Driveway Camera

[David Paul]

I am looking for a driveway camera to monitor vehicles as they approach the house. Wireless and an alert when vehicles approached. iOS protocol and video to amazon spot would be ideal. Prefer cloud storage if possible but not a priority. Mainly interested in just knowing when someone is coming up the driveway then security.
Ideas?

 

[mtwaterguy]

"ring"

 

[iahawk]

I second the Ring camera..wireless, sends motion alerts to your phone and records video of all movement and stores it in the cloud

 

[iahawk]

The Ring doorbell camera is also an option, depending where your front door is relative to your driveway.

 

[apollo11]

Blink XT
free cloud

 

[jhelrey]

Does the Ring cost money monthly?

 

[jrunde]

Ring has a yearly fee of $30 per device for up to 3 devices if you want cloud storage. 4 or more is $100 per year total

 

[James-W]

Someone at the bowling alley was telling me they had a camera on their garage pointed at the driveway and whenever there was movement the camera turned on and they got a picture of the driveway and whatever was there on their television set.

 

[mrrooG8]

We love our Ring. I might splurge for the cloud storage option now that the 30 free days of storage is over. Picture and video quality is really good.

 

[PeteyDaMan]

I use the Arlo cameras. Free 7 day storage and completely wireless. Batteries last about 4 months depending on how much recording they do. The smart phone app will alert when motion is detected by any camera and will proceed to record for however long you have them set.

 

[Bretny]

You guys are thinking real expensive.
HF has a wireless driveway alarm for $20. You can get mmany on the same frequency and use one or more that one sensor.

I have been useing this system for about a year at 350ft with the same batterys down to -10*

 

[diario]

my brother uses a ring flood light camera. he loves it.

 

[White Shadow]

I have a driveway alarm that uses a magnetometer instead of motion sensors to sound an alert inside the house when a vehicle comes up the driveway. The alert has many different sounds, but the one I like is actually the sound of dogs barking. My dog isn't too crazy about it though.

 

[thickhead]

I have a half dozen Blink cameras (3 inside and 3 outside) that cover all doors and the driveway & outside of the garage.
They record on motion and have free cloud storage with a data limit that knocks out the oldest clips first.
I have had the indoor units for 18 months and just got the outdoor units last week. You can easily arm only the ones you want to from your iPhone.
Nice, simple system with good software. Hub (about 2”x 2”) connects to your WiFi and the cameras and needs an ac outlet. I have cameras up to 60ft from the hub with no issues. The cameras themselves are maybe 2 1/2” square and batteries last for a lot of use.

Works great for me.

 

[thickhead]

Also (good or bad) Blink was just purchased by Amazon so I’m thinking they are going to stick around for a while......the reason I finally bought the outdoor units.

If you have cloud cameras for a company that closes who knows if they will be worthless or not.

 

[77Birdman]

I want to add new/updated cameras around my place. I don't want to pay a maintenance fee. I like the Arlo but was concerned about the power. I know those batteries are expensive and it looks like each camera holds 4 of them. Not sure over a couple of years time they would be cost effective. I have not seriously looked into anything yet and liked the idea of the Ring, until i just read it has a monthly fee.

 

[thickhead]

^
No monthly fee and uses 2 AA batteries.

https://blinkforhome.com

 

[ford33]

I installed three Blink indoor cameras this past weekend. They were very easy to install and the picture quality is very good. Using them outdoors over a long distance would be an issue. They have a wide field of view and a car 40 feet away would be a small object. They offer an outdoor camera XT series.

 

[bwringer]

We've been playing around with a Wyze cam at work, and it's pretty frickin' amazing for a measly $25. The apps work great. Checks all your boxes.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076H3SRXG/?tag=atomicindus08-20

A pretty decent review:
https://www.pcmag.com/review/358099/wyzecam

We added a 32GB microSD card, which stores several days of video.

 

[Showkey]

YI cameras on amazon and other places...........similar to other brands mentioned.
I have them in the home, shop, garage and indoor facing the driveway.

Also have two of their dash cams........has come in handy twice so far.

https://store.yitechnology.com/coll...6d6Xaz_GHz7t0GGj8H6J4LuZ0fLl5PJUaArgKEALw_wcB

 

[apollo11]

We've been playing around with a Wyze cam at work, and it's pretty frickin' amazing for a measly $25. The apps work great. Checks all your boxes.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076H3SRXG/?tag=atomicindus08-20

A pretty decent review:
https://www.pcmag.com/review/358099/wyzecam

We added a 32GB microSD card, which stores several days of video.

mine died
you also need power where the cam is
support is sketchy at best

 

[ole442]

I use the Arlo cameras. Free 7 day storage and completely wireless. Batteries last about 4 months depending on how much recording they do. The smart phone app will alert when motion is detected by any camera and will proceed to record for however long you have them set.

I have had the Arlo Pro system for approaching a year. So far so good and my daughter just installed them at her home.

 

[bruceu]

I have had the Arlo Pro system for approaching a year. So far so good and my daughter just installed them at her home.

I'll throw in a third show of support for Arlo.

Positives:
Batteries last for months, not weeks between recharge...assuming they only have occasion to record 1-2x a day
Good wireless range on the cameras
Easy setup. Takes minutes
The app is great
Free cloud storage for a week. If you want to save a recording, you can though
Good picture quality

Negatives:
There is a second or two lag between motion detection and when the video starts recording. Hasn't been a problem for me though
Not cheap but not terribly expensive for what you get
FYI - does not work through windows (I think because the motion sensor detects heat...that is how it works)

 

[ishiboo]

I don't like wireless or any of the solutions for cameras.

I have a Reolink POE camera that points at the driveway, and a Dakota Alert driveway alarm. The Reolink will send a photo when it detects motion, but I've found the most reliable solution is to use the driveway alarm to trigger a little script to send a photo... the PIR sensor is almost immune to false alarms, and never fails to detect a person walking on the driveway or a vehicle.

If I wasn't lazy, I could set it up so it doesn't send a photo when my girlfriend leaves/gets home from work, too.

 

[nelstomlinson]

I don't like wireless or any of the solutions for cameras.

I have a Reolink POE camera that points at the driveway, and a Dakota Alert driveway alarm. The Reolink will send a photo when it detects motion, but I've found the most reliable solution is to use the driveway alarm to trigger a little script to send a photo... the PIR sensor is almost immune to false alarms, and never fails to detect a person walking on the driveway or a vehicle.

This one I really like the sound of. Could you share some more details, and maybe the script?

 

[D1005]

After our neighbor broke in the garage and stole a bunch of stuff (while he was out on bail for that, he was caught with goods in his car from 3 other robberies he just committed, and the judge let him go free on all counts, go figure) we put up an EzViz camera system. It works well as far as images go, though the snow messes with picture exposure, but the software *****.

I'd like to add a driveway alarm, but have my doubts about motion sensors being buried in snow, or weeds, as they appear to be close to the ground. Plus, the end of the driveway is quite a hike from any power source. I've wondered about the magnetometer kind as previously mentioned, but haven't seen any. Little afraid of what they may cost on a very limited budget.