One camera offline orange light

[AmyNicole]

Randomly today one camera went offline after only having these 2 months. I rarely record video and this is the least used camera so I'm sure the battery is fine. The most used ones are more than half full.

If I "reset the base station" what does that mean and will that affect the other cameras? Do I have to re-sync them all? I tried pressing the sync button on the problem camera- orange light flashed for a second. . Then nothing.

[jguerdat]

Yes, resetting the base will require a whole new setup.  However, that doesn't seem to be required since you see the camera LED flash amber.  I'll wager you do, in fact, have weak/dead batteries which are noted by the LED flashing a slow amber. Use a fresh set of batteries or swap with another camera to prove this.

[AmyNicole]

Can anyone confirm this? "Whole new set up"? What does that mean exactly: that resetting the base means I have to take all the cameras down and re-sync them? That seems hard to believe that a company would make people do that just because of one not working camera? ....

[AmyNicole]

I'll try the batteries in case but I'm
99% sure it's not that.

[jguerdat]

A factory reset is a last ditch move. You usually don't need to do this but it's available.

[JamesC]

AmyNicole,

A reset (or factory reset) would require you to go through the setup process again adding the base station to your account and syncing all cameras. This doesn't seem necessary to resolve the issue you are describing.

A reboot of the base station (by pressing the on-off button) is a troubleshooting step that could be taken here that would not require any additional changes.

As suggested by jguerdat, it sounds like this is a low/depleted battery issue (slow flashing amber camera LED) and could be resolved by installing a fresh set.

JamesC

[AZPTChamp]

I have similar problem. One camera battery died. I replaced. Won't sync. Flashes orange. I tried 2 fresh sets of batteries, no luck. I tried working batteries in working camera in bad camera, and visa versa, still no luck. My batteries are confirmed good, however, my camera keeps saying bad batteries. Please help. Thx.

[AZPTChamp]

I've also turned base station off and on, no luck. Actually that created a 2nd problem. A 2nd camera won't sync now. Just flashing blue light. Although all lights on base station are green. Ugh.

[jguerdat]

Unfortunately, you may have to remove the cameras from Settings, My Devices and resync them.

[Dyno83]

jguerdat,

What you said did cause the led light to blink blue for a bit : when I deleted the camera from the account and removed the battery and plugged it into my pc with just the usb cable. Next, I tried to sync and the camera worked as long as it was plugged in to the cabloe. When I placed the battery back it started to flash orange again.  Today another camera that worked for two days is saying it is offline and I had to resync.  Do you think my batteries are being drained for some reason or has the camera battery gone bad? I am using the square rechargable batteries that come with the camera.  This system seems extremely unreliable, do you think I should return it? I can't go through this every few days...

Please let me know what the contact number is for customer service, I tried to find it and all I found is this FAQ and Message Board.

Thank you so much for helping

[jguerdat]

Try recharging the battery again. Wait at least 2.5hours, maybe a bit more, to see if the LED turns on and blue (assumes you haven't turned off the fully charged indicator in Settings). If it never turns on or if you then plug it in and leave it near the base only to find it rapidly depleted then you likely have a bad battery. If the system is new enough, swapmit at the store for another. Otherwise open a case here:

https://www.arlo.com/en-us/support/contact.aspx