topic Re: activity zones completely ignored in Arlo Q

activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Wed, 21 Mar 2018 18:08:47 GMT

Ok, I cannot for the life of me get my Arlo Qs to respect the activity zones I set up with either the iOS app or websit . Any motion within the field of view continues to trigger alerts. Here are the things I have tried:

- removed both cameras, re-paired and recreated zones

- made sure the activity zones are selected in the mode section

- removed all zones and recreated through the mode section

- removed zones so that there would be only 1 zone per camera in case that was the issue (had 3 overlapping zones before)

- tried repositioning the cameras so they would not be at a 45 degree angle, recreated zones, still have the same issue

- made sure they are running the latest firmware (1.8, etc.)

- tried resizing the zones in many different combinations (avoiding the edges of the frame, making them not too thin or too thick, etc.) nothing works.

If anybody can provide some clues as to how to solve this issue I would appreciate it tremendously.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

midget2000x — Wed, 21 Mar 2018 19:47:53 GMT

I don’t have an answer. I’m subscribing to this thread because I’m having the exact same problem. I’m trying to exclude the zones my dog moves around.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

ojix — Wed, 21 Mar 2018 22:03:40 GMT

I am experiencing exacly the same problem as yours, and I submitted a bug report to NETGEAR's support. Still waiting for their reply.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Wed, 21 Mar 2018 23:21:42 GMT

Thank you for posting. Let's keep the thread alive until we get a solution or any updates. There are more than a few of us and if we can stop wasting time re-pairing and recreating zones when the problem is on their end it would be best.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

midget2000x — Thu, 22 Mar 2018 00:34:33 GMT

This could be the answer.

https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Q/Zones-Not-Working/m-p/1313998#M4259

Re: activity zones completely ignored

ojix — Thu, 22 Mar 2018 00:44:06 GMT

Thank you for the comment, but I understand how to use zones and modes, and a particular zone is already selected in the mode setting tub (and saved of course).

So this is not the answer for me.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Thu, 22 Mar 2018 02:20:18 GMT

Ditto here. I am making sure "everywhere" is unchecked and that only the zone(s) I created are checked. It makes no difference as any movement outside of the zones continues to trigger a recording.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 14:40:09 GMT

Just tested again to see if the zones continue tobe ignored by the system. As of this morning, my Arlo Q is still not working as it should. Netgear, can you please address this issue, or at least acknowledge there is an issue? I need to use the cameras I boguht from you.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

jguerdat — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 14:55:49 GMT

FWIW, my zones seem to be working although not in a high traffic area for lots of samples.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 17:35:51 GMT

Are you running the latest firmware (1.8)? Did you experience activty zones being ignored previously? When did they start working properly again? Thanks.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

jguerdat — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 19:46:18 GMT

I'm running the latest - 1.8.3.2_17494. I'm not clear as to whether I ever had the issue due to how I've got the camera set up with minimal recordings that would be outside the zone. In response to the recent issues with zones, I deleted all my zones and recreated them as somewhat different sizes/locations. Did that fix something? No idea. Based on my experience and reviewing today's videos, it appears that I'm not getting recordings from outside the zone.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

baonguyenx — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 20:43:11 GMT

Activity zones are completely useless, and lot of users already had reported this issue.

I think it was a firmware issue that Arlo needs to fix, but there wasn't any response from Arlo of my previous post.

Arlo Q recording motion outside of detection zones

https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Q/Arlo-Q-recording-motion-outside-of-detection-zones/td-p/1493936

Here is a trick that can reduce the false alert by

1. Create a new mode

2. Setting motion sensitivity to 1

3. Created the smallest square at the area you would like to monitor

4. Enable it

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 21:47:54 GMT

I will try this and report back to see if it works. Thank you so much for the tip. Hopefully even though the zone is so small (smallest allowable by the system) ti will still trigger a recording if something enters it, even when setting the sensitivity to 1.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Fri, 23 Mar 2018 22:12:40 GMT

I tried your method, and you are right, motion outside the very small activity zone set to 1 does not trigger an alert, but the problem is that motion INSIDE the zone doesn't trigger an alert either, so in my case it is no different than simply turning the camera off altogether. Thanks anyway.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

ojix — Sat, 24 Mar 2018 07:26:40 GMT

How about setting motion sensitivity to 5 instead of 1 ?

I tried baonguyenx's method, except for the motion sensitivity remaining 5, and it seems working, at least so far. An old neighbor swinging a baseball bat at the corner of the screen, outside of the detection zone, does not trigger the sensor.

It may be just because the NETGEAR's server is temporarily back to normal, though.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Sat, 24 Mar 2018 09:36:41 GMT

I will try and report back, thanks!

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Sat, 24 Mar 2018 19:16:30 GMT

Following up on the tip from bayeonguyenx, I tried resizing the activity zone to see if I could find the sweet spot where it would be big enough to register movement but not big enough to be ignored, and I think I may have found it. In the attachment you can see the exact size of the activity zone I created (the red insert) relative to the size of the frame (in blue), and even when setting the motion sensitivity to "6", motion outside of it does not trigger an alert. If the zone is made a bit larger, it is ignored and any motion anywhere in the frame triggers an alert. If others having this problem could test this activity zone size to confirm it also works for them it would be helpful to everyone having this issue until NETGEAR decides to do its job. Maybe someone could try a couple of activity zones no larger than the size I used to see if having more than one still works, or try a couple of overlapping zones of this size to see if it that makes a difference or if they interfere with each other, or try sensitivity levels higher than 6 and report back.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Sun, 25 Mar 2018 00:01:12 GMT

UPDATE: As soon as it got dark I started to get alerts from anywhere in the frame, ignoring the activity zone that had been working perfectly fine all afternoon. I tried lowering the sensitivity but it did not work, kept getting alerts. I had to disarm the camera. I will try again tomorrow and report back.

Re: activity zones completely ignored

jguerdat — Sun, 25 Mar 2018 00:39:01 GMT

FWIW, my minimal zone is working fine. Nothing outside the zone is being detected,

Re: activity zones completely ignored

devotchko — Sun, 25 Mar 2018 17:48:51 GMT

And movement inside the zone triggers an alert? Because the minimum size zone did not in my case.