Poor camera performance after hooking up to solar panel

[jmace57]

I have a 2K essential camera (3rd gen) and have recently hooked it up to an Arlo-branded solar panel.  Since I hooked it up, I have been getting very choppy video, with up to 5 second skips between frames.  Also a lot of artifacting as shown in the attached photo.   Anyone else run into this behavior?  The solar charging went well, immediately recognizing the solar, and showing the power indicator as charging (and eventually full).

[jguerdat]

WHat happens if you disconnect the panel? That picture implies a WiFi connection issue which the panel should have no effect on (unless the position is somehow blocking the signal).

[jmace57]

Just a bit of a follow-up.  I am getting the artifacting ONLY when displaying through my phone app.  I also display occasionally through my Amazon Echo Show 15, and do not see artifacting there.  I DO see the skipping in both, but ONLY when the charging is actually occurring via solar.  The panel is hit by sunshine in the mornings, and by noon it is not.  The skipping only occurs in the morning while charging.

[StephenB]

---

@jmace57 wrote:

I am getting the artifacting ONLY when displaying through my phone app.  I also display occasionally through my Amazon Echo Show 15, and do not see artifacting there.  

---

The skipping and the artifacts you are seeing are both a result of playing a corrupted bitstream.

Decoder implementations handle corrupted bitstreams differently.   Some continue to output errored frames (resulting in artifacts), while others stop outputing frames until the next uncorrupted key frame is received  (which clears up the errors).  My Gen 3 cameras transmit key frames every 2 seconds.

The puzzle of course is why charging the camera leads to the bitstream errors.