Reolink: Deconstruction of a dangerous misleading youtube review "Finding the BEST 4K Security Camera NVR Package (Reolink vs Amcrest vs Swann)"

[Elton Noway]

Great information from all... thanks! Wanted to run this by you all Just to make sure I'm deciphering everything correctly. Here's the deal... my mailbox is 185 feet from the closest mounting position I can use. Not ideal but it is what it is. I don't need an event triggers, facial recognition software, motion detection, PTZ capability etc. I'm basically looking for a POE camera I can set-and forget... one that will capture activity around my mailbox 24 hours a day while providing the best, "closest" video image I can get without breaking the bank. I know there are some super powerful optical zoom cameras out there but some of the price tags are more than I spent on my entire system. I'm also aware that due to the distance, night vision recordings IR or otherwise wouldnt be very good but night vision recording are not my first priority. I have a nice bright mercury vapor street light just above my mail box which illuminates the entire area so hoping it will help. I'm not sure if a bullet style camera or a dome style camera will offer the best solution for my situation but based on the above info it it appears a zoomed in Vari-focal like the bullet style 5241-Z12E fits the bill. Yes-No- Other suggestion?

 

[wittaj]

Great information from all... thanks! Wanted to run this by you all Just to make sure I'm deciphering everything correctly. Here's the deal... my mailbox is 185 feet from the closest mounting position I can use. Not ideal but it is what it is. I don't need an event triggers, facial recognition software, motion detection, PTZ capability etc. I'm basically looking for a POE camera I can set-and forget... one that will capture activity around my mailbox 24 hours a day while providing the best, "closest" video image I can get without breaking the bank. I know there are some super powerful optical zoom cameras out there but some of the price tags are more than I spent on my entire system. I'm also aware that due to the distance, night vision recordings IR or otherwise wouldnt be very good but night vision recording are not my first priority. I have a nice bright mercury vapor street light just above my mail box which illuminates the entire area so hoping it will help. I'm not sure if a bullet style camera or a dome style camera will offer the best solution for my situation but based on the above info it it appears a zoomed in Vari-focal like the bullet style 5241-Z12E fits the bill. Yes-No- Other suggestion?

Yes, the Z12E will give you the best image at that distance unless you jump to a PTZ.

You will find any other camera would just provide too big of a field of view that wouldn't let you be able to IDENTIFY anything.

 

[Elton Noway]

AWESOME... Thank you for the quick response and verification.. just what I was looking for!

 

[mat200]

FYI - found this to be interesting posted at reddit

There was a good reply .. basically add a lot more light ( flood lights )



Posted byu/airbag888
2 months ago
New to Reolink and not a thrilled by the night time motion performance (8CH NVR + 820A & 822A)
Question about NVR and POE Cam
Hi guys. After watching hookups videos I got naively sold on the reolinks. I'm even more ashamed to say that because I'm into IT and been dabbling in IP Cams ages ago..
Anyway thinking the industry moved forwards and not back I got a set of Reolink 8ch NVR + 4 cams + 3 additional ones thinking (again naively) that the 4k resolution would do great...
Part of the reason for my lack of research was due to me being a new dad of 2 and also building our new home.
As the times go home got ready 4-5 months later than expected aka Reolink return window gone.

Now managed to install most of them (2 left) and to my regret, nighttime motion SUCKS. No other way to put it.. It ghosts and smears and changing the setting for exposure does not do ANYTHING.
Suffice to say that while the still picture is not bad (no thief is going to strike a pose for a selfie)

Research seems to show that this is due to

a small sensor to resolution ratio

craptastic iframe to fps ratio (it should be 1:1 but it's more like 1:4)

bad shutter speeds.

Essentially the iframe and shutter speeds are tuned to produce a great still image but anything moving is lost.
The issue apparently being the hardware itself, if it was tuned as required above to produce a clear moving image, it would be too dark to be usable.

Obviously, law enforcement would not be able to take ghost/smeared faces for any sort of identification and obviously, while daytime performance is great most crimes occur at night

..







ref:

The reply by Specialturkeyraww was good, and he did a good youtube review which showed that you must add a significant amount of flood light to get the reolinks to work at night.

Default = no floodlight
Adjust = with floodlight

( basically Reolink just stinks in low light performance .. )




He noted, that he likes to force the Reolink cameras to remain in B&W mode ( IR light ) instead of color mode to get a crisp image, and only uses one camera for color info.



ref:

 

[wittaj]

And with that amount of light added to make the reos look like that, just think how great a Dahua or Hik would be with that same amount of light!

 

[user8963]

@mat200
The sad story about it..

The one who made the video (rhiz oplast) was banned(not 100% sure, but i think he was banned like me) from reolinks subreddit for asking the wrong questions.

3 months ago he started complaining about reolinks move to remove shutter/gain control from the firmware
you can read it here:


as you see the OP posted it 3 months ago, then he got banned..
now "Specialturkeyraww" posting the similiar content and maybe got banned again, because the turkey guy seems not active anymore.

there are people who try to find an answer to understand why their reoshit is now even worse.

