VMB5000 Continually losing contact with cameras

[ChicagoArlo]

My VMB500r4 'SmartHub' keeps losing contact with the two cameras, which are an Ultra and a Pro 2.  

This has always been an issue with this setup, happening at random.   It could work fine for weeks, then I'd notice that the base was flickering amber, check the app and see that the cameras were offline, sometimes had been for a while.  Usually I could fix the issue by resetting the hub.  Sometimes the problem would come back a day later, but mostly it worked okay.    I cleverly (?) set up a Kasa wifi remote switch to turn the hub off every night for 2 minutes, then back on, and that seemed to prevent the problem, though not always.

Lately the problem is much worse, with the cameras going offline a few times a day.   I even changed the Kasa switch to go off/on every four hours, but still I'll find that the cameras are offline.

I've had this two-camera Arlo setup for a few years.   It's an unusual setup in that it monitors the exterior of our place, and we're on a corner in a city neighborhood.   It's a neighborhood of single family houses, not 'downtown,' but still: the cameras pick up motion and record it all the time, not just occasionally.  In the middle of the night there may be a walker or car only a few times an hour, but at busy times of the day, the cameras record several times a minute.  So the base gets a LOT more data than most probably do.    I figured this was the issue with the base: it's overloaded by too much data, so a regular reset to 'flush the system' should help.  And it did, but apparently no longer.

Firmware on the hub appears to be up to date, 'No updates available.'  It is 1.21.1.0_1431_9611cf3

Is the hub just cooked?   There's no 'better' newer model to change to.

Any advice welcomed!

[Edinburgh_lad1]

What's the actual message that makes you think the connection is lost, and does the colour of the LED change, too?

Unfortunately, there's no way to change WiFi channels of your base station, nor there is an option to select either 2.4GHz or 5GHz band. Presumably, though, in a family house, there's little interference from other devices emitting WiFi signal (other routers).

What could help you is moving the base station closer to the cameras. If the proximity to the router prevents you from that, you can use powerline adapters. 

I don't think switching the base station on and off does it any good - it's meant to run on non-stop. Switching it on and off all the time means that the base station needs to establish a connection with each camera from scratch. 

Another issue may be some objects, like metal objects, that could potentially impede the signal strength. 

Finally, what is your broadband speed like? 

[ChicagoArlo]

The actual message is the usual 'the Arlo device appears to be offline.'  As I said, when this happens, the hub/base light flickers amber. 

I can't move the base station.  It took a lot of trial and error to find this position, where it's located about midway between the cameras in order to have an adequate signal from both.  Nothing in the house has changed that would affect the wireless connection.

And yes, power cycling it (and the Netgear range extender it's attached to via ethernet cable) does do good.  When the hub's connection to the cameras has been lost, power cycling enables the hub to re-establish the connection.

We have fiber internet, and speed (I just checked) is 325 up, 319 down.   

[StephenB]

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

 As I said, when this happens, the hub/base light flickers amber. 

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The next time it happens, I suggest connecting your phone to the extender wifi, disable mobile data, and see if you have internet service when connected to the extender wifi.

Your path is internet -> router -> extender -> base -> cameras

The router and internet speed are great, but it would be useful to confirm that the extender is still working properly.

[ChicagoArlo]

That's a good suggestion, but the system has not been cooperative today--there's been no outage! 

It's possible I am misunderstanding how it all works, but my assumption has been that the cameras are upstream from the hub/base, and since I never have a problem contacting the base, the problem must be between the base and cameras, probably on the base side since it's both cameras.   (Actually one camera was acting up a couple of weeks ago but a replacement battery and complete reboot seems to have fixed that.   Both cameras are hardwired but it seems the battery still has to be functional.)

I will update if there's another outage and I can test with my phone.

[StephenB]

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

It's possible I am misunderstanding how it all works, but my assumption has been that the cameras are upstream from the hub/base, and since I never have a problem contacting the base, the problem must be between the base and cameras, probably on the base side since it's both cameras.   

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It does sound like it's at the base, but I think it still could be linked to a mis-behaving extender.   

