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Video Doorbells | Pad Patter 12.15.22

dawnmarch said:
I have Ring cameras all over the place. The way our house is set up, I can't really see out to the front of our house without going all the way to the other side of the house and looking out one of my kids' bedrooms. So, we have one just looking out into the driveway so I can see what is going on out there when the dogs start barking or there is other activity out there. That one is battery operated and I just swap the battery about once/month. We also have a ring doorbell that is wired in the place where a regular doorbell used to be. Our front door is in a sort of alcove, so the doorbell faces sideways which is why I can't use that one to see the driveway/front of the house.

On the side of the house, I took out our old regular, wired flood lights and replaced them with a wired, motion activated flood light Ring (if you can do basic light fixture wiring, you can do this). In the backyard, I have another motion activated floodlight but since it's in a place where we didn't have wires and I didn't want to change the batteries, that one is solar and it works great. That one is mostly to keep an eye on the pool -- we are all adults in the house but I still don't like people swimming by themselves. And I have two plug-in Rings inside for keeping an eye on the dogs when we're not home. I'm not really a total paranoid nut, I promise -- each camera has a specific purpose! :D

It doesn't get too cold here in Scottsdale but it sure does get HOT! We haven't had any problems with our cameras in the heat. If you have another kind of camera, you probably already experienced this but the two things that I don't love about the Rings is that you have to pay a monthly fee to be able to access the video after the fact and they take a few seconds after the motion alert to actually get the video feed up and running in the app.
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I think you’ve convinced me that we need more cameras!

Now I’m curious if we’re paying a monthly fee because I don’t even know…
 
IntenseMagic said:
Do you use a video doorbell or know someone who does? We do use one. It always records motion, but I don't always have it notify me when it does. I just check it usually every morning and afternoon.
If so what brand? We have Ring
Is it wired or wireless? It's wireless and rechargeable. Because of the settings I have on it, it doesn't drain very fast at all. I probably charge it every couple of months. I have far more animals trigger it in the night than visitors or creepers. I'd like to put another one on the back of the house.
Does it function poorly when it's too hot or too cold? Haven't had any problem with it at all.
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It sounds like Ring is a popular choice. We want another on the back of our house too.
 
estir_bune said:
My husband just installed a ring doorbell... we have cameras everywhere so I didn't want it... Our other doorbell was a motion sensored light bar (really cool) but I could not hear it from my upstairs office - now I get that recognizable ring chime on my phone when some one shows at the door... I miss the old door bell....
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The motion sensor light bar definitely sounds cool.

I like that our doorbell does some fun festive chimes.
 
We have an Arlo doorbell camera, and Simplisafe alarm system with cameras on the driveway, back door and inside our downstairs. We get alerts sometimes to cats or possums on our stoop at night. So far, we haven't had any attempted break-ins or scary things happen- although our neighorhood periodically gets someone trying car doors at night looking for unlocked ones. Our driveway camera is also on a motion-floodlight, so no one seems to have come on our driveway since we set that one up. We do get funny videos of our dog and cat running around playing on the inside camera (it only records after we set the alarm, so isn't just recording us living in the house)
 
My cousin lived in the country and had a local guy install a camera in the house (large open area) and one in the barn. When she was out either in the barn or even running errands, she could check on her mother at home. After her mother died in 2017 she sold that house and bought one around the corner from me. She had the same guy install cameras outside for her at this house. No inside camera although she has thought about it. Just this past year she had him install a video doorbell. The difference is that she has a monitor in her house specifically for her cameras. She can view them from her tablet or phone but as far as I know she has no videos available. She likes having a local guy do it but I'm not sure what would happen if something happens to him.

I know a lot of people consider them an invasion of privacy. I do live in an area where houses are not that close together so it was easy to set up so that I don't see everything that is happening at the neighbor's house.
 
We just got a ring doorbell at black friday prices. A lot of our neighbors have them & we've had a spree of package thiefs & car break ins in our neighborhood so we figured we'd jump on the bandwagon. We wired ours to our old doorbell (super easy) and so far I love it. I can see how the ring flood lights would be really nice too- we'll probably pick up those at some point in the future.
 
HavaDrPepper said:
@dawnmarch You use yours like I use mine... to watch the dog! The guy that set mine up for me definitely recommended paying for the protection plan and he suggested the yearly option since it was cheaper than the monthly rate. I just consider it another form of insurance.

I spend the most time in the back of my house, away from both doors which is why I needed some kind of doorbells. It was a hassle for quite some time when I had none because I didn't always hear a knock on the door. And, with the video I can actually decide if I even want to answer the door. We gets lots of solicitations in this neighborhood and even with a no soliciting sign, they still come to the door. Especially this one company that I have told repeatedly that I am not interested. The summer of 2020 was fantastic since no one was doing door to door solicitation!

