Camera(s) stops recording - reboot only solution

[Seattlegrunge]

I have had Arlo Wire-Free for several years, without any big issues. In February I bought Arlo Ultra with 3 cameras (appr. $1300 including mounts, outdoor power cables etc) and it worked fine in the beginning (except for the install, where the smart hub didn't connect/update so I had to perform the first install by my parents house). But since a couple of months ago the cameras stop recording/recognizing movements. Not all three at the same time, but one camera, or sometimes two. The only solution to get a non-recording camera to record is to reboot the smart hub. Then the camera works as supposed again - for a couple of hours or maybe up to 20 hours sometimes. Then it stops recording/recognizing movements again and I have too reboot the smart hub again. Very unreliable system!

It is not always the same camera. Sometimes it happens to the camera closest (6 feet) to the smart hub, sometimes to the camera furthest away (40 feet) and sometimes the camera in between (9 feet). When a camera starts recording/recognizing movements it doesn't show any live view. When clicking the play button the load icon starts spinning, but live view picture doesn't appear in the app. Terrible! Not acceptable for a system of this big sum of money! All cameras are in a Smart plan, so that is not the issue.

This unreliable behaviour (forcing you to reboot all the time, extra annoying when not at home for a trip) is not acceptable at all! There must be a fix to this huge problem. And I know that I am not alone, several posts in this forum is about the same problem. I also have several friends that have Arlo Pro 2 (on my recommendation) and they start to experience the same problem, but not as frequent as with Arlo Ultra.

Also the activity zones haven't worked for a couple of weeks. Thats leads to a big bunch of alerts (when the camera does record/recognize movements) that I have chosen to not get (alerts that are outside the activity zones).

There are so many flaws to this expensive system. I have recommended Arlo to other people for several years, I have been talking proudly of my good cameras/surveillance system to many people. My recommendations to other have given Arlo at least 6 new customers, probably more. I can't recommend Arlo anymore, not right now, with all these problems. And I am ashamed of my friends and family that now are having issues with their systems.

Get your expensive product working! It is that simple and plain.

[LandJS]

This is getting so old, not one recording or notification for almost 24 hours.  I can walk by and trigger all 7 cameras without either working and it's BS.  If Arlo can't fix this issue they damn sure owe us a rebate until they do, what service can charge you while it's not working.  JamesC and the rest quit telling us they are working on it, when is the question, when is the damned thing expected to be fixed.

[LandJS]

yup 40 mins waiting for Arlo support, 1 hour 40 mins with support and he says, "let me go check" and poof just like that session ended.  By the time he got done with testing not only are cams not working again they are all no longer synced again and I have to remove everything and start from scratch for the 4th time since this firmware update.  BS is what it is, nothing but BS and their looking at it.  BS anyone who has been on here knows that will be a month or more.

[KingSolomon]

On 4/27 Arlo released an update that stopped recording all cameras because they no longer trigger movement or sound. For 9 days I was not aware of this until I needed to see a recording and realized nothing was recorded. I did not make any changes to my Arlo system. When I reached out to customer support they advised that I reset all cameras. I reset one camera but was not able to add it back as the Arlo system refused to add it back on my iPhone. On an android device I was able to "add" it back; however, I do not see the new camera -- in other words I got the successful message, but that camera is not in the list.

I am able to see live stream on all cameras and the movement test is successful. When I move around the cameras at night, the light turns on, but does not record at anytime of the day. I even tried manual recording and that works.

When can I expect a fix for this from Arlo software engineers (who messed this up)?

[LandJS]

That has been the issue since the last hub firmware.  As you said live works, manual record works, detection and lights work but no recording or notifications.  The only fix I know of is to reset the hub (the little push button) and start over.  install the hub and manually re-sync each camera.  Then redo all your settings until it happens again.  I had to do it three times now and so yesterday I spent 1 hour 40 mins with support until we were cut off (seems to happen a lot on support anymore) the last thing they had me do which I was avoiding because I knew what would happen was the basic reset and sure enough the no cameras available screen or something similar pops up at the top of the page and there I was redoing it for the 4th time.