[jguerdat]

In a FWIW thought, I also occasionally get to see my hub blinking amber. If I check cameras, they're offline. However, the issue resolves shortly and, since the hub isn't always being watched, I have no idea how often this occurs. It would appear to be something anyplace between my router and the servers that is causing a drop in the connection. I have a fairly large number of devices connected to the hub but not as much traffic as what you describe. The thought is that it's not a hub issue but a connection one.

[StephenB]

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@jguerdat wrote:

It would appear to be something anyplace between my router and the servers that is causing a drop in the connection. 

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Or the extender dropping the router wifi link, and then reconnecting to it.

There are some tools that will repeatedly ping (every second) and graph the results.  gping is one (though it's been a while since I tried it).  You could run something like that on a PC, pinging the base station, and look for drops that way.

Or use the built-in ping with -n and put the output in a file instead of on the screen.  You'll get a lot of output if you do it this way.

[ChicagoArlo]

The not-exactly-good news is that the cameras did go offline again, but I am a bit embarrassed to report that I couldn't access the extender with my phone, because it requires a password that I evidently didn't set up.   Or maybe it's a default on the device.   Anyway, before I could do more digging into that, the Kasa switch caused a reset and it's all functioning again.

I do think there's some reason to think that the extender is the problem, though.   For one thing, I see that in my office, where the router is, the wifi network signals (2.4 and 5G) from the extender are inconsistent.   For another, looking at my history here I see that the extender was the source of a problem I had a couple of years ago with this setup.   StephenB, you helped me with that, so I am certainly inclined to think you're onto something this time too.

I'm going to experiment with this and also see if I can't figure out what pw the extender has.   I don't understand why the loss of *downstream* connection would cause the hub to report that it's lost contact with the *cameras,* but there are a lot of things in this world that I don't understand.

[ChicagoArlo]

I moved the extender and hub to a location closer to the router, though it's probably worse for connection with one of the two cameras.   So far so good, though with a random intermittent problem who knows when it may show its ugly head again.

In the meantime I remembered that the extender's initial setup just uses the pw from the router you're connecting to, so that works.   The extender is showing good connection to the router so maybe all really will be well.   ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

[ChicagoArlo]

Okay, I already have my answer.   After working for only about a half hour, the hub lost contact with the cameras.   On my phone I can connect to the wifi extender's network and access the internet just fine (yes, cell data off), so that's not the problem.    Something is causing the hub to drop contact with the cameras, both of them at the same time, and if anything, it's getting worse, multiple times a day, so that power-cycling every few hours doesn't really help that much.

[StephenB · Accepted solution]

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

 On my phone I can connect to the wifi extender's network and access the internet just fine (yes, cell data off), so that's not the problem.   

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Agreed.

A less likely possibility is that the extender's ethernet hardware is starting to fail.  Hard to rule that out, unless you connect the base directly to the router (and move one of the cameras, so it is close enough to get a good signal from the base in that spot).

It could be a failing base of course, but it'd be best not to replace unless you are sure.

[jguerdat]

It may not be the hubs losing contact with the cameras but the hub losing contact with the servers, as I mentioned before. If so, changing hubs won't solve it. Since I occasionally see the same sort of thing, I'm not at all convinced it's a hardware/local network thing.

[ChicagoArlo]

I've now got the hub in my office, connected to our router by ethernet cable.   This places the hub within a fifteen feet of one of the cameras, though far from the other.     So far (only about 15 mins), it seems to be working, though recordings from the far camera are intermittent.

We're about to go on a trip so if this fix gives me at least a partial view, I'll take it.   When we return I'm going to look into a new mesh wifi system.

[StephenB]

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@jguerdat wrote:

It may not be the hubs losing contact with the cameras but the hub losing contact with the servers, 

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That is of course a possibility.  Seems to be happening really often though.

[ChicagoArlo]

Going on 72 hours now, with no outages.   The Kasa remote switch is still doing an on-off of the hub every night at 2am, but I may turn it off as it seems unnecessary.

The further camera is not in good wifi range to the hub now, but the closer camera is rock solid.  

So the problem apparently has been the wifi repeater all along.   When we get home I will look for a better option for placing the hub and getting its signal to the router, probably via mesh.  

Thanks, StephenB and jguerdat!