Sudden Battery drain

[Valiantclan]

 3 cameras seem to drain their batteries in 1 week. . . In the last couple months. I've have the system for almost 2 years now, and never had problems before. The batteries are Streamlight 123, Store bought. I've swapped camera locations around to closer ones. I've tried other batteries, and they die quicker. I've removed and re-connected all cameras to try to isolate the issue, and the same 3 cameras still drain the batteries in a week. This seemed to start at the beginning of the year. Thet 're all indoor usage, and none are over 25 feet in distance, with just standard walls. Has anyone notices a degridation in operation with the original systems? I have a base with 5 cameras.

[jguerdat]

I have 4 originals with no noticeable increase in battery usage. Have you restarted the base?  Any chance something near the base has changed, something with a 2.4GHz wireless rdio?

[szollar]

We also have 5 cameras and are having the same problem, despite that the camera was turned off after new battery replacement last weekend. One of the cameras showed the battery drained, and after he replaced the battery, the camera wouldn't synch. Each time he reset the base station or the camera, another camera wouldn't synch, a wack-a-mole situation until eventually none of them would synch. He ended up rebuilding the entire system from scratch, after replacing the batteries, and even turned one of the Arlo cameras off after battery replacement. One week later the battery is drained in that camera, even though the camera was off all week.

[brh]

@Valiantclan @szollar

Usually rapid battery drain is caused by the camera losing its communication with the base and trying to continually establish a connection to the base. It might not be anything that you changed, but it could be interferrence from a neighbor's devices that they recently purchased that uses the 2.4 Ghz band, (which is very crowded anyway), 

Try taking one of the cameras that is draining the fastest and temporarily bring it closer to the base and see how long the batteries last. If it is interferrence you might need to purchase an additional base station and put some cameras on each to improve the communication signal strength. That is what I had to do.

Brian

[sholden]

I have an Arlo camera (H7) with firmware 1.2.16720 that has for the last couple of months that was working fine and then will drain without sending out a warning email.  I've tried moving it around and swapping out batteries from my other unit which hasn't had any issues.

[JamesC]

sholden,

How long are the batteries lasting? How much usage does that camera see (live streaming, recordings, etc.)

Have you checked your email spam filter for the low battery emails?

JamesC

[sholden]

JamesC, 

They are lasting 7-8 days.  The other two Arlos are sending out low battery warnings, this one doesn't. Netgear is going to replace the unit once I ship it back to them (my cost for shipping to).

Steve

[TVMike]

I have been having the same problem with my H7 and tried moving the 1 of 4 units that is draining the batteries in about a week and tried moving it closer to the base station. The results were the same. I have one camera on that same basestation that I replaced the batteries on November 1, 2017 and it shows 65% of juice left on those batteries. I am not going to waste any more money on putting batteries in this one camera until there is a solution or NG replaces the offending camera.

FW 1.2.16720

[jguerdat]

They won't replace the camera from a post here - this is a user forum. You need to open a case with support here.

[YetiCreature]

Yes, 2 of my 3 cameras have recently started doing the same.  They are about 14 months old with stock Arlo batteries.  Smells of a software issue as I used to get approximately 6-8 months standby time.  Obviously Arlo couldn't leave good enough alone!

[JamesC]

The engineering team is currently investigating recent reports of increased battery drain. When I have more information on this issue, i'll provide an update.

JamesC

[Tiffany0918]

Has this issue been addressed?

[ShayneS]

Hi Tiffany0918,

The engineering team is still hard at work investigating this. We will provide information as soon as we receive it.

[gauravie]

Hi All 

I have same issues. I have cameras working for last 6 months and now suddenly this problem. My batteries are not lasting for 3-4 days.

regards

Gaurav

[bellbirdweb17]

I am suddenly having this problems as well.

Post from September saying they are working hard to on it, any updates now its November ?