Arlo Pro Nightvision Issue

[arlobro]

Hi,

Having an issue with Nightvision.

During the day, live view works just fine.

During the night, when using live view, it works fine..but after shutting down the live view - I get about 4 or 5 alerts in a row right after using live view that motion was detected (and it records for 20 seconds each -as I have it set to do)

Tested by turning Nightvision off, live view works, and when closed, no motion detected.

It seems like the camera is detecting its own Nightvision light as motion for some reason.. Bug? anyone else have this issue?

I have the latest base and camera firmware installed.

Thanks.

[greenweenie]

Had a 4 camera H7 Pro set... no problems, just bought another 4 camera H8 set. First camera just placed and 19 motion detects in a row in a motionless garage setting. Oh NO.

 

[Ultbruin]

Just got my Arlo Pro H7 last week. All 4 mounted outdoors. 3 of them working beautifully. 1 located in back patio aimed at French door with glass windows goes off at night and once it does it keeps going. It racked up 300+ clips in a row last night bc I had my phone on silent. Had to turn off motion this morning, turn it back on, then its fine. But drained battery from 100% to 70%. Can't see anything that's triggering it.

Another night it started going off and I decreased sensitivity to 1 and it still keeps going. It started after I did live view. So seems that can trigger this phenomenon at night also. 
Will try switching camera placement with another camera to see if it's a location problem or a camera problem.

[JamesC]

Ultbruin,

Please let us know if the issue follows the camera or if it turns out to be the location.

JamesC

[Ultbruin]

It is definitely the camera.  It does the same thing in a different location.  Still unclear what's causing it.  Once it starts it keeps going.  I have to turn of motion detection, wait a few minutes and turn it back on.  Very random.  

Sometimes just live viewing that camera will trigger it, the repeated "motion detected" recordings.

Opened a case #27984378.  Waiting for reply.

[jguerdat]

That's usually an hardware issue. Contact support and open a case.

[ysu]

I also opened a support case to exchange my cameras. They are asking my address now, so I guess they will ship something soon? Do they ship to me first or do I need to ship old cameras back to them first? I hope they can send to me first, because at least I can use the cameras at day time without problem.

[jguerdat]

That's an extra cost to have the replacement shipped first. You can always ask, though...

[greenweenie]

Same camera... now not just after live view. I rebooted the base station and after the camera came back online it just started firing over and over and over until I finally had enough and turned it off.

[jguerdat]

You can try removing and replacing the battery to reset the camera, too, just in case.  If that doesn't work, open a case with support.

[Ultbruin]

Ysu did they ship you new cameras yet? It's been almost a week of back and forth emails for my case number now, running different tests and scenarios. Already realize it's the night vision issue.
Still no discussion about exchanging the one affected camera. Getting a little drawn out for my taste. Tempted to return the entire system to Best Buy which I have a few more days to do so.

[JamesC]

For those experiencing this issue. Can you confirm you still see the same behavior when audio is disabled for the camera?

Consider disabling or reducing audio sensitivity and test to see if you get the same results:

How do I change the audio sensitivity on my Arlo camera?

Log in to your Arlo account and navigate to Settings > My Devices > select the desired camera > Audio Settings > toggle off speaker and microphone

JamesC

[ysu]

No, they "escalated" my case to higher level support but now asking new questions like "did you try to turn off good cameras to make sure bad cameras still behave bad"... A bit tired. But I still performed the requested troubleshooting step and reported back. Issue not resolved.

[Ultbruin]

Thanks for the response ysu. Yeah they just bumped me to higher level as well. I don't see how they can fix anything by having me make adjustments. I have 4 cameras. 1 does not perform like the other 3. No matter what settings you adjust/try it's not going to miraculously work like the other 3. The only solution is to exchange the defective camera.
Wish I could exchange out 1 camera w Best Buy.

[manofice]

JamesC, when I had this issue...audio detection was completely off and changing senstivity did not make a difference.

[ArloPro_gk]

I have had my system for a week now and have been tweaking it in every day and night to alert me only when I want to be alerted.  After "dialing in" both my daytime mode settings and my nighttime mode settings I have come to the conclusion that the night vision setting is just not going to work for me.  I have 4 cameras in which I now have night vision disabled for all 4 and they are not triggering any false alerts or repeated alerts.   Motion sensing seems to be working to my expectation without night vison enabled as I have plenty of lighting around my house and it’s not totally dark.   Other than this issue, I am very satisfied with this product at this point in time and I have no intentions of returning it because of the night vison issues.

[ysu]

Support agreed to do one RMA first until issue is confirmed. That's insane. I want all 3 bad cameras RMA'ed, and according to experience read on forum, you might not even get it fixed on first swap.

I'm going to ask RMA all 3. If they don't do that I might just return entire set to bestbuy. I bought this to protect my house and make my life easier. Not to spend hours to be netgear QA when the issue is very clear. Don't want this to be a lengthy battle with netgear support and process.

James, I really hope you have better understanding to this issue and can help convince support team to understand they need to RMA all 3 cameras at one time for me. Otherwise we can easily run this thing for a few months with multiple back and forth. Thanks. Case 27976415

[ysu]

And while I'm at this, here's a summary of similar reports on this forum, just from the first 2 pages.

The following threads have exactly same issue reported, with all factors matched:

1) night vision on

2) after live view or legit motion

3) multiple false alarms afterwards

4) the only resolved cases were by replacing cameras by Netgear

Arlo Pro Nightvision Issue [This Thread]
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Arlo-Pro-Nightvision-Issue/m-p/1176183#U1176183

4XH16C7UA9955 - recording without motion [originator just confirmed it's only with night vision]
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/4XH16C7UA9955-recording-without-motion/m-p/1219762#U121976...

