Wireless Outdoor Cameras Recommendations?

eatmorfood

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Im an IT tech so i understand the pitfalls of wireless. I've messed with foscams in the past. With my current camera setup, once I went hikvision, I cant look back to anything less.

I've got family in another state looking to install a camera on his detached garage. I was looking for something approaching hik grade so I went for the Dahua IPC-HFW1200SN-W. Unfortunately, the camera we got is either a lemon or they all have issues. While visiting the family last week and attempting to deploy this cam, it evidently will not reconnect to the wireless network after loss of power. I have both wired & wireless IP's setup static. I set the wireless as the default. i can take the wire off the cam (leaving power) and use it wireless. but as soon as i remove the power and plug back in, it wont reconnect wirelessly. I can plug back in the rj45 and it automatically connects wirelessly just fine. It's a brand new netgear r6400 (which is a great router in my opinion) with a very standard setup. The cam also had a few other issues, when power was removed, it would not retain the ddns settings - reset back to factory and i was having trouble viewing the camera remotely. I setup under my ddns account and ported the port in the router. When i view that address locally or remote control a remote pc to test, after logging into the cam, i get "main connection failed". i didnt spend any time messing with the last error since the wireless issue was the main issue for me. I checked the forums here and didnt see any reference to this cam.

I'd rather keep the network infrastructure to a minimum (less to troubleshoot) - as in camera not wired to a wireless extender which then wirelessly connects to the main router. The main router is located on the back wall of the house and is very close to the detached garage so signal is awesome.

So to the point of the question, any other decent options? Most wireless IP cams apparently suck. I've read lots of reviews on various models and sifting trough those that dont know what they are doing from actual issues with the model camera is becoming time consuming. A bullet cam is best in this location i think. needs good night viewing. 4mm. I saw hik had a dome that supported wifi but lots of reviews saying how bad the wireless was on it (i think even the hik site or somewhere officially said the wireless use was not recommended).

The cam will be connected to Blue Iris so no need for any features on the camera other than stay on, don't flicker and if the power goes out, reconnect to the wireless.

Thanks for any help!
 
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klasipca

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You don't need wireless, afterall you will sill need a wire to power it, you can get the best camera you can get with POE and just connect to wireless bridge/router/access point. Will give you MUCH better wireless results then using cameras with built-in wireless.
 

nayr

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sorry bro, the entire market is junk.. they are a gimmick and not one company I have seen has actually put any real effort into it.. I think you'll be less disappointed with the x-ray vision glasses out of a comic book.

the only good way to get it to work, is what you have stated you dont want to do.. use an external bridge and a normal wired camera.. so reconsider that solution, because its really the best you've got if you cant get a trench dug.

If I was doing family in another state, I would have them dig a trench before I presented them with a WiFi nightmare.. you dont have to burry it deep if you put it in conduit.

I have an outdoor Ubiquiti network running on a farm in Kansas, I installed it >3 years ago.. correctly, to central building with Satellite Internet transmits it to several buildings and an outdoor pool area.. has been running like a champ and the've never had an issue, every time I go back its still up and working.. only pulled this off with quality hardware and a proper installation.
 

eatmorfood

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Yeah I know they're all junk from reading the reviews, but this one had less bad reviews so i thought id give it another shot before i went with the wireless bridge. i just can't go back to Foscam - even though the little voice in my head says this is no better. If this doesn't work out, i'll try the bridge and if that fails, I'll leave it up to the family member as to what they want to do. thanks for everyone's input!
 

jaclarkaus

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What about powerline networking? Chuck a unit in a sealed waterproof box with a POE injector, and way you go ...
 

harriska2

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I have 2 M7B77 cameras and one needs to be sent back as the IR simply doesn't work. The other one is a bit fuzzy. Both updated firmware. The one that works is OK. I'm not that impressed. I have them on POE with a TP Link router running to an i7 dedicated blue iris server. It does everything I need which isn't that much. I sort of really like Blue Iris, though.
 
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