‎Camera shows off line but works (kind of) | SimpliSafe Support Home
 
Churchill7's profile

Wednesday, June 26th, 2024 3:27 PM

Camera shows off line but works (kind of)

Have a camera in the front yard over the left side of the garage. It’s pretty far from the home WiFi router so I installed a range extender and attached the camera to that hoping that would help. When connected to the range extended running a speed test on my phone it pulls 12ms, 625 down, 76 up. So signal is not a problem.

Camera behavior: Senses and records front yard activity. Alerts on motion. Shows off line in app and will not respond to live view requests claiming the camera is off line. 

11 Messages

5 months ago

Interesting new observation. When it detects motion the camera shows on line in the app. As soon as the video is available it goes back to offline 

1.4K Messages

5 months ago

Try the SS connection checker or Net Analyzer (Android). In SS connection checker, theres a details tab after the check, below the blue bars, that shows approximate signal strength in Dbm. Speed matter, walls matter, and Dbm signal strength matters most. If thats strong, say -50Dbm, then something else is going on.

And distance from base station matter for outdoor cams as well. Need a signal from base to wake outdoor cams.

11 Messages

Do you happen to know the approx max distance from base station that a camera can handle?

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@Churchill7​ Unfortunately no. Density of walls etc. Will affect RF and Wifi.

11 Messages

5 months ago

 Ok, this is weird. I connected a solar panel to the camera to keep the battery up since I can’t see the battery health and now it’s connected with a good signal. I removed it and it disconnect. Put it back and it’s connected. That I don’t completely understand that. 

1.4K Messages

@Churchill7​ I've had this stuff 15 months give or take, I'm exploring weirdness with an inside tech over the next several days. 

What it could be, or may be, is related to performance mode. Where with and if you have at the least cost monitoring or the most cost one, with solar and or power cables, performance mode is supposed to kick in between a certain charge level.

Supposed faster live views. My bug with solar. Or one of them lol.

There is a current support ticket where some folks weren't getting notifications while in the 90s charge level with power cables. Unplugging said cables and notifications would come in.

You may have discovered a new bug, hopefully some admin will read your post, respond and send it over to the developers. @davey_d or @emily_s 

Someone really needs to rifle thru their firmware and fix some lingering issues.

11 Messages

Finally a good bug because it fixed my original issue haha

Community Admin

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3.4K Messages

5 months ago

@Churchill7 Just so I have this right, your Outdoor Camera shows an Offline error message despite being able to detect and record motion just fine? And when the Solar Panel is plugged in the error message goes away?

That is certainly something we would want to look into! I've forwarded your case details to our engineering team to investigate further. 

11 Messages

@emily_s​ pretty much. Under normal running motion detection and alerts are fine. Recording video is fine. In the app it shows off line and you can’t update settings or watch live. When I connected the solar to it all that went away and it stayed connected

11 Messages

Oops, well so much of a long term fix. Today it shows off line again with the same behavior. Of note though…. When it was on line yesterday the connection was noted as good with full bars. Very bizarre 

11 Messages

And it’s back again. Maybe it’ll stay this time

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