Dropcam Pro Wi-Fi Wireless Video Monitoring Security Camera

Let's get the cons out of the way first, shall we?This camera is fairly expensive, it costs money to use the recording service (*if* you use it - you don't have to), it eats a lot of bandwidth when it's running, and you can't use local storage (except if you pay for the recording service and then download clips). If you're technically savvy and invest the time, you can do basically what this does for a lot less money.However, I *am* technically savvy and have set up streaming cameras before, and yet I am very happy to be using the Dropcam Pro. Why? Let me tell you by moving onto the pros:First, setup could hardly be easier. You plug it into a computer (Windows or OS X, possibly Linux but I'm not sure) when you first get it in order to configure the WiFi password (yes, you'll need WiFi) and to set up a Dropcam account (or link it to one if you already have one). That takes all of a minute or two (literally). Then, you plug it into the wall adapter (or any other USB power supply). If you'd like, you can wall-mount it. That's it. You're done with setup. You can use any micro USB cable and any USB power source to power it, so you're not stuck with the included ones if you don't want to be. You can paint the cables and the camera mount if you want to help it blend in, but I'd not recommend painting the camera (it can be removed from the mount).Second, yes, the monthly/annual fee for recording and associated inability to stream to local storage is a pain, but (a) it's core to the company's business model and so isn't likely to change, and, more importantly, (b) *it is worth it* - you don't need to set up streaming, you don't need to make sure you have sufficient disk storage, you don't need to worry that someone will break in and steal the camera *and* the device the footage is stored on, you don't need to worry about setting up a way to view the footage remotely, and you don't need to worry that a power outage will remove your ability to at least see what was recorded earlier when you're remote. Having set up my own monitoring system, I know how great it is that they do the heavy lifting for you, and, to me, it justifies the price of the camera as well as the annual fee (which, again, you don't need to pay if you only want to view the streaming video).Third, while the bandwidth usage can be extreme, you can schedule when the camera is on, and you can remotely turn it on and off, so you can control how much you use. I would hope that Dropcam will soon make it possible to stream lower-resolution video until motion or audio is detected (that would significantly reduce bandwidth needs), but that hasn't yet happened.Once you set it up, you can view the footage (live and recorded) as well as change settings from any modern browser and any reasonably up-to-date iOS or Android device. You get a two-week free subscription (note that the trial subscription only records 7 days at a time, so by the second week, you'll have lost part of the first) to see if you like the recording capability. I do. However, you could easily just use it to monitor without recording if you do desire, and that's free once you've bought the camera.Video quality is quite good (see other reviews). The sensor on the camera is much higher resolution than the streamed video, so if you tell it to focus on an area and record/stream just that area, it's better than just expanding the footage - it actually streams from a smaller section of the sensor but at the same resolution, meaning that there actually *is* more detail in the zoomed section than if you'd just enlarged the video of the entire area. You can't zoom in to read a newspaper from 30' away, but you can definitely zoom in a fair bit.The microphone is exceptional - I can hear at least as well as if I were standing by the camera, which means you can hear other rooms even if you can't see them.Night vision is good, but limited by the IR LEDs. If you bought a separate IR bulb, you could probably illuminate a much larger area, but I've not tried that as I don't need that functionality.The speaker (used if you talk to people/pets by the camera) is decent. There's a fair bit of lag, and because there is also lag when streaming, conversations are sort of like talking to astronauts on the moon - there's a delay each way. Still, it's mostly usable, but it's no speakerphone.The light that indicates the camera is on can be turned off even while the camera is recording... this is a feature some will love and others will dislike.The settings of the camera are easily accessible from both browsers and mobile devices.You could buy this and set it up for less technically-savvy relatives if you (a) know their wifi name and password and so could temporarily set yours up the same way during the setup phase, or (b) buy a wifi router, set it up for them, and ship it with the camera.I've not yet found a better camera/microphone combo for this price, and the additional functionality makes it a win in my book.

