Arlo Pro 2 Infrared Light Fault Issues (Third Camera)

[ProChris20]

Hi, I am hoping very much you guys can help me as Arlo Support was confused.... I have had Arlo Pro for a couple of years now no issues and early this year I upgraded my camera at my gate from a Pro to a Pro 2 and I got an Arlo VMA4900 outdoor power supply for it to use the 3 second pre-record. I also have hard-wired CCTV but these are high up for a wider view of my garden but on one camera I can see the Arlo Pro 2 and in February it snowed here and was a little cold and I noticed on the hard-wired CCTV that the Pro 2 was dimming and getting bright again. I then noticed that the Infrared light had dimmed so much it was virtually off. As this was very bad I returned the camera to the place I bought it from and bought another from a different place. That was in February and then once again in March pretty much the same thing happened so I spoke to Arlo Support who were confused and told me to try moving the camera closer to the Base Station which made no difference and also to try removing the battery for 30 seconds and putting it back in but again no difference. Then they said I can send it to them as it's under warranty and they would send me a replacement but I had to pay shipping which I felt was unacceptable personally. As they said that and I hadn't long owned it again I contacted the seller and returned it to them and bought a new one from yet another store. Everything seemed fine up until 20th of April when yet again the Infrared light has dimmed so it seems either Pro 2 cameras aren't very good and this issue happens every month to everyone's or something else is happening? I know my set up will be rare as not everyone will have a hard-wired CCTV camera recording 24/7 and it see the Pro 2 camera to notice this happen but I'm very glad I do although it's very annoying this keeps happening. I have attached a couple of images showing what happened the other day and the difference between when it was fine to how it is now.

[Dannybear]

Couple of questions.
The attached photo shows the brightness changes within 48hrs correct?
Have you applied pinch and zoom and or activity zones to the camera?
This could be a long shot but is it possible that the CCTV infrared is causing the arlo camera to auto dim the IR Leds to reduce flare?

[ProChris20]

Hi,

Thank you for your reply. The pictures are from over 3 days as the before picture was from the 19th and the after is from the 21st. I am 100% positive the problem isn't related to the Infrared from my hard wired CCTV camera as it's much too high for the Arlo Pro 2 to be affected and the Infrared on the hardwired isn't high powered. I am also very sure it's not down to this because this seems to happen after almost a month of having it and nothing like it happens before and if it was down to the Infrared light it would happen a lot more and then fix it's self.

I have a video that shows my one Pro 2 in this location back in February where it's dimmed and got bright so many times and then virtually turned off and that was the most extreme case I've had so far but you can't upload a clip here sadly.

[Dannybear]

Does the LED behaviour change if you remove and reapply external power to the camera?
Are you using the arlo supplied cable and power adapter?
The fact that you have this the third time on different cameras and that the issue appears after 48hrs points to firmware issue.
I have removed pinch and zoom as well as activity zones to stop my cameras from having issues after 48hrs of active operation.

[ProChris20]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. I don't have any Zones set up so I just went in to the app and created one which made no difference and deleted it again and no difference. When I remove power the Infrared goes off and then when I trigger it by passing in front of it the Infrared comes on but at the same dim level. I am using the Arlo VMA4900 outdoor power supply plugged in to an outdoor weatherproof socket enclosure. The firmware is personally what I thought was the cause but I haven't actually had a firmware change in a while now and certainly not in the past week or so. As I thought it could be down to the firmware I would have thought others may have came across this and Arlo would be aware this happenesand have so sort of fix but the answers I got from Arlo Support weren't helpful at all.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Arlo-Smart-Outdoor-Adapter-Official/dp/B07CHN5371

[Dannybear]

I could be wrong but your the first to provide this observation I think.

The firmware bug symptoms I’ve had with using pinch and zoom has been traced as far back as mid last year on this forum and I’ve had the issue since I purchased the system last September not knowing what it was about and performing the usual power resets, resync and factory resets.
If you have reset the pinch and zoom using the web browser then this is something else in the firmware.

