Arlo Pro 2 Cam Externally Powered Lockup’s & Encoder Errors.

[Dannybear]

I have a recurring issue with my three cameras when they are externally powered. I note that they loose connection after a few days of being externally powered with the chargers supplied. I also experience encoder faults with the video being repetitively smeared in a two second loop. The cameras work fine when operating on battery only. Does anyone know if these chargers are designed for the continuous operation of the cameras? Do I need some mains power filtering device or a ferrite on the cable to remove spikes? It gets annoying to have to reset the battery in the cameras eveytime it happens.

[Dannybear]

Yay, clocked over my first forum page.

@firesec
Thanks for taking a look, and no problem with your reluctance as it is different pixelation issue anyway.
I hear what you’re saying about the heating causing problems, I myself have seen issues with uneven heating across parts of the PCB’s can cause timing issues between digital onboard components.

I suggest that your issue could be likened to the great Arlo Pro camera pixelation problems way back in 2017 that were resolved with a firmware fix.
Might be worth escalating to support if you’re inclined.

[Gen8bigup]

My workaround is to attach it to the mains via a timer switch on it. Turns it on for a couple of hours each week to get it to 100pct charge. The pixelation goes away as soon as it’s on battery

[Dannybear]

That is a brilliant idea, it might be easier for me to do a similar approach, I would not then need to keep trying to nut this problem out.
Might have to time the battery charge outside of the ripple control times though.

[Dannybear]

Hmm, if I run the cameras on battery I won’t be able to have basic activity zones available when arlo eventually gets them working for me. Now I can’t sleep, the camera has started to pixelate again.😦

[Dannybear]

I performed a factory reset of the base station and the camera pixelated within 24hrs again. Within a few hours after the pixelation the camera progressed to just saying it was connecting but no dice. Reset via the camera settings still works.
Now I will trial using an external USB backup battery on the camera and charge it with the power adapter to filter the mains supply, if it works it should still give me activity zones when arlo gets them working.

[Dannybear]

Scratch that, USB battery pack rated for 3.4A but 5vdc is not enough to clear charger alarm.
Seems to be another nail in the arlo camera design.😣

[jguerdat]

The Pro camera batteries require a Qualcomm Quick Charge-rated charger providing both 5v (which will run the camera) and 9v (which will charge the battery).

[Dannybear]

@jguerdat
Thanks for the detail, I was requested by support to fit AVRs to the camera’s power adaptors and was trying a simpler/cheaper method to achieve the same outcome to regulate the supply voltage. I think that the Belkin battery pack I was using does not have enough 5 volts for running just the camera. I will look to trying a car USB adapter to see if it might work.

[Dannybear]

Well I purchased a 12vdc supply and a compliant USB charger to run the problem camera and it did not resolve the issue.

I installed a heat sink on the back of the camera but again no fix.

I am beginning to conclude that this issue is firmware related, not hardware or environmental.

[jguerdat]

12v supply? Why? You should probably regulate it down to 9v for starters plus I don't know how Quick Charge works - it needs some sort of handshake, I think.

[Dannybear]

@jguerdat
I was asked to use an AVR to regulate the mains supply to the arlo charger that was feeding the camera. This I thought was better done using a regulated dc power supply and a Qualicom USB car charger. Did the trick but the pixelation issue came back. At least it eliminated the ripple control tones I get from my energy provider as well as any design issues with the arlo chargers causing the pixelation.

[Dannybear]

Just another update, was asked to check if the pixelation was observed if the camera was positioned outside. Yes camera was mounted outside and pixelation returned.

So the conclusion is that I can’t use these cameras if externally powered.
Support have no clue why, and everyone else is seeing the same thing so they remove the battery.
Seems I should have just purchased wireless motion detectors instead.

[Dannybear]

I think I am getting closer to the root of the issue.
I relocated the test camera back inside and within a few hours it started to pixelate again.
The lighting inside is normally dull so the camera auto switches to night mode and this eventually enables the start of the pixelation.
If it is recording at the time you turn on the lights inside the camera doesn’t switch to day mode until it finishes recording. Then after a subsequent recording the camera pixelation is gone.
So an externally powered camera will only work reliably if the lights remain on.

[Dannybear]

Getting even closer now for certain that this is firmware related.
My testing has confirmed so far that this issue is not caused by the camera’s hardware design or by environmental triggers.
Now to isolate the firmware bug.

[jguerdat]

You really seem to be lacking the luck of the Irish.  🙂

Have you reset the system and started fresh? I wonder if that would clear things up.

[Dannybear]

@jguerdat
Thanks for your interest, I have only gone down to removal of all devices and factory reset of the base station with no improvement.
The next step would be deleting the account and starting with a new email.

I am getting closer to understanding the fault mechanism and I suspect that it would explain why a lot of the arlo camera users are experiencing unexplained timeouts, lost connections, pixelation and corrupted settings even with the ultra from what I’m reading.

The same issues I get have been documented on the forum as far back as the middle of last year so I don’t feel so alone in this.
For me this has been ongoing since purchasing the unit back in September although I only started posting about it here in January and getting support involved.

[Dannybear · Accepted solution]

I am now satisfied that this issue is caused by a arlo firmware bug. The solution is for Arlo’s software team to implement a bug fix in the next update.

[Dannybear]

I want to share the following workaround for the above pixelation issue and many more that I have found to be related.
Missing cloud recordings, Unreliable operation of the press to talk function,
Missed or continuous motion detection and some others not documented here.

The workaround is to use the web browser to reset the pinch and zoom setting on all your cameras.
Note that battery cameras may loose connection when you apply the reset and will require a battery reset and resync to the base.

If you intend to reapply the pinch and zoom settings, I suggest that you reset the base station and reseat all the camera batteries every 24hrs to maintain reliability.

I don’t have an Ultra camera so cannot advise if this will work.