Issue with night light following software update - spotlight on, night vision on!!!!! Arlo Ultra

[Antman68]

Hey Arlo, how come, following you latest software "upgrade", if you switch night vision off in settings the spotlight switches off too? Only happens on camera with CVR. I don't want night vision on as camera faces windows and there's a street light near by.... way too much interference for your product to handle!! Instructions say to switch off night vision if facing windows but, I switch night vision off, spot light goes off. I switch spot light on again, night vision gets switched on again too. WHY? I want the spotlight to come on when motion detected... colour image at night... just like I enjoyed before the update! Do you test your software before you release it? Same issue via iOS, Android and Windows devices. BTW - the update isn't an improvement - not one single part of it. Disappointing.

[StephenB]

Do you see "Library" in your app interface? Or do you instead see "Feed' and "Dashboard"?

[Antman68]

Dashboard, feed - in all three. Relevance?

[StephenB]

It's relevant because the current app supports two different user interfaces. With Feed, you should have NightVision set to "Color" in the NightVision settings, and should have the spotlight turned on in the Light Settings. Is that what you have?

[Antman68]

with the settings you suggest I see a poor black and white feed with flaring on the image (from infrared lamps)... if I then walk in front of the camera the spotlight doesn't consistently come on and motion isn't always registered and recorded. Sometimes it does see movement and the spotlight comes on and event is sometimes recorded... but it is not consistent. On previous version, night vision was completely off, spot light came on when motion detected and was always recorded. I want to turn night vision off completely.

[Antman68]

but if I turn off night vision completely the spot light is also switched off, even when there's motion! BTW - when reviewing CVR there's only one scale... before it was possible to zoom in on hours and minutes... don't see the option(s) any more.

[ShayneS]

Hi @Antman68 

By design, turning Night Vision to Black and White and/or Disabling Night Vision will automatically turn OFF Spotlight. The only time Spotlight will be turned ON is when Color is selected in Night Vision.

[Antman68]

Hi ShayneS, before the update I could have night vision off and spotlight on, this was on cameras without CVR and also on cameras with CVR.  Since the update this has changed for cameras with CVR... both on or both off.

This is what I see with night vision, in colour on left, B&W on right... not great!

[Antman68]

I should add that this is what I saw before the update too... only before I could switch night vision off and had a perfectly acceptable colour view which was then enhanced by the spotlight when motion detected.  If I want to see something on the timeline at night, outside of when motion is detected, there's really not much to see is there?

The instructions say that night vision maybe impaired by lighting, reflective surfaces... I don't have an issue with that... but I need the spotlight to come on when motion is detected.

[ShayneS]

Thanks, I added this info for the team to review. 

[ShayneS]

@Antman68 

The application in which you would like to use the camera is currently limited to spotlight ON/Night vision on. The night vision/infrared is used to detect the motion, then the camera follows your rule for Color/Spotlight ON or black and white Spotlight/Off. 

I can request  an enhancement for future consideration. 

[Antman68]

The previous version of the application worked fine for my purposes, how about I get to revert back?  Not sure how you manage to categorise a basic requirement as an "enhancement for future consideration"!  

It is now dark for fourteen hours per day which means I will be recording useless video for the majority of the 24 hour day... that is to say, the dark part when most of the things you'd rather didn't happen do.

Put another way, I have one security camera on continuous video recording (CVR 24/7) that doesn't record useable video at night.  Hmmm.

I also have the same type of security camera, not on CVR, that doesn't have the issue.

Occurs to me that the solution to the problem is, at minimum, to stop subscribing to CVR for this camera.

Is this Arlo's recommendation, to stop paying the higher subscription for CVR?  Is it really Arlo's position that a fully functional service should be considered "an enhancement" it might consider?

An alternative solution is to throw this Arlo rubbish in the bin and buy a product with software that works, at night, in all conditions and circumstances, but particularly... WHEN IT IS NEEDED!!!!!!

[Antman68]

Hey Arlo, now the camera without CVR won't allow the spotlight to be on without night vision being on too!

Rather than fix the side that didn't work, after your terrible software update, the non-CVR camera that was OK now isn't!

Also, when CVR stops randomly, requiring manual intervention to restart (sometimes after many hours because your software doesn't alert users about issues and I don't spend all day staring at your app), is this another one of those "enhancements"?   If not, perhaps you might consider a user alert for when CVR stops, as an "enhancement for future consideration".  Of course the alert wouldn't be required if CVR just worked... CONTINUOUSLY !

Clue is in the name, no?