’s fine. I haven’t needed to really use it except for scaring my wife when she is on the driveway and I speak out of the speaker.

chyna's avatar

I have Arlo.
I have to recharge the cameras about every 2 months. Not bad for my front door and back door, but for the side of the house I have to get a step ladder because I wanted it high enough that someone couldn’t grab it.
There seems to be a 10 second delay on mine. Not sure if they all have that. Meaning that if a delivery is made, my phone alerts me and by the time it alerts me, the delivery person is already leaving down my steps. He is on the camera. It’s just a matter of notification. I don’t think anyone else is able to see my cameras. Mine is not set up for police notification.

Pandora's avatar

I have both. I started with arlo for the back yard but I couldn’t hook it up with solar so I have to use the batteries. The batteries last pretty long but I mostly use it when I’m going to be away from the house and no one is home. It can last me months but I don’t use it much. I use to have one in the house but somehow it went bad.
Now I have ring for the front door. You have to be careful of the options you sign up for. I have it set not to share with the neighborhood. I use rechargeable battery but not with solar. I don’t get enough sun to make that work. It last me a full week to maybe about 10 days before I replace it with a second rechargeable battery. Several things can affect how long it last. From the heat, to the cold to your settings. The higher the settings the least effective it is. Now if you can put one straight into the wiring that would be better. Then you never have to worry about replacing the battery.

I use to have one that was attached straight to hardwire but my (I think it’s called a transformer) for my doorbell isn’t working anymore and I cannot find where it is. It’s usually behind the door alarm in the house but it’s not there. The only other place is behind the electrical box but we didn’t want to pay an electrician to hunt down the transformer. So we opted for battery-operated.

I also have the ring in the house. Plug-in type. Excellent for viewing and hearing and talking to someone. I only turn those on when I’m going to be gone.
Did have it on when my nephew was home watching my dog while we were gone for a week. I would turn it on at night and turn it off from my phone during the day, so he could have his privacy and I could be sure he was safe at night.

As for safety anything can be hacked. Your laptop, computer and your phone. If you are going to worry about someone hacking in and listening than don’t get these items.
But as for companies, just read the fine print for what you are giving permission to
I like the ring the most. I have fewer issues when tuning in on my phone from miles away.
We also have ring in my inlaw’s home to monitor my father-in-law when he’s home alone and also to answer and call them when they don’t hear the doorbell. They are better at hearing the phone than the doorbell. We can also call them when a package is left at their door. They are both hard of hearing. It gives us both peace of mind.

cookieman's avatar

I have the Nest system (cameras, alarm, motion sensors, smoke/carbon detectors) and my friend, Mike has the Arlo system. We both set them up ourselves and have compared notes.

I love the Nest products for quality, ease of use, privacy, and app support. From what Mike has told me, they are comparable and he loves his system.

Sadly, Nest lost points from me when they were bought by Google who discontinued some of the products. I also am more concerned about privacy with Google in control now.

When I have to eventually replace my Nest system, I think I’ll go with Arlo.

elbanditoroso's avatar

All, thanks for the replies. I’m going to go with Arlo – will order it today.

RocketGuy's avatar

We have Arlo and Ring. Arlo is pretty good. Takes a few sec to sense motion and start recording. Our outdoor cam triggers on joggers and trash trucks, which is fine. That uses a lot of power so I added an Arlo-compatible solar panel to keep it charged. The other cams don’t trigger as often so their batteries last at least 2 months. I like that the footage is stored off-line. That way, if anything happens locally I’ll still have footage. Still, my outside cam is located 8 ft off the ground to discourage theft. The disadvantage is that if power or internet goes out, they don’t work.

I don’t like our Ring as much. It’s kind of rudimentary and needs maybe 20 sec to sense motion and notify me. I usually get recordings of the mailman or UPS guy walking away. Rarely catch their faces. Answering doorbell rings is convenient though. I can chat with door to door salespeople and hit the hang up button without seeing their disappointed faces. No need to even open the door. Mine is powered thru the original doorbell transformer. It’s bolted to my inner garage wall exactly opposite the doorbell, with the wires passing thru to the outer porch wall (in case @Pandora might be interested).

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