Review: EZVIZ DB1C

biggen

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This has got me a little worried, since I have the same cheapo 16V 10VA transformer that is giving me reboots on the DB1C. I thought that 30VA would fix it for sure(just about to order), but now I see stories of people that had to go to 24V 40VA to get stable performance from other products (Ring Pro). Always a bit iffy on upping the voltage on a 16V chime, even though people say it's fine, just a little louder, more wear and tear. No one ever rings the doorbell here so that should not be a problem. I do want to avoid burning out anything though, for both hassle and safety reasons.
Just disconnect the door bell if no one uses it. I disconnected mine and wired the transformer directly to the DB1C. I left the disconnected bell on the wall just for “looks”.
 

mangler

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Apparently there is a Supco T45 transformer rated at 40VA, does 2.5, 8,12, 16 and 24V.
 
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Loofer

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Thanks for all the info on this thread folks (some a bit too detailed for me).
Was looking for comparisons on DB1C and DB1 but couldn’t find much until I came across this forum.

In the UK the price is about £120.
The US version can be delivered for about £85 and that’s at retail price of $99 so I think I’ll hold out till it gets ear $69 again.
Anyway of knowing if it would work in UK?
We work on 230V AC here. Any potential network issues?
 

planetix

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Thanks for all the info on this thread folks (some a bit too detailed for me).
Was looking for comparisons on DB1C and DB1 but couldn’t find much until I came across this forum.

In the UK the price is about £120.
The US version can be delivered for about £85 and that’s at retail price of $99 so I think I’ll hold out till it gets ear $69 again.
Anyway of knowing if it would work in UK?
We work on 230V AC here. Any potential network issues?
Just Google Ring Doorbell UK, there are a number of articles on how to do it/requirements/gotchas/etc. The DBC1 has the same requirements as the Ring, Nest, etc.

In fact I didn't even switch out my power kit from my old Ring doorbell. I think one issue you'll have in the UK is you won't be able to use your existing door chime if it is a mechanical one wired in because the voltage on those is lower, but check around.
 

andycots

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Hi, what audio channel do you have it set to, got no sound on myn through BI.

Edit, sorted had to put onto RTSP alternate AAC in video settings.

Thanks
 
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andycots

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Had myn a few days now, upgrade from DB1 and have to say i am happier with it a lot more stable too, still left it onto a 2.4Ghz signal as also seems more reliable than a 5Ghz and is plenty fast enough on 2.4Ghz, better picture day and night and more of it too with the 170deg view, got a lot more in the pic, the lack of ONVIF i can live without although i did mail Ezviz support to request it in future and they said they would pass it on, will see.

If a few more mail them for ONVIF it may help, this is EU mail your may be different, support.eu@ezvizlife.com

Doorbell.20210116_093235165.jpgDoorbell.20210116_054015024.1.jpg

Here a day and night view, although the snow doesn't help with showing colours, will get couple more later when cleared.

Thanks
 

andreq

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Just wanna chime in about the transformers and a little review after 2 months owning 2 DB1C.

I'm running 2 units (DB1C) off a 16v 30va with no reboot or any issues.
I had constant reboot with a 16v 10va.

I've installed my doorbells mid November.
They're both integrated in my Home Assistant server and exposed to Google as Cameras.
I'm using the 2nd stream set to H264 for google and HA, let me see the stream on any devices.

The SD card recording are in H265 main stream, nice and crisp, small file size.
I have yet to setup an NVR, but could be hooked to the main stream.

Haven't had any false positive when someone ring the bell, my old crusty chime works nicely every time and the app pops up (unless my phone has wifi off to save battery).
The detection is hit or miss, but I disabled notifications as I didn't need them.
I kind of like that it records more small videos on the SD card than not enough.

I'm not a power user of the Ezviz app, I prefer to run everything locally, but its decent, the live stream is good and I had fun calling/scaring my gf just before she got to the door :p.
Didn't have issue with 2 way communication, but I've only tried it a few time.

All I all, those are my first camera doorbell and I really like them. No issue, image quality is good, stream is rock solid.
 

mangler

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Just wanna chime in about the transformers and a little review after 2 months owning 2 DB1C.

I'm running 2 units (DB1C) off a 16v 30va with no reboot or any issues.
I had constant reboot with a 16v 10va.

I've installed my doorbells mid November.
They're both integrated in my Home Assistant server and exposed to Google as Cameras.
I'm using the 2nd stream set to H264 for google and HA, let me see the stream on any devices.

The SD card recording are in H265 main stream, nice and crisp, small file size.
I have yet to setup an NVR, but could be hooked to the main stream.

Haven't had any false positive when someone ring the bell, my old crusty chime works nicely every time and the app pops up (unless my phone has wifi off to save battery).
The detection is hit or miss, but I disabled notifications as I didn't need them.
I kind of like that it records more small videos on the SD card than not enough.

I'm not a power user of the Ezviz app, I prefer to run everything locally, but its decent, the live stream is good and I had fun calling/scaring my gf just before she got to the door :p.
Didn't have issue with 2 way communication, but I've only tried it a few time.

