topic Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working in Arlo Pro 3

Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

linuxtech — Mon, 16 Mar 2020 19:28:43 GMT

Hi all,

I decided to purchased Arlo Pro 3 b/c I've used Arlo Pro 2 in the past, and like it.

I just recently purchased the Aro Pro 3 (4 cameras) brand new, and the activity zone isn't working like it should.

I only want it to record/alert the motion within the defined area, but somehow it still record outside of the zone.

I've tried many different zones, but still not working. My smart hub firmware is up-to-date.

My second issue is the schedule not working as I defined it.

I created the schedule for living room, and added it to the 'Schedule' plan for it not to record video during specified night time. However, it still continue to record and alert like normal.

Overall, the video quality and audio are good, better than Ring Spotlight.

If the engineers/developers can fix these two issues, I'm sure myself and other users are very happy.

Thanks.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

JamesC — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 16:15:42 GMT

linuxtech,

The development team is investigating reports of inaccurate motion detection when using activity zones, I will provide an update on this issue when we have more information available.

After creating the schedule, do you also have it selected within your modes?

JamesC

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

linuxtech — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 18:55:12 GMT

Hello James,

Yes, I did.

I can provide a screenshot later.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

JamesC — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 20:37:20 GMT

linuxtech,

Thanks, I will send you a private message to gather more details about the activity zones issue you're experiencing.

JamesC

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Phoney49 — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 22:17:49 GMT

I have a Pro 3 on an Ultra hub. On battery, it works fine. If I plug the camera in, ie running on AC, it works fine for a day or 2, but then randomly starts recording. I have not figured it out what triggers it, so I just unplug it and wait hoping it will be fixed.
I had the same problem with an Ultra camera. The last firmware upgrade resolved it on the Ultra, and it has been plugged in and working well.
Hopefully a fix for the Pro 3 is in the works.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Phoney49 — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 22:18:54 GMT

By the way, the issue only occurs at night.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

linuxtech — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 14:31:17 GMT

Hello Phoney49,

Why you don't use Arlo Pro 3 base station with your cameras ?

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Phoney49 — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 15:36:03 GMT

Because I own it. It came with an Ultra camera that I bought.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

StephenB — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 20:32:56 GMT

@Phoney49 wrote:
On battery, it works fine. If I plug the camera in, ie running on AC, it works fine for a day or 2, but then randomly starts recording.

Do you have a microSD card in the base? If you don't, you might consider adding one. Then you could enable direct access to local storage, and take a look at the local recordings - sometimes they are a bit longer than the ones in the cloud.

Also, are you using activity zones on this particular camera?

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Phoney49 — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 22:41:29 GMT

I have an SD card and access enabled, so I can have a collection of recordings with nothing happening locally.
I have an Activity Zone, and I have had no activity Zone. I have changed sensitivity all the way to zero. Nothing makes a difference.
Development should understand this problem. It is exactly the same as the problem with the Ultra that was fixed.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

StephenB — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 23:13:06 GMT

@Phoney49 wrote:

Development should understand this problem. It is exactly the same as the problem with the Ultra that was fixed.

Well, it's the same symptoms. Hard to say if it's the root cause.

Have you contacted support? https://www.arlo.com/en-us/support/contact.aspx

@Phoney49 wrote:
I have an SD card and access enabled, so I can have a collection of recordings with nothing happening locally.
I have an Activity Zone, and I have had no activity Zone. I have changed sensitivity all the way to zero. Nothing makes a difference.

Are the notifications at night labeled as audio or motion? For a while my Ultra was delivering audio notifications (even though it was turned off). Seems unlikely that would only happen at night though.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Phoney49 — Thu, 19 Mar 2020 15:18:17 GMT

I think I contacted support. I remember sending a sample video. I reported a lot of problems, spent hours doing triage on different issues.
I don't know of any way to check the status of problems I have reported. Also, I don't get any communication regarding the status of open issues. I know I could phone, but that can take time.
Arlo does not have a world class problem management system, since all communication requires phone or chat.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Jcamp — Thu, 19 Mar 2020 15:32:34 GMT

I wouldn’t take one of the Pro 3 cameras if you gave it to me. I have been having problems with 2 of them, which by the way have been re turned. Support is absolutely no help what so ever. They have been going to get back to me for the last month. James asked me to send him videos of my false alerts which I did. His reply was support is looking to it. That was 3 weeks ago. When you call support you get someone in the Philippines who can’t speak English very good so it becomes a problem. All they do is type into a computer and give you the answer that comes up on the screen, which is usually wrong. I feel sorry for anyone that has to call for support. I purchased a Arlo Ultra in place of the Pro 3 and it is working like a charm. A good addition for my 5 Pro 2 cameras. Good luck to all.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

Tony85254 — Thu, 02 Apr 2020 21:15:03 GMT

Same problem here. Just started to act up a few weeks ago.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

linuxtech — Thu, 02 Apr 2020 21:19:51 GMT

Hello,

With the new app update deployed last week, I seen a detection and zone alert improvements.

However, the activity schedule is still not much better.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

bikeman147 — Wed, 08 Apr 2020 03:32:23 GMT

Please check you firewall settings. After a lot of vm5000 hub resets, delete/rejoins and 180 inverts, we discovered it was not arlo’s fault.

you must permit

Arlostatic*.s3.amazonaws.com

arlochunks-z2-prod.s3.amazonaws.com

arlos3-prod-z2.amazonaws.com

arlos3-prod-log-s3.amazonaws.com

YMMV. Check your firewall logs for similar items that may be getting filtered. If you have a category based firewall they may get lumped into the computer and information group.

In any case, once these sites were permitted both pro2 and ultra zones worked quickly and correctly.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

linuxtech — Thu, 09 Apr 2020 00:22:27 GMT

Hi,

I'm using VMB4540, are the firewall rules necessary ?

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

AceNJ — Tue, 05 May 2020 01:30:33 GMT

Is there any update on this by chance? I have a 3 camera pack of Arlo 3. Activity zone is working properly on 2 out of 3. The one that isn’t working is draining battery rapidly because it keeps recording cars passing by. The others are working great with activity zones. So it seems to be a camera specific issue.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

StephenB — Tue, 05 May 2020 01:36:44 GMT

@AceNJ wrote:
The one that isn’t working is draining battery rapidly because it keeps recording cars passing by.

Note that activity zones won't improve your battery life. The camera will stream all motion (in and out of the zones) to the cloud. The cloud then drops recordings and notifications that are out of the zones. So the camera is doing same amount of work whether zones are set up or not (and therefore will use the same amount of power).

On the main problem - one thing you might want to try is deleting the zones and recreating them.

Re: Activity Zone and Schedule are not working

AceNJ — Tue, 05 May 2020 02:21:32 GMT

That is interesting information. I have two cameras point to the same street. Both brand new and after 1 month the one with the activity zone issue is down to 20%. The other working properly at a different street angle but capturing the same cars passing by is at 65%.

Yes I did try to delete and recreate the zones.