Question

I apologize for my rant and not sure if i should post here but i am frustrated. If i had known these cameras were so unreliable i would never had purchased. They are so unreliable i have turned off all notifications. I have a stick up cam on my garage and a spotlight cam at my front door. I have both set to People Only. If someone walks down the hill, on the sidewalk the garage and front camera will record but if someone walks up the hill only the garage camera will record. Why? The cameras dont consistently record from one day to the next. When the newspaper delivery is made to my neighbor, my front camera records it eventhough it is outside the motion range. Sometimes i get notifications on my phone and sometimes i dont. I never get a popup anymore. If i had money to blow i would throw them in the trash and buy something new because these cameras do not help.  

Answer 1

Everyone knows they don't constantly record. They only record motions. I spent hundreds on ring cameras. Absolutely brilliant. No issues 99•9% of issues are caused by user error.  

Comments

@aroid10 she said “consistently”.  

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@trueblue Not user error when a camera only records people walking down the sidewalk and not up the sidewalk or when it only records a specific car in my neighbors driveway that is outside the zone.  

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@arcboutant I didn’t say that. I actually hate my ring too

Answer 2

I would suggest a call to Ring. I think they could probably help you fix these issues. There is a very good possibility that you only have to make some simple changes in the various settings.  

Comments

@ermina Tried several times. No idea why it happens. This is why I am so frustrated.  

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@arcboutant You called them and they couldn't resolve your issues?  

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@ermina I have called several times. I have given up.  

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How long have you had the cams. Call back and tell them you have called before without resolution and to escalate this to a higher level. If you had them less than a year tell them straight out either help me fix it or send me replacements.  

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@ermina lol I’ve been waiting 2 weeks for my doorbell replacement after spending an hour with their tech support. They can’t even tell me why it hasn’t shipped.  

Answer 3

Don't know if this will help but you can link the cameras. . So if camera "a" detects motions and begins recording, cameras "b, c, and d" will become recording as well. And you can do that with all your cameras and lights. If a single camera detects they can all start recording or just a select few. Your choice. Might be something to look at if you want consistency.  

Comments

@hilel Wont work in this case. When someone walks up the hill the first camera is the front which is not detecting the person so it is not recording so it wont trigger the garage which records ok.  

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@arcboutant ahhh gotcha. Have you tried multiple motion zones? It's better to have multiple zones covering an area instead of one large motion zone.  

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@hilel My zone is small. Just a small front side yard. The driveway is my neighbor.  

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@hilel just curious, how is that helpful? I am new to ring. I have a doorbell 2, chime pro, flood light cam, and spotlight cam.  

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@fence can't remember where I read it. But many users in this group suggest having multiple zones instead of a single zone. I'm can't recall the technical reasoning behind it. But it's been posted before

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@arcboutant what's the height of your camera? Looks like it should be mounted slightly higher so as to have more of an angle looking down.  

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@hilel Just got off the phone with Tech support. Camera angle has been changed and multiple zones crested. Will run tests tonight to see what happens.  

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@arcboutant The screen shot you posted above shows that the camera will only start recording if someone is on your grass, since you have that zone marked. It looks like you need to make that zone bigger to cover the whole street if you want to record people walking up the hill on the sidewalk or in the street. I see you have a tiny portion of the sidewalk in the zone, but once someone triggers motion from that small edge of the corner from walking up the hill, by the time the camera starts recording they are probably already to the left of the camera where it won't record them.  

Answer 4

It's under the "linked devices" tab

Answer 5

Sounds like you need a better understanding of how these cameras work and how to use the settings properly. I have 5 wired ring cams and they all work perfectly for the past 3 years. I would start with your motion zones and not worry about the sensitivity feature as it is not very accurate.  

Comments

@idioglossia48381 I have to use People only or it gets every car going down the road. Outside of my zone settings.  

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@arcboutant I have set a couple of mine to people only and it still records everything especially my cats lol

Answer 6

In front of my house, I have 2 door bells, 3 spot light cameras, not all of them record at the same time, there’s always a time when one miss to record,  

Answer 7

I absolutely have the exact same problems. There's so many false-positives, but what annoys me the most is when I KNOW someone is at the door but the app completely fails to respond--first, it doesn't send me an alert, then when I manually trigger live view it sits there "Connecting. " and then eventually throws an error. You know what works literally 100% of the time? My ONVIF wifi camera. I 100% regret purchasing Ring products, but now that I have it I'm stuck w/ it, for the time being anyways. There's nothing better than being out of the house, having ring send you a motion alert, try to view it and have it completely fail. so you wait patiently for the recording to become available, but nothing ever shows up in the list. So you just sit there like "welp, glad I have this product"

Answer 8

Battery cams? ISP router?  

Answer 9

Your not alone! Very unreliable and getting worse all the time.  

Answer 10

I rarely take advice but did on this brand and regret it too. I’ve had nest cams for years and love them. I got a ring security system when I moved and it was fine, so since I was now already paying for monitoring this enticed me to buy cameras too. I didn’t want to pay extra device fees that Nest charges. But i know now the fees are worth it. Continuous recording without fail, no waiting with nest. Ring cams are ok for casual use like checking on the pets or to see of a package is on the porch. But not enough for security

Answer 11

I feel the same as you - I got about 3 months' service out of mine - it was a Christmas gift to my 91-year-old mother, and the notifications were set to her phone and mine and her iPad. She passed away at the end of February. I gave her phone to my niece and tried to change the ownership on the Ring. They have informed me that I have to have a notarized death certificate and a power of attorney-like permission to "change ownership" and I am mad.  

Comments

@bruise5 first off, let me say I'm sorry for your loss. Unfortunately, this is a pretty common practice though when trying to transfer most secure account types out of somebody's name after they pass away. It's not just Ring.  

Answer 12

99% of the issues with Ring devices are either poor wifi signal or user error. Doesn't sound like you're doing anything wrong, so most likely you wifi is the issue. Inconsistent signal strength will cause your cameras to go in and out. Same can be caused if the wifi strength is barely enough to reach the camera. There are several steps you can take to resolve either of those issues.