All I all, those are my first camera doorbell and I really like them. No issue, image quality is good, stream is rock solid.
This confirms i likely have an issue with mine. Even after a transformer upgrade (Edwards 30VA, using 16V), it can't handle the IR lights. As soon as I turn them on, i get reboots (sometimes less than 9 minutes). Without the IR lights it is rock stable, aside from the occasionnal message saying the network speeds are too low for the quality (it is not, the door bell is within 10 feet of the router).

I guess next step is feeding the doorbell system 24V and seeing if that solves the problem (Edwards transformer has 24V 30VA connections). Hopefully i don't get a burnt out bulb in the remaining dumb door bell switch :)
 

kklee

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This confirms i likely have an issue with mine. Even after a transformer upgrade (Edwards 30VA, using 16V), it can't handle the IR lights. As soon as I turn them on, i get reboots (sometimes less than 9 minutes). Without the IR lights it is rock stable, aside from the occasionnal message saying the network speeds are too low for the quality (it is not, the door bell is within 10 feet of the router).

I guess next step is feeding the doorbell system 24V and seeing if that solves the problem (Edwards transformer has 24V 30VA connections). Hopefully i don't get a burnt out bulb in the remaining dumb door bell switch :)
Just wanted to share some things I discovered while troubleshooting a problem I was having with my DB1C dropping out and occasionally restarting.

I wasn't sure if was Wifi or power related. I eventually ruled out Wifi as the issue. For what it's worth, the DB1C works great on 5GHz.

I upgraded the chime transformer to 16VAC 30VA, which didn't help with the dropouts, but it did improve the volume of my mechanical chime. I also tested with a 24AC 700mA wall wart from another project and that didn't make any difference for dropouts either.

After resetting and reconfiguring the DB1C a few times while trying different Wifi AP configurations, BI suddenly couldn't access the stream any more, even though I never touched the BI configuration. The EZVIZ app on my Pixel 5 worked fine accessing the doorbell since I had to use it to configure it each time.

When I originally configured the DB1C in BI, I used the streams mentioned in this thread because the Find/Inspect feature couldn't find the doorbell. That was many versions of BI ago.

I ran the Find/Inspect again and it was successful. The only thing that appeared to change was the Main stream is now just a /, no substream detected.

As a test, if I enter the previous setting for the main stream, BI can't connect to the doorbell, and it starts dropping pings. Adding the substream setting from this thread also causes problems.

The doorbell has now stabilized since the re-detection in BI.

As for the built-in AI detection, I did some more playing around and found that a minimal defined detection area and sensitivity set to the lowest setting seemed to work well for human detection and reduced false alerts (still happens, but not very frequently).

As far as I know, the firmware hasn't changed since the initial install when it detected new firmware and I applied it. Currently it's running version 5.3.0 build 201106.
 

andycots

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Myn seems to be a lot more stable than the old DB1, got it on my Deco mesh and pretty solid so far, but I do have issues when I tell Echo to connect to view it messes up the resolution somewhere and I have to reboot in BI, I think the Echo stream alters the format, that causes the issue.

or and not bothered for the new outdoor chime, what was wrong with old one.
 

bob2701

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Anyone find the option to turn off "Outdoor Bell Sound"? I like the + of a 256G storage.
 

bob2701

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Extremely disappointed with the DB1C.
I have the EZVIZ DB1 and have been more or less happy with it. I was going to get another DB1 for my daughters house but saw a great price on the DB1C at Kohls so I bought one.
First problem I noticed was the inability to turn off the outside bell sound as noted earlier in this thread. Apparently support thinks it still works, they say it is in the same place on the APP as for the DB1. I have been unable to get a peep out of Alarm Notification when set to Human Shape. While the Image change works during the day it sucks at night with IR turned on. With sensitivity set to low any bug or dust particle will trigger the notification. The IR is a big magnet for insects so I have to keep it off.
Using 201106 and would love to get the Human Shape to work, I have set it to highest sensitivity and walked right up to the camera, walked back and forth but no alarm.
Another thing that makes no sense to me is the "At Home Mode", why would you want to turn off notifications when you are home, or for that matter anytime.
Well, looks like time to see how Kohls return policy is.
 

biggen

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I gave up on the AI and just use plain ol'e motion detection for it with the sensitivity set to the lowest and use a mask to prevent anything too far away from setting it off. That seems to work pretty good. I run my porch lights all night long so it never switches to BW/IR so I can't comment on that ability. The outside bell doesn't apply to me either. Who rings that anymore except for salesmen? 1 out of 10 delivery guys may but its so quiet you can't hear it ring in the house anyway.

Its definitely not a perfect device but its the best doorbell I've seen so far. It needs some firmware tweaks as you have found out with its motion detection. Hopefully that will take care of some of the AI issues.
 

biggen

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@biggen Where you able to get the Human Shape to work at all? No matter what I do it remains silent.
It works but ignores the mask so its pretty useless. I had to just setup motion detection. It does honor that mask.
 

SuperDave

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Hello all, I was considering getting either the DB1 or one of its clones. What exactly is the advantage of the DB1C? I know about the AI person detect and that doesn't even matter to me. I will be using with Blue Iris. As for motion detection I'd rather have it detect too much than not enough. Thanks!
 
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