[KingSolomon]

Unfortunately this is not the first time Arlo messes up and I am extremely unhappy with their QA team if they have one and their engineering team for not writing tests.

Their release process needs to be improved and if it fails, it needs to be reverted back. Unfortunately it seems they lack all of the above and the responsibilities to their customers. If I knew about this before I bought the cameras, I wouldn't have bought them.

What bothers me the most is not the fact that they released a broken software (although that of itself is unacceptable), but the fact that they are careless about it and will not release another update until they decide to do so.

[ShayneS]

Hi @ Seattlegrunge

  Please contact the Support Team to further investigate this issue. You will find several options for contacting support in the provided link. Arlo Tech Support

[KingSolomon]

@ShayneS and to all other moderators and employees of Arlo:

YOUR CUSTOMERS ARE HAVING ISSUES WITH YOUR SYSTEM THAT NONE OF OUR CAMERAS ARE WORKING AS EXPECTED INCLUDING THE VERY BASIC REASON WHY WE BOUGHT SUCH EXPENSIVE SYSTEM SPENDING OVER TWO THOUSAND US DOLLARS. THE REASON IS BECAUSE THE SOFTWARE ENGINEERS AT ARLO SIMPLY/ -- THEY ARE SO HORRIBLE THAT WE, YOUR CUSTOMERS, DEEPLY REGRET PURCHASING YOUR SYSTEM.

SOLUTION IS SIMPLE: FIX YOUR AND GET THE SYSTEM WORKING AS OF 3 WEEKS AGO!!!

If Arlo does not want to fix their, no problem, buy our cameras back at the same amount it cost us to buy them on amazon and any other retailer we purchased them in.

FIX Your AND THAT IS ALL

RELEASE A FIX OR REVERT TO PREVIOUS RELEASE

FIRE ALL SOFTWARE ENGINEERS AND GET GOOD ONES. YOUR SYSTEM IS EXPENSIVE AND YOU CAN AFFORD TO DO SO.

FIRE ALL YOUR QUALITY ASSURANCE ENGINEERS AND GET GOOD ONES THAT WILL TEST YOUR SYSTEM BEFORE IT GETS RELEASED.

All this is very very simple.

WE -- YOUR CUSTOMERS -- SHOULD NOT HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT ARLO SYSTEM NOT WORKING, NOR DO WE HAVE TO FIX ARLO's MISTAKES/ERRORS WHATEVER YOU WANT TO CALL IT.

I am shouting because it seems the answer to all your problems is call customer service and your customer service says "yeah, we released a broken system and we don't know when it will be fixed"

THIS IS COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE!

My system has not been recording since April 27th 3AM -- the time when new software was released.

FIX THE ARLO SYSTEM NOW!!!

[ShayneS]

Hi @KingSolomon

Can you provide more details regarding the issue you are experiencing?

-When did this issue first occur?

-What are the status LED's displaying on your base station?

-Is this occurring on Arlo Ultra cameras only?

What trouble shooting steps have you performed?

[KingSolomon]

@ShayneS 

- When did this issue first occur?

  On April 27th at 3am -- the time when arlo released an update. I only noticed it 9 days later because arlo failed to provide any sort of notification

- What are the status LED's displaying on your base station?

  Blue -- which is exactly why I thought everything is normal

- Is this occurring on Arlo Ultra cameras only?

  Yes -- I don't have any other arlo products

- What trouble shooting steps have you performed?

1. Called arlo customer service twice
2. At the suggestion of arlo customer service restarted base station
3. At the suggestion of arlo customer service restarted my router
4. At the suggestion of arlo customer service removed one camera from my arlo account and now I am unable to add it back because the arlo system fails to "rename" the camera.

Do you have any additional questions that I did not describe in my previous comments in this post?

[LandJS]

common ShaynS "call support"  I have 6 tickets with support over this since the firmware update, both camera support and smart support.  The last one for over 1 hour 40 mins after a 40 min wait, the one before, more than an hour.  They don't need more details and don't even answer the tickets.  This wasn't happening to anyone before the firmware update and has had a steady stream of complaints since.  It's not rocket science.

