Base Station Requirement?

[bstamper]

I'm researching before buying.

I'm seeing posts in the forum here where people are putting the cameras on their "own" wifi rather than connecting to the base station.  Is the base station a requirement?  Does it still have to exist on the network if the cameras are going to be on another wifi network or can the Cameras operate by themselves without the base station on the network?

I have an Enterprise Cisco Wireless deployment in my home consisting of multiple AP's properly placed around the house and would prefer to connect the cameras to it rather than the to base station.  This way I would know each camera is getting the best signal/quality.  

[TomMac]

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Arlo regular camera ( the water resistant eggs ) must link to the Arlo base... And will only link to same.  The base is connected by eithernet to a port on your router/switch and sets up it's own wifi system for the cameras to link to.

The Arlo Q camera will link directly to your  wifi system ( not an Arlo base ) and use that as it's connection to the internet.

[jguerdat · Accepted solution]

Slight modification - the wireless cameras can connect to the Netgear R7000 routers directly, bypassing the need for the base.  No other router at the moment can do this.

[bstamper]

Sorry, this still doesn't make sense to me?  No other router can do what?  If a camera can connect to a router its pure 802.11 (WiFi) and thus should be able to connect to any Wifi.  What exactly are you saying about the R7000 being the only router that can do this?

[jguerdat]

No other router than the R7000 will communicate with the wireless cameras - it essentially has the base station built-in. The wireless cameras require a proprietary WiFi connection to work while the Q cameras only need a WiFi connection to get to the servers (for all intents and purposes, it's as if they have a base station built into the camera).

So, you either use the base station or the Netgear R7000 router.  Those are your only choices for the wireless cameras.

[TomMac]

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bstamper wrote:

Sorry, this still doesn't make sense to me?  No other router can do what?  If a camera can connect to a router its pure 802.11 (WiFi) and thus should be able to connect to any Wifi.  What exactly are you saying about the R7000 being the only router that can do this?

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Yes, he is correct ( tho I thought there was some sw problems with the 7000 router lately )

The Arlo cam will only talk to the Arlo base ( or a 7000 ). Even tho it is wifi and 802.11 it will ONLY connect to a base unit.

[jguerdat]

Yeah, the firmware for the R7000 has issues so I'm using beta firmware that's readily available. The wireless cameras connect fine with 1.06.40 (there's a newer beta that doesn't include Arlo capability).

[bstamper]

Bah, OK, probably have to pass on the system then for now.  Makes no sense to add aditional 2.4Ghz RF to an already crowded environment just to run these cameras. 

[jguerdat]

If it's of use, the Q indoor cameras can operate on the 5GHz band as well.

[bstamper]

Woudl be...but the need to supply power (any wire really) to the camera is what I was trying to get around.  Have a brand new house that I can't justify running cable all over.