 

[wittaj]

Reolink is the perfect solution for DIY....(NOT). Notice no video or stills of night images...

Reolink 4K 8-Channel Security Camera NVR is The Best DIY CCTV Kit of 2021

Affordable, easy to install, and versatile, the RLK8-820D4-A features HDMI output, a great smartphone app, and professional desktop software.

www.makeuseof.com

 

[wittaj]

Check out how great it is compared to Ring when nobody is moving...

Why Everyone Needs a 4K Smart Cam (Reolink Vs Ring)

My latest video explores why a 4K smart/security camera is necessary for crime detection, and the factors that make a good camera.

www.smarthomepoint.com

 

[mat200]

Check out how great it is compared to Ring when nobody is moving...

Why Everyone Needs a 4K Smart Cam (Reolink Vs Ring)

My latest video explores why a 4K smart/security camera is necessary for crime detection, and the factors that make a good camera.

www.smarthomepoint.com

And .. this is what he looks like when moving with good light ...





Note he is comparing a 8MP camera ("4K") with a 2mp ("1080p") camera



ref:

 

[Mark_M]

Another one taking the sweet sponsor money.
I made a comment, it got deleted.... I wonder who did it because they can delete comments on their own videos....

Someone here needs to get sponsored by Reolink and tell us what they require you to say about the product.

 

[user8963]

moderator on reolink subreddit



"What, are police going to say sorry, we can't accept that footage, it's too fishy at the edges?"

nono.. they have enhance tech...
went full (sponsored) reolink... its not only the quality, also the fov and mountings looks awful !

 

[The Automation Guy]

Wow! It wasn't until the last camera angle when the racoons slowed to almost a stop that you could even see the telltail rings around their tails. It was a burry mess whenever they were moving! I have to laugh that the guy doesn't even know that you can rotate the camera view to correct it whenever you rotate the lens when mounting it. This guy is clearly Reolink's target audience and they have great success with this target group.

Maybe Reolink should change their tag line to "Reolink, when you are too dumb to know any better."

 

[user8963]

I have to laugh that the guy doesn't even know that you can rotate the camera view to correct it whenever you rotate the lens when mounting it.

Yeah.. i laughed too.
But then i googled.... rotate is not supported on Reolink cameras

https://support.reolink.com/hc/en-us/articles/900000603746-Can-I-Rotate-Camera-Image-90-Degrees

 

[mat200]

moderator on reolink subreddit



"What, are police going to say sorry, we can't accept that footage, it's too fishy at the edges?"

nono.. they have enhance tech...
went full (sponsored) reolink... its not only the quality, also the fov and mountings looks awful !

finally one pauses to see their slow poke friend .. and we finally see what sort of animal this is..



oh, and finally the tail stops moving ..



too bad he's turning his head now ..

and with a blur .. there they go ..




finally the slow poke comes into frame .. always the laggard ..









pausing for a snail or something .. note, there are 2 coons here .. look closely ..



and before you know it they disappear .. um, no wait .. they are still in this frame .. squint a bit more to see them ..



and finally the 3rd trailing behind ..

 

[wittaj]

^But on the plus side, look how great that Honda looks....oh wait it is parked and not moving

 

[mat200]

fwiw:

reports of Reolink finally updating their firmware to allow iframe adjustments .. just took them forever, let's see if this works and if they put this version as standard ..
( sometimes firmware is forked and the new branch with the features you like gets dropped .. hoping this adjustment becomes the main branch .. )

REOLINK beta firmware allows Iframe adjusting to work in Blue Iris!!

Hey guys - new to the forum, possibly late to the party on this, however, I figured Id share anyhow. Been getting my ass kicked trying to get Blue Iris and Deepstacks to work and I found this forum. While trying to figure out my issue, it was pointed out that REOLINK cams arent good to use due...

ipcamtalk.com

 

[sebastiantombs]

Given the level of technical expertise of the average Reolink buyer somehow I don't think it will matter much at all.

 

[wittaj]

The OP of that beta thread was asked to provide BI camera status page update at night to see if the camera will actually honor user inputted FPS and iframes, as well as a night video with motion showing that it was improved...since that hasn't happened either the the OP got busy or it isn't working as advertised....

 

[MrRobinHood]

I figured they were hedgehogs, the only animals I know to move fast enough to be a blur are Sonic and Knuckles.

 

[user8963]

Things people like The Hook Up never talk about in a nutshell:
(one of the main problems of most of Hookups "comparisons")


(Quote from the end:
"Take these numbers with a grain of salt and dont rely 100% on the dori numbers. You still want to keep other specs in mind like the IR distance (...). There is a lot more that goes into selecting the perfect security camera"

To add:
-> sensor size
-> DORI @ night / low light

Conclusion: even if MEGAPIXEL was a topic in the video above, there are some downsides (on most cameras) with higher megapixel , like problems with small sensors resulting in horrible night vision.