Motion alerts are non stop at night. Arlo Pro
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Motion-alerts-are-non-stop-at-night-Arlo-Pro/m-p/1196788#U...

Outdoor camera detects motion constantly at night
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Outdoor-camera-detects-motion-constantly-at-night/m-p/1219...

Arlo Pro Night Vision constant motion activation and no night vision
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Arlo-Pro-Night-Vision-constant-motion-activation-and-no-ni...

Motion detected nonstop
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Motion-detected-nonstop/m-p/1217969#U1217969

The following threads are related issues, but might or might not be the same issue, as some factors are not confirmed. E.g., some didn't mention night vision:

motion detection sends false alerts
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/motion-detection-sends-false-alerts/m-p/1219951#U1219951

Arlo pro will not reset motion sensor. The motion icon stays orange
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Arlo-pro-will-not-reset-motion-sensor-The-motion-icon-stay...

Arlo pro camera senativity issues
https://community.netgear.com/t5/Arlo-Pro/Arlo-pro-camera-senativity-issues/m-p/1217907#U1217907

Netgear, if you are reading, there's something wrong with this otherwise great product. This is not an isolated issue. Stop asking customers to go thru a nearly 2 week troubleshooting process (like you did to me, case #27976415) and still only want to RMA 1 camera at a time when multiple cameras have issues -- experience shows even with RMA, you might need to get it right in multiple rounds, because you guys haven't figured out the root cause so every swap is just a random hit or miss. We spent $$$ on this product and many of us like it, but this issue is driving lots of frastration.

I, for one, am seriously considering returning the product to Bestbuy at end of this week (within 15 days) if your support doesn't move faster.

[Ultbruin]

ArloPro_gk:  sorry to hear that your night vision is not working.  Seems like you should try to remedy the unit instead of living with the issue as you did pay for the product to work.

Ysu:  I feel you man.  It took me a week of Q&A with the online back/forth tech before they finally offered me a RMA this morning.  Since you have 3 cameras that aren't working as they should I would just return the entire thing to Best Buy.  Much easier, faster.  If you still have faith in this company, then buy another set.  If not, look elsewhere.  I have 3 cameras that are working flawlessly and will have to assume that it's just 1 camera that is defective at this time and am willing to go through with the RMA.  I think in the future it may be faster to call Netgear on the phone to run diagnostics.  But then I don't want to spend half the day on the phone.  It's not like we want to RMA a product.  It's such a pain in the arse!  This is the first time that I can remember in > 10 years of technology product use that I've had a defective product.

[ysu]

Thanks for understanding. Yes I've been doing email support, not phone call, because like you said, I don't have time to be stuck on phone all day. Customer who buys this camera probably 1) has a job so they can afford it; and 2) has a family and maybe kids so they care about safety. That means email support is the easiest way for our daily schedule.

[foxfly]

Nice summary ysu! I have tried 4 sets of the 4-camera system from Best Buy, and each set had two or three cameras giving me this problem. One of the sets had an additional problem that as soon as I logged in the app, 3 cameras sent out false alerts and started to record. This problem has also been reported in this forum. I tested the cameras outside as well as in my closet to simulate dark environment with room temperature, since initially I thought it was related to temperature (which turned out to be wrong). I had spent many hours on testing those units as other users did. I eventually got really tired of dealing with this, and had my last replacement returned. The failure rate is so high, so it should be very easy to reproduce the problem. What worries me is that Netgear doesn't seem to have identified the problem yet as of today. Arlo pro is a great idea. If they have this problem fixed in the future, I'll definitely purchase it again.

[arlobro]

Sorry haven't responded, been busy!

This is where I stand with Netgear:

We would like to let you know the issue you reported is now being looked into by Engineering and QA. In the meanwhile, we are expecting a new hardware revision of the Pro cameras, due in about two months. We'll be happy to process any needed exchanges at that time. Thank you for the patience and for reporting the issue to us.

Hope that H9 fixes it 🙂

H7 seems to be your best bet if you happen to get a good working one.   Every H8 I tried has the ticking and or the false motion events. I think may not just be hardware but location of the night vision led array.  Making the best with what I got so far, but will be following up until this is fixed and I receive all working cams (I need at a minimum 2 replaced, possibly 3 - I think the one that was working fine after a couple weeks of service has now developed the false motion issue, something may have burned out... or burned in?)

[foxfly]

That's good, at least we know there is a time frame of about 2 months. 

[arlobro]

Yeah, I just hope it's not lip service because the issue is not going away anytime soon.

You'd think by now they would have figured out exactly what the cause is.

As I said in previous post, my suspicions are either a bad part snuck its way into manufacturing, or plain old poor design where it's triggering itself with its own night vision led array (trying to improve night vision distance and motion range introduced a major flaw?)..I think the fix for that case is pretty much Arlo Pro+ version 2.0 cams...whenever they come out

[Ultbruin]

Thanks for the update arlobro.  Disconcerting to hear that the H8 unit are not performing.  Hope my RMA unit works.  Otherwise this can get very drawn out waiting for the H9.  My other 3 H7 cameras have performed flawlessly thus far.

[manofice]

If they have finally identified the problem, they should be able to know which devices have or could potentially have this problem and do a recall. What happens when this happens when everyone's warranty is out?