(1,2,3,4-Pack) Wyze Cam v3 Indoor/Outdoor Security Camera(Open Box)
$38.68
Condition: Refurbished; Open Box
Style: 2 Pack
Top positive review
753 people found this helpful
The only one that didn't have significant lag time in the live feed!
By Kelly Daniels on Reviewed in the United States on August 5, 2021
I like these little cameras! Setup was a breeze, picture quality is amazing, and the live feed is pretty much actually live (less than a 1 second delay for me, which was the best of all the newer cameras I tested - more about that below). Real time live video is important to me for various reasons. For example, one of my dogs keeps peeing in the house (marking), and if I can't catch him just before he pees then he's never going to learn to stop doing that. With a delay of even 3-4 seconds, I would be too late. These cameras are small and light. The base is magnetic and very adjustable, and there are also adhesive and screw-in options for mounting. Low light performance is exceptional - the IR night vision isn't needed until it's pretty much completely dark. The app is so-so.. it is responsive and more or less intuitive, and it does have all the basic capabilities needed. It just lacks some features that I would have liked. For example, you can't fast forward through event videos or continuous recordings. To jump to other points you have to move a bar on the timeline.. it is very difficult to skip just a tiny bit ahead. I keep going too far, then going back too far or not far enough, and it's a pain. You have to guess where to look for things. For this reason, continuous recording was not a great solution for me, because it was too hard to find events. Recording events only is better, but I'd still like the ability to fast forward, or to see the actual video as you move your finger along the timeline. Speaking of recording events only to your SD card: SD card recordings are NOT subject to the 12 second video/5 minute cooldown that you get with the free cloud recordings. If you choose "events only" in the settings, it will break time into 1 minute increments, and it will continue recording until motion stops. This wasn't made clear in any of the documentation I could find, and the live chat agent gave me incorrect information. I almost gave up and returned these before even opening them, but first I decided to message them on Facebook. The Facebook messenger representative gave me the correct information and links to where I could find more detailed information on their website. So, crisis averted. The audio is pretty terrible in recorded events. It sounds like you're talking from across a long tunnel while holding your hand over the microphone. When right up next to the camera outside, I can understand speech, but it still does not sound good. It is slightly better indoors. I don't know what the sound is like for the live feed though, and I don't know how it sounds when I talk through the camera. (I haven't had anyone here to help me test things like that. The dogs won't cooperate, they all want to be in the same room as me all the time). For me, the fact that there is almost no lag in the live video more than makes up for the shortcomings in audio. Plus the price is great -- a lot more than they were before May, unfortunately, but still very competitively priced. As soon as they're in stock anywhere, I'll be adding two pan cameras for inside, and maybe their doorbell, depending on whether or not there is enough space on my door frame. Here are all the cameras I've had/tried, to give you all some comparisons. This will be long, but the summary is that between Dericam, Blink, Eufy, Eufy Solo, LittleElf, and Wyze, I liked the Wyze ones best. I did not test Ring because they are really expensive and have no options for local storage at all. You have to pay for a subscription for each camera if you want to view recordings. I didn't test Arlo because they're expensive and I hadn't gotten to them yet. No need to do more testing now though, I'm keeping the wyze cameras. 1. Original indoor cameras that I want to replace - Dericam 1080P P2, indoor pan/tilt, purchased in 2017. They're old now and are showing their age, but there is virtually no lag time at all in the live feed, and you get all features and local storage without ever paying any fees. The app is kind of buggy and annoying (and slow by today's standards), but these cameras served me well for 3-4 years. They are deteriorating now though, and it's time for an upgrade. 2. Blink mini outdoor, 5 camera kit (ordered on prime day, so I got a really good deal). The Blink cameras were really nice (image quality, sound, features, ease of installation), but I had a consistent 3 second delay in the live feed. (My network is not the issue.) It's really too bad, those seemed perfect otherwise. I tried every single troubleshooting step and anything that other people mentioned having done in message boards. No difference though, I always had a 3 second delay, so I returned them. 3. Littlelf 1080P, pan/tilt etc. Priced around what wyze cameras cost. As far as I can tell this company only makes indoor cameras, so I would have had to get a different brand for outside, and use two apps to keep track of my house. Not really want I want, but Lifflelf promised the ability to see multiple live streams at the same time, so I wanted to try them. That feature does work and is actually really nice. Good image quality (but not as good as the other newer ones), good audio, an app that was a little clunky but definitely usable... but I had a 4 second delay with these cameras, so they went back. 4. Eufy - EufyCam E, 2-cam kit. These were by far the most expensive cameras I tried, but they promise a year of battery life, and I wasn't sure if I'd be able to get power outside at that point. The cameras seem really solid and well made. I had no trouble adding the homebase and camera, although I did have a lot of trouble creating my account in the first place. The app seemed less intuitive than Blink or Wyze - (not a dealbreaker), but worked. Image quality was great, sound was great, but I found that these had a 3-4 second delay. For the price, they would have had to be perfect. 5. Eufy Solo IndoorCam P22 (pan/tilt), and Solo OutdoorCam C22 (which looks like a big eyeball, I really liked the design). The price of the indoor cameras was similar to Wyze, but their outdoor cameras were a lot more. I thought that since these cameras connect directly to wifi and not to a base, they'd be faster. I was wrong though, I had the same 3-4 second delay as with the other Eufy cameras. Video quality is great, but not as good as the wyze v3 in my opinion. Audio quality was really good with these. But the delay was a dealbreaker. The End. I applaud you if you got this far!
