topic Arlo Pro 2, utilizing USB port to connect to surveillance hard drive as local backup in Arlo Pro 2

Arlo Pro 2, utilizing USB port to connect to surveillance hard drive as local backup

scientificsolve — Wed, 15 Jul 2020 14:59:49 GMT

I am thinking of utilizing surveillance hard drive (4 TB WD Purple) to do continuous recording on Arlo. I know that a power supply is needed for hard drive which I have way around that. All I need to know is if adding a surveillance hard drive will work as local backup.

Hence, this is what I am thinking. Take 4 TB hard drive, get a local power supply for hard drive, use a USB to hard drive connector, and do local backup of continuous video stream. Did anyone tried this approach or is it theoretically possible with base station?

Re: Arlo Pro 2, utilizing USB port to connect to surveillance hard drive.

michaelkenward — Wed, 15 Jul 2020 09:23:57 GMT

@scientificsolve wrote:

I am thinking of utilizing surveillance hard drive (4 TB WD Purple) to do continuous recording on Arlo. I know that a power supply is needed for hard drive which I have way around that. All I need to know is if adding a surveillance hard drive will work as local backup.

Attempts to get that sort of thing to work have been less than startling.

If you read the documentation for the Ultra system, for example, it says:

"The minimum USB drive size is 16 GB and the maximum size drive that those file systems support is 2 TB. "

It may be that the 16 GB has grown to 32 GB, but there has been no increase at the top end. Pro 2 and Pro 3 come with similar warnings.

The manual also says:

The SmartHub supports USB 2.0-compatible devices. Not all HDDs are compatible with the SmartHub. If you’re not sure, consult the manufacturer of the HDD.

Personally, I wouldn't trust any disk manufacturer , or Arlo, to know all the different combinations that might work.

Most people find that a 256 GB drive keeps the going for months before recordings overwrite.

Re: Arlo Pro 2, utilizing USB port to connect to surveillance hard drive.

jguerdat — Wed, 15 Jul 2020 13:26:54 GMT

Not to mention that you can't record 24/7 with any Arlo camera. CVR is the closest you can get and that's totally cloud-based. Also, in my limited testing, I found an hour's recording of live view (when that was possible) was well over 1GB which would fill that 2TB partition in 1/4 year-ish so not exactly all that useful, especially trying to find a time period in that mammoth file.