Amcrest Battery Operated Outdoor Camera

[sydney]

Hello,

I have this Amcrest AB2WFCAM battery camera.

I just have two questions for now. Assume I have no physical access to the Smart HUB where the USB is
plugged into. Without using my android app, any other way I can get access to this HUB to look at
videos captured? I have the IP of the HUB.

Assume I will mount this camera in a low traffic location with 2-3 motion detections per day, how
many days do you expect a fully charged battery to last before the next recharge? Spec says it's a 2300mAh
battery.


Thanks

[sydney]

Amcrest support folks, can you help answer my questions?

[Revo2Maxx]

Well sadly this question is loaded with loads of things that no one can answer outside the person that owns the device. While the manual says it can work the camera upto 6 months on 1 charge. However there is a lot of info that is hard to judge. Age of camera, age of battery, level of battery charge, type of motion events and length of time for each motion.

Smart home device will need Smart home app for access...

[sydney]

Well I bought this camera a week ago so it's my possessions. I don't have the answers to my questions. That's why I posted here. Yes, the specs says it's a 2300mAh rechargeable battery lasting up to 6 months. You can pretty much ignore lasting 6 months. We know it's impossible. That's lab data they are giving you. That's why I asked a very reasonable question about assuming 2-3 motions per day, how long will it last before I've to climb up & get it down
or stick a microUSB cable up to charge it?

About the Smart Hub. That's what I kind of come to a conclusion. It can only work with the app. But i wanted to post the question here for Amcrest support to give a definitive answer or they might have an 'unpublished hack' to get access to the video.

[Revo2Maxx]

No it isn't impossible to be honest.. This camera is a PIR motion sensor system that does nothing beside detect motion and as soon as there is motion that is when the camera works and then it sends that info the HUB, there is nothing in the camera that makes it work very hard like a normal CCTV camera that is on constantly and always making loads and loads of images that gets reprocessed and checked for changes..

The camera in question while I can't say that it will last 6 months and again I mean only the person that owns it (You) can know how long it will last in your 2 or 3 motion event a day setup..

Also one needs to understand that working with cameras like this is almost impossible for 1 user to give another user in a different weather type a length of life per charge.. Cold vs hot change in life of battery charge..

Also might want to go over Specs and see what the Distance is for Detection outside that range it might never see a motion event. In my area I have very high humidity and my detection range is even lower then specs..

[sydney]

I have the camera setup and running and been testing for several days now. Though the camera sits inside the house where there is no motion. I checked the battery 2-3 times day via the app just to see how good (or bad) the camera is in terms of power consumption. What I notice is it uses 1% per day with NO motion. So at 100% charged, in theory it will only last approx. 100 days. No where close to 6 months. That's for sure. Now the reason why I haven't mounted yet is because I may consider returning it if it only gives me 4 weeks of use. I don't want to charge it every 4 weeks. This is NOT good enough. I understand there are many factors that can influence power consumption. Even a camera with 10,000mAh will not get you 6 months!

[Revo2Maxx]

Sadly not sure camera has been wired also the location its in is high traffic so no telling how much time I would get.

SmartSelect_20210403-112517_Amcrest Smart Home.jpg (116.41 KiB) Viewed 3315 times

[Revo2Maxx]

Also I thought I would mention that while it don't really work on my NVR My AI 4216E-AI NVR does load the camera into the system.. It just don't stream anything live.. What will happen once the system gets active by motion then the streaming comes up on the screen as soon as the camera goes back to sleep the last viewed image stays there on the screen until it wakes up again..

Main thing and why it is said not to work out side of Smart Home app is because the camera isn't in a constant state of action and in that sense don't stream video.. What makes it last so long is the camera goes offline and only the PIR is active when not in use.. When you look at the camera on your HUB with the Smart Home app and look at the info you have waken up the camera and making it work and so that will take some battery.. Also remember that when the camera is active it is taking power and the showing of xyz % of power Personally let it go a week and check everyday looking at the camera is using power that it wouldn't normally be using if it was doing it job without being disturbed by looking at the SH app... So when the camera goes back to lower amp draw buy only working the PIR that % your seeing will increase some because it isn't using the current to run the camera only the PIR so in a since it would gain some Voltage. As Current is needed that voltage will drop once it changes the current needs that voltage can rise

I know my PIR isn't the same but I do have a 3.7v PIR on one of my PTZ camera motion sensor and it is said to last normal operation 8 to 9 month and it has been over a year and still working.. While I have not changed it out I will when it is the cameras turn for Maintenance and measure the voltage however it is still within the voltage cut off that is built into the battery or it wouldn't work seeing it shuts down before it can be over discharged..

[Revo2Maxx]

So yeah I am not sure as I was saying it would be hard to gauge what one can do over another.. I left mine on Battery today and as you seen before it was at 100% and now it is on 94% so that is a large jump.. Battery life is another thing. Your camera is new and to be honest it might need a couple Discharge and charge cycles to know for sure how something will act. I mean sure they are not NCAD or NMH type of batteries and should give full out of the gate on first charge however at times I have seen some that had some issues with charge because of memory loss.. Should be close to fully discharged before charged or life could go short.. Personally I don't know the true state of my Battery it has been Powered by cable and not on battery until today..

[Revo2Maxx]

So today looking at my Battery I am down to 90%, was about same amount of traffic on motion as day before..

Also another thing to remember when it comes to the system and one of the reasons that this can last a while in battery mode. Is when you get an alert it is saving this data on the Hub. So when you click on playback it isn't accessing the camera like it would for a CCTV camera with a MSD installed. This gets the Data from the Hub..

To be honest I don't like Wifi cameras much. I have a lot of them however I use them in Wired mode... I personally didn't like the idea of this camera system to start with and after owning it I have grown to have some respect for it more then I did before knowing about how it works..
While I am not 100% sure about this. I am guessing that the Wifi it is running on isn't the normal Wifi that our phone, computer or other devices run on and is why it has connection distance that it does. While it isn't Perfect it is able to go past my other Wifi Camera range for distance..