And I was impressed, just not for the price (thus the one star knock off). Don't let that deter you if all you want is a way to keep an eye on things and be alerted to (other) things.PRO: The setup was very simple. A caveman could do it.CON: Such a small device literally requiring a cable is a turn-off. That this does not have a Li-Ion battery and support recharging is simply a joke, I'm sorry. Now, you might say "but then how would you charge it if it's mounted somewhere?!" Easy - I would buy 4 or so of the portable recharge packs and just swap between them every week or whatever while the others are recharging. The value of doing this is that when mounting it somewhere that is not readily accessible to a power outlet (for example, the ceiling), I don't have to care about buying extension cables BUT I could charge the thing. Something this size should be able to hold a charge for at least a week if not longer. Might seem like an additional maintenance routine, but at least provide the choice for those that don't want cables everywhere.PRO: The video quality is great.CON: Why do you have to tap anything to "improve quality" when zooming in? This doesn't make sense, the camera should automatically assume improved quality since - SHOCK - the only reason one would zoom in is to get a CLEARER LOOK at the target! This is clunky and silly.PRO: The alerts give you enough to know when something's going on.CON: As with most other cameras it's picky about lights and shadows. So it lets you pick a zone where you want to detect movement, the problem is if light from a window runs across that zone as the sun moves, the camera detects this as motion and sends false alerts. It's annoying, because you can't tell the camera how to properly identify true motion even though it's pinned down to a specific region only.PRO: It's versatile enough to mount nearly anywhere.CON: The drywall anchors provided didn't accept the screws at all. As a result mine is mounted precariously. A better design would have included a center mount screw, no drywall mount, and drywall anchors as part of the back plate (not separate) that you just drive the screw through and into the wall, so that the screw itself creates the hole that the anchor goes into, while the center screw allows you to at least keep the thing up there while getting the mounting done.PRO: it picks up audio quite nicely. I was able to hear sounds from downstairs, which is what I wanted.CON: Because the microphone is amplified there is a ton of white noise in the background, so it's hard to detail exactly what you're hearing unless it's a car going by on the street outside. Would it have killed someone to implement some cleanup here? It's called noise gate, it's not hard.PRO: You can tell the camera not to detect, dependent on the location of your phone or tablet.CON: This is GPS dependent, meaning that of course, it's not going to be fine enough detail to know if you're in one room vs. another. It will know if you're in one building vs. another, yes. If that isn't what you wanted, well, you're kinda SOL. I'm not sure why this bothers me so much, but it does.PRO: You can tell the camera not to detect during certain times of the day.CON: The issue here is that it assumes such times are static OR that you would combine this with the location detection (so for example, if you're in the home, it doesn't detect but if you're not in the home, it does). But say I'm in the office. I don't want it detecting. I can't use the location setting (see above), and I might be in the office any of the 24 hours in a day, so I can't use the time setting. So ultimately I have to manually disable alerting while I'm in the office, which is annoying.Again, pros and cons. I think I can recommend some improvements, if the "Director of Customer Relations" for Dropcam is still paying attention.- Rather than location based and/or time based detection disable, consider making your app more useful: when your phone is in range of the camera (and it will know that it is once it's joined the same WiFi hotspot), tell the app to prompt the user to disable the alerts because you're on the same network now. Let the user choose (A) disable now, (B) disable for a period of time, or (C) don't disable now but prompt again in (X) minutes/hours/days. That's better than nothing, or until we can get a technology that is smarter than wireless and shorter range than Bluetooth that would allow for more intuitive management.- If you're going to pitch a "wireless" camera, make sure it's truly "wireless" in every way. Figure out a way to power this thing without having to have it plugged in 24/7. I'm sure you can do it, I've got hallway lights that use 4 AA batteries and last for over a month before I have to replace them, so I'm almost certain it's possible to do the same here.- Noise gate. Figure it out. You can detect movement, why not detect sound and THEN play it rather than just blaring a bunch of static noise?

Bottom line: although more expensive than a traditional IP Camera, and requiring a subscription fee for recording, the ease of setup, wide viewing angle, amazing image, and accessibility of these cameras make them an excellent buy.Something to keep in mind is the tremendous amount of data these cameras will use. A 7 day cloud package means your camera is transmitting HD quality video over your internet connection 24/7/365. If you are on a limited data plan - even if that plan is in the neighborhood of 250gb - you might consider first checking your current usage to make sure you won't incur overages from cloud recording.Setup: easy. Can be completed directly from your smart phone. By downloading the Dropcam app, and plugging the camera in, you're pretty much set to go. The app finds the camera easily as long as your phone is nearly touching the camera. Setup requires giving the camera a name and selecting a wifi network (you'll obviously need your wifi password).Image and audio: the image is just amazing. The wide viewing angle allows you to see a great deal of activity from a single camera. The image is clear enough to allow easy recognition of faces, objects and animals. Beyond about 20 feet it does become a little difficult to pick out smaller details such as license plate numbers, however. There is a function that allows you to zoom the image and enhance, which works very well. The draw back is that you're narrowing the cameras view. Although you can zoom in on a recorded video, the enhance function will not work after the fact. Audio recording is excellent, allowing you to hear low volume conversations inside and out. Speaking through the camera is to low volume to be very functional unless in a low noise environment.The smart phone app: a pretty solid viewing application. Coupled with the DVR functionality, a great way to keep track of what's going on in front of your cameras. The smart phone app is a sort of stripped down version of the web app.Web app: this adds the ability to create zones within your cameras view. For example, a camera at our front door sees our entry way as well as a portion of our front yard. So we've established an "entryway" zone and a "front yard zone". The end product is that we get alerts specific to where motion is occurring. The webapp also allows the creation of time lapses, condensing hours and hours of video from a camera into a seconds long video.Cloud recording: you're sort of wasting the potential of these cameras without using the cloud recording. Each camera gets one week of free cloud recording included. After