Top critical review
246 people found this helpful
Abysmal mic and sound. See video.
By LJ on Reviewed in the United States on September 15, 2022
EDIT: I uploaded a video of the camera's sound quality in action, so if you view the video turn on your sound BUT KEEP THE VOLUME DOWN (initially). No need for bleeding ears. During the Wyze portions of the video I was sitting roughly 20 feet away and six feet below the camera; There should be no feedback at that distance. During the iPhone portion (where I filmed the same space as the one the V3 is normally set up to film) I was roughly six feet away and six feet below the camera. The point was to capture the same sounds in the same room. All the videos were taken very early in the morning, with no traffic or human noise outside, and with what I'd call regular ambient interior noise (the humming of appliances, the running of a computer in the vicinity, etc). No other people were present to make noise inside. The first portion of the video is the sound that the V3 produces when I am viewing the live feed. It was screen-captured with my iPhone. The second portion is a comparison demonstrating the sound my iPhone picks up in the same general space, at the same general time, in the exact same conditions, and with the exact same ambient noise in the background as in the first portion; This is not to show how much better the iPhone's mic is than the Wyze (obviously it's better) but to give you an idea as to what noise and sounds were actually present in the room while I was viewing the V3's live feed of the same room, and capturing it with my phone camera. The third portion is the same space with the same ambient noise, plus conversation from the television that is eight feet from the V3. I chose a scene that sounds a lot like regular conversation, set it to conversation volume, and it has some light score that comes in at the end. The final portion is what my iPhone picked up in the same space during the same time and conditions, and while playing the exact same scene/conversation on the TV at the same volume as while capturing it on the V3. If you listen VERY carefully you MIGHT be able to pick up a word or two in the V3's video that you can compare to the iPhone's. Maybe. It took me three tries. Hint: listen for the word "Garrett". Hope the video helps you make a more informed purchasing decision! Original Review: Picture is ok. Night vision/low light is very good. Motion detection is spot-on. The camera looks good, design-wise. Why the one star? Because that's where the good ends. The problem is the mic/sound quality is appalling bad. That's such an old, tried-and-true tech I have no idea how they managed to bungle it so much, but managed they did. Maybe they are using the very cheapest, most absolute garbage quality components on the face of the earth, which sucks, because better components don't cost that much, especially wholesale. They're just squeezing every penny out of profit and selling garbage wrapped up and promoted as quality. Frustrating. So, what sound does it pick up? From what I've read online there are various audio manifestations/issues ranging from nearly no sound at all, all the way to my problem, which is the sound picked up becomes a garbled, distorted, feed-backed jumble of sometimes jarring noises that maybe sort-of could be interpreted as words (in the case of people taking) but nearly nothing's decipherable by any stretch of the imagination. Pet noises, like barks, meows, growls, etc. are literally non-existent. If it picks it up at all it's just converted to "noise". All other sound is just as bad. Sometimes there's these random-seeming staticky "bangs" every once in a while. Who knows what that is. I hate it. You hear that developers? I. Hate. This. Camera. And I wish I didn't because otherwise I like so much about it. But, alas, I need sound so I am able to use the function where you talk to someone through the camera and hear them when they respond. I also need to be able to hear what's going on with my pets. I need to be able to hear when the camera's motion-detection is tripped and the cause of the trip has moved out of the line of the camera but is still out there rustling and bumping around, or otherwise making noise out on my porch and the surrounding area. If I had children I wouldn't be able to hear them, or speak to them through the camera. or hear when one is crying. So, be forewarned, if any of the above is one of your needs/goals you probably won't be able to do that with this camera. Buy elsewhere. It's incredibly stupid they didn't fix this problem before releasing the V3. A lot of people online report the V2 being awful as well, so the developers knew. That means you shouldn't put off buying one for when the next gen comes out (whenever that is). They probably won't fix it. The worst part, I think, is it doesn't support the use of an external mic, which would be such an easy solve. There's no input port and the simple hardware and software to support that, and that really is stupid AF. If it did allow the connecting of an external mic all I'd have to do is plug one in and I would have the sound I need. At least then I wouldn't be writing this scathing review. It would be a win-win for everyone! But no. Finally, apparently contacting customer support is a total waste of time, and the people you talk to (bless their hearts, it isn't really their fault) have no tech experience or understanding whatsoever of how these things work. I don't know about you, but I find that exhausting. If one were to spend the time necessary to troubleshoot all the garbage products we wind up with one would never have time to do anything else, and even with that effort 95% of the time it results in no improvement, and no resolution. I'm tired of it. Just make a solid product, and when something goes wrong, replace it or refund the money, don't make anyone jump through hoops. Finally, fix the issue, fast. And don't repeat it in the next iteration. Long and the short of it is I need a camera with a functioning mic and/or that has an input for an external mic. The end. That shouldn't be too much to ask, even at the price-point these cameras are at. I regret buying these, as now they're going to be tossed after I buy another brand (according to message boards even cheapo Chinese no-name brands have a better mic than these things!). What a waste of time, money, and resources.
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