Arlo (VMS3330) Is Not Recording Or Live Streaming After Netgear Nighthawk R9000 Update

[themos]

Hello, I've had this arlo system for more than a year working perfectly fine with my Netgear Nighthawk X10. I noticed that after updating the router to firmware V1.0.4.12 the cameras stopped responding. Regardless if I use the mobile app or web interface the live feed does not come through. The camera makes a 'click' sound and I can see the infrared lights come on only for a brief moment and then it turns off with no result. A message "The device failed to connect. Please try again" pops up. I noticed also that it does not even show me the battery status or any other information about the cameras.

I tried soft rebooting the base unit, nothing. I tried turning off and on, still nothing. The base unit does connect to the internet and I can interract with it from the app/web interface (i.e change the mode etc..). I tried to remove all cameras and restore to factory defaults. I was able to readd the base unit to my account but not the cameras. Altho the blinking blue lights on the camera units suggest a successful sync with the base unit they never show in the app or the interface anymore.

Pluging the base unit to a separate router fixes everything. I was able to readd/sync the cameras with the base unit and the cameras stream fine. Swithcing back to the nighthawk and I'm back to the original issue where the cameras don't respond. I still get notification on my phone when geolocation changes and modes change. I also get motion alerts when something is detected (when I was doing my tests for example) but then nothing appears in the library. It seems the cameras get triggered but either not recording or not uploading to nergear.

It was suggested to me by arlo support that the wifi from my router maybe interfering. I tried turning the radio off for both 2.4 and 5GHz and still nothing. It was working fine with wifi on anyway and even when I successfully got it to work with a different router my nighthawk was still on.

Firewall rules have not changed on my router. I can still reach netgear servers just fine. I've noticed in other posts that ports 80, 443 and possibly 123 need to be allowed to netgear and I confirm that is the case. There are no blocked services in my router's config.

Does anyone have any ideas of what might be going on here?

Thanks,

Themos

[jguerdat]

I agree that it sounds like the signal from the base is being interfered with from the router. While I have a base sitting right next to my X6S/R8000P router and have no problems, others have noted that moving the base away from the router has helped. You could simply stretch the Ethernet cable to reposition the base and/or router or connect the base to a WiFi or powerline extender.

[themos]

Hello and thank you for your reply. I tried to move the base unit to a different room and connect on a switch I have. No difference. The base unit does connect to the internet but the cameras still don't work.

I spoke again to arlo support and they told me to downgrade the firmware of my netgear router. I have a backup of my config, but I'm wondering if I'll be able to retain my settings or restore them if i downgrade. I'm a bit relactant to just downgrade the router. They suggested that it could be a bug in the latest version of the Nighthawk R9000 router I have. Looking online for this issue it doesn't seem there are any known issues with the router.

I'm quite convinced the router is the factor here because as an experiment I tethered my phone to my laptop and shared that connection via ethernet to the arlo base unit and all worked fine.

[jguerdat]

Hmmm.  This could be a tough one. WHat happens if you set the base into the DMZ?

Downgrading should be fine as long as you also reset the router before loading your backup config for that firmware. Be sure to backup your current config should you choose to upgrade again. BTW, did you happen to reset the router when you last upgraded? Sometimes that's recommended.

[themos · Accepted solution]

I was very relactant to downgrade my router. I wanted to try everything before it got to that. So today I decided to swap my modem (Netgear DM200) with another vdsl modem (both in bridge mode) and I was surprised to find out that arlo started working fine. I then put back the DM200 and arlo stopped working. I restored the DM200 and set it up again. But no luck. So it seems the problem is the Netgear DM200. I don't know what exactly. There are no firewall rules of any sort in that modem. I simply configured it to connect to my ISP, changed the mode to "modem only" and plugged it to my router.

I'm not sure if this is a known thing and Netgear will fix it but, searching on google I found a few people reporting issues with the DM200 and IOT.