the free trial expires, 7 days of cloud recording (it's a rolling 7 days) costs $100/year for the first camera and $50 for each additional. So three cameras with 7 day cloud plans would cost $200/year. I know how awful recurring charges are, but considering the quality, reliability and ease of access you're getting a lot of bang for your buck.Indoor/outdoor: these cameras are designed and rated for indoor use only. But that doesn't mean you can't use them outdoor. We currently have two placed outside in custom made enclosures. The enclosure is made of a 4" piece of 2" PVC, a 2" to 1.5" reducer and a 1.5" cap. You can then use the mounting system that comes with the dropcam to mount the camera holding pvc enclosure outside. This method has kept two cameras safe through two significant California storms (significant rain and wind). It has not faced temperatures below 40F.Baby monitor: dropcams actually make for a pretty solid baby monitor, if not a little expensive. We purchased it as a baby monitor with the intention of deploying it for other uses when the kids no longer need it. It has all the functions of a modern baby video monitor with the exception of pan or tilt, but the extra wide viewing angle helps make up for this minor short coming.Support: after the first of the year a glitch in the Dropcam iOS app caused cloud recordings to be sorted backwards. It made it appear that the camera had stopped recording. The app was fixed in a matter of days, but I did call in prior to the update to see what the problem was. Not only was a clear timeline explained for the fox, but I was given several months credit on my cloud recording. And all this happened on a Sunday. To me, that's about as good as support for a product can get.All told, Dropcam is a well built product with excellent support, a great app and web interface, with a wide array of possible applications. I often recommend it to friends and relatives.

This is my first negative review of product that offers outstanding hardware. I bought this camera looking to expand upon the two rooms covered by my Foscam cameras. Overall I have been satisfied with my Foscam cameras, but was looking to expand beyond 720p resolution to 1080p offered by the Dropcam and have experienced some issues with the Foscam FW8921 model needing to frequently be restarted for the video feed to resume. The Dropcam Pro excelled in nearly every way over the Foscam with exception of one fatal flaw.PROs:*Fantastic aluminum build quality. Sleek and minimalistic design.*Setting port forwarding protocol through a router necessary to connect to the Foscam camera when away from home is a challenge. Setting up the Dropcam was a breeze, requiring only an IOS device and can be accomplished by anyone regardless of technological literacy.*Video quality both day and night are excellent. I was expecting the Dropcam Pro to provide a better picture offering more megapixels and full HD 1080p resolution in contrast to the 720p Foscam, but was still surprised at how much more clear the resolution appears.*Although the Dropcam does not feature pan and tilt, the wide field of view essentially eliminates the need of such feature.*There will be a video delay when viewing video broadcast from any Wi-Fi/IP camera. What is impressive about the Dropcam is it produces no longer delay than my Foscam cameras despite broadcasting in higher resolution and able to provide noticeable better frame rate at 1080p than the Foscam at 720p.CONs:*In order to capture a wide field of view the image does have a fisheye effect very similar to the video captured with action cameras.*Foscam and virtually all other IP cameras allow you to easily capture and record video or pictures either manually or setting up motion detection directly on your camera via an SD card, to your computer, or smartphone/tablet. The only way Dropcam allows videos to be stored is through their cloud based storage. You will receive a short free trial then you get to add another recurring bill to your phone, internet, cable...etc bills, necessary to use this camera for any more than live (delayed) viewing. Additionally, Dropcam has done a good job at preventing customers implementing workarounds from paying for their cloud storage.Overall:$200 is a reasonable price for the build, image and overall performance quality this camera offers. Unfortunately, Dropcams efforts to keep cashing in on the product after the initial purchase is a horrendous approach taking advantage of customers and the reason mine was returned. Dropcam should entice consumers to use their cloud based storage through features such as superior application and website playback design not mandate in order to provide continued use of a product you purchased unsubsidized. The company intentionally prevents any means to record video through any method besides their cloud storage. Without paying the recurring fees the camera becomes practically useless. The delay in video and audio when viewing "live" makes it a poor choice as a baby monitor and without paying for recording capability it offers no surveillance value. I would strongly recommend waiting for Samsung to release their Smartcam HD model expected in March for $179 which match the features and design of Dropcam while adding local onboard storage eliminating privacy concerns and extra fees beyond initial price with the possible exception of an SD card. Hope this review is helpful. I provided all the highlights of the this product rather than simply complaining about my reason for returning for others to make an informed decision before purchasing. I am sure some will not mind the required recurring fee, but I feel the majority would choose otherwise if aware other options exists without the continued extra fees.*UPDATE*I have had 2 days to play around with the Samsung Smartcam HD and can gladly say so far it lives up to expectations combining the best of Foscam features with the top notch hardware of the Dropcam. The build quality of the Dropcam reigns supreme, like comparing Samsung Galaxy to an iPhone, but everything else is on par if not better with the Smartcam. Setup is just as simple on the Smartcam HD while offering the advantage of having the ability to setup straight from your Android phone or tablet in addition to iOS device. Load time to pull up the image on both cameras website and applications are nearly the same. Both cameras occasionally fail when attempting to connect from the Android app requiring a 2nd attempt. There is no clear winner in image quality with both offering nearly the same wide field of view, but somehow the Smartcam does so without as much of a fisheye effect. The mic and speaker on the Samsung are notably better. The Smartcam HD utilizes your Gmail account to send event (motion detection) notifications immediately to your phone and Picasa for snapshots of events, whereas the Micro SD slot is used to store video recordings. So if your worried about an intruder simply stealing the camera and all your evidence, then you will be relieved to have access of the free cloud storage of that photo of them taking the camera. Sure your limited to 1GB of free space on Picasa, but that stores a whole lot of images which are easy to delete straight from the Smartcam App. Unless you really need to have constant video recording being done, the Samsung Smartcam HD is a much better value that only increases as time passes and no furture bills become due. I plan on putting up a full review of the Smartcam HD once I have more time testing it out.