[LandJS]

ShayneS go look at ticket #41635013 and get the whole list of what was tried.  This guy was the most knowledgeable I had so far

[Seattlegrunge]

Calling the support team is not going to help. I will be told the same standard questions and procedures; restart the camera, restart the base, resync the cameras, reinstall the base etc. Didn't help last time, not the times before that either.

You must be able to see that this is a wide spread error. The cameras stops recording/recognizing motion and the activity zones does not work anymore. This forum is proof of that. Many, many threads from different Arlo Ultra users are highlighting these problems. You must come to a solution.

Your support team are always very friendly, I have called them/been chatting with them several times, but the instructions never work (instructions that everyone already tries since that is basic things you test with tech stuff). The forum is a much better place to get input from.

My old cameras do not have this problem, the work and work (they are connected to the old hub). I am not able to dismout my Ultra cameras just to resync them. I am injured since February and can't climb a ladder. Probably I will be able to do so in September, if I am lucky.

The problem with camera stops recording/recognizing motion (not the same camera each time) started in March (don't know exactly when) and the activity zone problem started some weeks ago, in April.

[tamazyan]

I'm having same problem after last update, I have already reset it my system and reconfigured the cameras 5 times. And whenever contacting to technical support, they don't know what are they talking about, I'm very disappointed.

Also I noticed after latest update, every time rebooting base-station my 5 cameras goes back to default settings, and I have to reconfigure one by one.

[Rick1984]

Hi. Just like another person said. I have one particular camera that will only detect motion and not record at all. Only about 1 sec of it. Then you go the video it shows a motion or video detected and it says 0 seconds. Also it doesn’t connect to live. It just keeps connecting and connecting and it finally says is can’t connect. I have reset the whole system twice. And re sync cameras and that particular one keeps doing the same thing. Soooo annoying! Please help arlo.

[LandJS]

NO I did not get the answer I needed.  I did not get an answer at all and the firmware is still broken.

[n1976jmk]

@ShayneS 

@JamesC 

good afternoon Shayne and James, if you look at some other recent threads, they are all the same issue as this one.  Which customers have been begging for help with their offline systems.

no offense Shanyne, but to ask people to contact support in the typical canned response.  You can see all of these customers have been.  My system started doing this the other day too.

Please take real action and escalate to Arlo engineers to get a fix.

as everyone has been saying it started on the exact day when the Ultra base station firmware was released April 27.

please!

[LandJS]

ShanyeB ???, JamesC ??? Anybody at Arlo ???

[n1976jmk]

@LandJS 

I am just not sure why Shayne is using that same copy and paste ‘canned’ method to tell me people to contact support when he can see it’s affecting many people and being reported for weeks.

I wish they were escalating it and getting back to us with information wheather the issue could be fixed from there end or a new firmware rollout.

@JamesC 

please some type of update for us would be beyond appreciated.

[ShayneS]

@LandJS @n1976jmk

I am looking in to these reports & I will provide an update as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience.

[n1976jmk]

Thank you!

[Seattlegrunge]

@ShayneS

Yes, please look for solutions to these issues asap. We are many customers who have reported these for several weeks without any answers. We have paid huge money for our camera systems, and are still paying customers while we pay for the smart plan subscriptions. At least we can demand functioning cameras/hubs.

We understand that things can go wrong sometimes, and we normally have patience, but when we get no answers week after week something doesn't feel right. Hopefully that feeling can be turned to a more positive feeling again, like all the other years we have been customers. I would like to brag about my Arlo system again.

[LandJS]

The way I see it, it has already been more than three weeks going on a month, Arlo at the very least owes us a refund for this month of paid service.  I brought this up to support on my last ticket and didn't even get an acknowledgment relating to that.  If I pay you for a month of service I don't receive you owe me a month of service and lucky I don't bill you for labor for the 4 times I had to climb ladders and redo 7 cameras.  Some have to pay an installer.

[KingSolomon]

Absolutely and not only that but Arlo would be legally liable should anything happen and the recordings are missing

[ShayneS · Accepted solution]

We have released an update that should resolve the issue with cameras not recording. You can find more information pertaining this update here. Arlo SmartHub VMB5000 - 1.16.1.4_550_7655954 - 19th May 2020 

Please let us know if you continue to experience this issue