topic Re: Cannot add camera to base station in Arlo Essential Outdoor 2nd Gen

Cannot add camera to base station

Mappe — Sat, 07 Jun 2025 09:29:19 GMT

I have three Arlo Cameras including Pro and Essential. All connected to my base station VMB4000. However, my recent Essential Outdoor cameras (2nd gen) will only connect to my WiFi making any recordings impossible via the base station. I get the same error message (65535) every time I try. WiFi works well but not directly to the base station as the others. What is wrong?

Re: Cannot add camera to base station

jguerdat — Sat, 07 Jun 2025 13:11:28 GMT

The VMB4000 may be part of the issue since several folks have various issues using those. However, try rebooting the base and ensure it's on the latest firmware.

https://community.arlo.com/t5/Firmware-Release-Notes/Arlo-Firmware-Release-Table/m-p/1920885#M791

Re: Cannot add camera to base station

Mappe — Mon, 09 Jun 2025 10:34:16 GMT

I have rebooted both camera and base station and they are on the latest firmware. They just won't connect. The funny thing is my previous generation Essential camera (Spotlight) has no problems at all to connect to the base. But the two newer version cameras (Outdoor) simply won't. I can only connect to my WiFi and they are more or less useless without a subscription. Maybe that is the thinking from Arlo? To force me into needing to have a subscription and not a standalone system with five cameras and a base station?

Re: Cannot add camera to base station

StephenB — Mon, 09 Jun 2025 12:00:15 GMT

@Mappe wrote:

To force me into needing to have a subscription and not a standalone system with five cameras and a base station?

One thing to clarify - the VMB4000 base supports recording, but has no playback functions. The ONLY way to see local recordings is to eject the storage using the app, and then connect the storage to a PC for viewing.

The Pro 2 cameras were sold with 7-day free cloud recording (limited to accounts with 5 or fewer unsubscribed cameras). All the recordings you see in the app are saved in the Arlo Cloud, not the base station.

The 2nd gen Essentials (like all currently sold Arlo cameras) do not have any free cloud storage. If you want to view local recordings for those cameras, you need a smarthub (VMB4540 or VMB5000) - not a VMB4000 or VMB4500.

@Mappe wrote:

I have rebooted both camera and base station and they are on the latest firmware.

You need to check the firmware in the device settings, you cannot depend on the firmware update feature for this.

So follow the link posted above, and make sure the firmware revisions in your devices match what is posted.