I bought both cameras (one of each) with two ideas in mind:1) Monitor my dog while away - he suffers from separation anxiety2) Monitor the room in case of an intruder.(I also bought a Y-cam HomeMonitor Indoor camera, which was returned. You can see my product review in the Y-cam Amazon product page or click my name above to see my other reviews.)I think the DropCam is superior for surveillance recording because it streams the video and uploads to the server in a timely manner whereas the Y-cam stores and forwards, and the Y-cam delay is VERY significant. This is explained more in that other review. If the intruder sees the camera and unplugs it the DropCam cloud recording is near-real-time up to the point where power is lost. It will capture the image of the intruder off-site! That's critical.The DropCam software also lets you turn off the indicator lights so it does not draw attention from an intruder, and a nanny or dog walker won't know whether it's on or off. I consider that an advantage, even if the camera is in plain view on a shelf or table. You should check your local laws about video surveillance.DropCam HD vs. DropCam Pro:From a user perspective these products are very similar. Dimensions are about the same. They both have the same image resolution spec at 1280x720 pixels, and use the same mounting/power supplies. The Pro model is a wider angle lens, and in my opinion, the ONLY reason to buy the pro model is if you need to cover the wider view. I think the DropCam advertising is misleading because they say Pro gives you 8x zoom vs. 4x zoom for the HD model, but the down-side of the wider angle is that you get LESS detail using the same number of pixels with a wide-angle, and as you increase zoom the image becomes grainy and loses clarity. So the HD model is actually letting you see more detail in the image than the Pro model in real-world use, both in normal mode and when you zoom.If you place an HD model in the corner of a rectangular room you will see most of it (107-degree wide field of view, but despite that rating -- if you mount it in a corned it will NOT allow you to see the entire 90-degree sweep), whereas the Pro model gives you a 130-degree, even wider field of view that will allow you to see the entire 90-degree sweep, wall to wall. The wider angle lens makes everything appear farther away and smaller. With that in mind, most people will be more satisfied, and save $50, with the HD model.DropCam advertises the audio quality to be better on the Pro model, and it's speaker is a bit louder on talk-back but subjectively speaking I think any difference is insignificant. The microphones are extremely sensitive on both models. They also advertise the night vision to be better on the Pro model but my observations don't support that. They're about the same.For dog monitoring (same would apply for child monitoring) I found either DropCam to be excellent because they have high resolution, and also enable me to talk back to him through the speaker in the camera. The talk-back feature is not reliable and the sound tends to break up or drop out completely, even though my home bandwidth tests well. My dog does respond to my voice, when I tell him to settle down, and seems to get more relaxed.With both models the connection drops once in a while (one camera or the other at separate times, and eventually comes back by itself), in a location where Wi-Fi signal is strong and Internet stays up for other devices. I'm not certain whether this issue is on the cloud server side or in my cameras. It's happened when I'm home and online with other devices that continue to work, and when there is no contention from other devices (so I suspect the issue may be on the cloud server side).Overall I recommend these cameras and will keep them. I would like to see the monthly cost for cloud storage go down, and the occasional dropped connections to improve. I don't know of anything better right now unless you roll your own using a cloud service and streaming video, but you'd have to roll up your sleeves and be fairly technical to do that well. DropCam's easy setup, the motion detection and cloud recording are great, and can't be beat right now!Update 4/7/2014 -- Haven't had dropouts for several months. Upgrading my review from 4 stars to 5.