[ProChris20]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure what to do though because returning them and buying a replacement every month isn't a great solution especially as it's a right faf setting the Arlo VMA4900 Outdoor Power Supply up and attaching it to the bracket then gettting the right angle of the camera.

[Dannybear]

Although you observe the dimming via the CCTV, have you noticed a visual reduction of night vision on the pro2 camera that is consistent with the CCTV camera?

One more test would be to remove the battery and just run on external power. It’s possible that the charger is changing the voltage to charge the battery. This is normal for quick charge by Qualcomm chargers.

[ArloProOwner]

4/23/2019 USA EST 3:37 pm

RE:  Camera(s) not detecting motion - In my over a year of using these cameras, my experience with my 10 Arlo Pro & Arlo Pro2 cameras, that any camera at any time decides to not show any new activity while others around it ar.  In my experience, the camera has somehow on its own turned off the Night Vision and the camera's view is zoomed 100% to the top left corner where of course it's not going to detect any motion…maybe sound, but certainly not motion.  When t his happens, the camera is USELESS.  You get cameras to SEE things happening, and they are not catching movement when this "fault" happens.  This  happens almost every day to one or more of my cameras for no known reason.   And not receiving alerts form a particular camera (sometimes too late after it missed plenty of movement for a long length of time then the retrigger time is not even adjustable.).  So when you're cameras are not detecting motion, try checking that devices setting…scroll down to Video Settings….and  see what view your camera has.  If it's something super blurry that you don't even know what it is a photo of, then you will have to unzoom it by pinching or unpinching the photo, and adjust it to full view again, what you see on that snapshot is what the camera's actual view is.  Anyway, mine frequently (3 different cameras today) somehow reset or default that view for some reason.  It's not me, it's something to do with Arlo's program or software or something, and there is no rhyme or reason to these faults when they happen most of the time.

I have had a camera go off line for a few days now, finally decided to delete it, and I'll attempt to add it back onto the base station, which is always a problem if you have your cameras (as I do) plugged in and at various heights and awkwardness to reach.  Even the fact that you have to do this  now and then is very unacceptable and ends up being a waste of time in the long run, because it always screws up again, on it's own.  When these devices go off line there's nothing you can do to find out what the problem is except unplug it and reinstall it and hope for the best….because you can't click on anything…it won't let you, so  you have no idea what the cause of it going off line is even after 3 days, while the other 9 cameras (fingers crossed) have not had that problem…..right now…..they have certainly all had that problem, and the entire system had to be deleted and redone, with Arlo's help with me on the phone, after I was on the phone on HOLD for 1 ½ hours!  Yes, HOURS!  Glad I still have a land line and it was a toll free #.

Arlo Pro/2 is the most unreliable system I have.  And the amount of wasted time that you spend on these cameras is so unfair to us since these cameras and system are NOT CHEAP by any means.

Also, another flaw with the Arlo system is all of my cameras are all set to record for a fixed amount of time, the maximum amount of time being 120 seconds, and most of the time they will record various times, sometimes 10 second , sometimes 25, sometimes 11/2 minutes, all various amounts of times. Some days they do great, but that is few and far between that any of them work like they should.

GOOD LUCK!

[ProChris20]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. I tested this last night as I decided to try the removing the batter again and waiting 10 minutes and when I removed the battery it was still plugged in and I noticed the camera still functioned which was news to me as I thought you had to have a battery in it to work. Sadly without the battery in though the Infrared was still the same and there doesn't seem to be much I can do so far to fix it again. Currently there is no change in the view from the camera in question but the one I had go faulty in February got so dim the Infrared was almost off completely and that time you could see how much poorer the picture was.

[ProChris20]

Update:- The camera Infrared has fixed it's self somehow? I've not done anything but it's back being as bright as it once was but sadly this hasn't provided any answer as to what causes it?

[Dannybear]

When it occurs again try using the USB charger and cable that came with the camera pack to eliminate the outdoor cable your using.