I was lucky in that I already had 2 wired lights at the driveway and the patio that I could put the wired floodlights on. I considered a solar for the front door only it would not get enough sunlight to be feasible so battery is it. One of the inside cameras is a plug-in but the other is battery. There is no way to hide a cord for one at the location I have it. So I just got 2 extra batteries and a charger that is plugged in at all times. When a battery gets low, I just swap them out.
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I frequently use our video doorbell to avoid solicitors. It drives me crazy that they ignore our “no soliciting” sign!
 
Scrapping with Liz said:
I have never heard of a ring doorbell or video doorbell! I feel like I'm living in the dark ages over here. I actually don't even have a doorbell. People just knock. Haha. We do have motion sensor lights that come on at night. Of course, we do live in a very rural area and I have to give everyone very specific instructions on how to get to our house.
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My husband wishes we lived in a very rural area. I’m impressed you don’t even have a doorbell; I would never notice anyone at our door without ours (which I also wouldn’t mind haha).
 
HavaDrPepper said:
My cousin lived in the country and had a local guy install a camera in the house (large open area) and one in the barn. When she was out either in the barn or even running errands, she could check on her mother at home. After her mother died in 2017 she sold that house and bought one around the corner from me. She had the same guy install cameras outside for her at this house. No inside camera although she has thought about it. Just this past year she had him install a video doorbell. The difference is that she has a monitor in her house specifically for her cameras. She can view them from her tablet or phone but as far as I know she has no videos available. She likes having a local guy do it but I'm not sure what would happen if something happens to him.

I know a lot of people consider them an invasion of privacy. I do live in an area where houses are not that close together so it was easy to set up so that I don't see everything that is happening at the neighbor's house.
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I can definitely understand why people consider them an invasion of privacy.
 
amien1 said:
We just got a ring doorbell at black friday prices. A lot of our neighbors have them & we've had a spree of package thiefs & car break ins in our neighborhood so we figured we'd jump on the bandwagon. We wired ours to our old doorbell (super easy) and so far I love it. I can see how the ring flood lights would be really nice too- we'll probably pick up those at some point in the future.
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Yay for Black Friday prices! I’m sorry about the problems in your neighborhood and hope the Ring works out well for you.
 
When we were having repeated home invasions while I was home the police suggested to us to increase our security with cameras so we could have proof but by the time we figured out our options (we couldn’t have wired so our options were more limited) the issue died down luckily. If I was ever in a situation where I needed more security I wouldn’t hesitate to consider video doorbells and the like though.
 
littlekiwi said:
If I was ever in a situation where I needed more security I wouldn’t hesitate to consider video doorbells and the like though.
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Living alone as a female and being older, the cameras definitely give me a better sense of being secure. I think they are great for people like me.
 
littlekiwi said:
When we were having repeated home invasions while I was home the police suggested to us to increase our security with cameras so we could have proof but by the time we figured out our options (we couldn’t have wired so our options were more limited) the issue died down luckily. If I was ever in a situation where I needed more security I wouldn’t hesitate to consider video doorbells and the like though.
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I’m glad the issues died down for you Jennifer. I feel like more security is always worth the investment.
 
It turns out the suspicious activity we had was just people looking for a lost cat collar. It has a tracking device and they tracked it to our house. They came again yesterday while we were home to look for it so we let them check everywhere but couldn’t find it in all our recent snow. I’m glad we don’t have to worry about who was walking around our entire yard any more.
 
We have a Ring camera hard-wired to our doorbell. I am glad that we have it, because about 6 months ago a kid running from the cops tried to hide on our porch, and it gave us a ring at like 2 am in the morning. He was trying to jump into our backyard and rang the bell of our next-door neighbor to see if they were home - presumably to break in. We called 911 and they came out and caught him. He and his friends had been out stealing things from people's cars and our 2 doors down neighbor shot a warning shot at them and his friends jumped in their car and left him behind. (we saw this on our neighbor's ring when it was asked to see).

That said - I am constantly barraged by alerts when people walk by the house. They bug me, but for the times when we have been alerted to issues and people at the door, it is worth it. We were able to talk to the guy that owned the dog that attacked ours when we were at the Vet getting Gadget checked out through the ring app while we weren't home.

All in all, I would recommend it, but I would NOT recommend getting the neighborhood alerts. For me, it made me too scared as it was "a man was in my backyard", a kid was breaking into our car", etc...and I started to feel really unsafe in my own home. Also - my heart couldn't handle all the dogs and cats lost.
 
umyesh said:
I think you’ve convinced me that we need more cameras!

Now I’m curious if we’re paying a monthly fee because I don’t even know…
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Our ring is free. I don't know if there are paid options.
 
Pachimac said:
Our ring is free. I don't know if there are paid options.
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So how do you watch past videos? They aren't saved if you don't pay for a protection account and are only available at the time of the live notification. At least according to what Ring says.

By paying for my plan, I can save videos from 6 cameras up to 180 days.
 
The only experience I have with video doorbells is seeing them as I was delivering packages for the USPS from Oct 2020 through July 2021. I was barely aware of them prior to that, but when I realized I was seeing so many of them, it occurred to me how often I was being recorded by strangers. I'm generally a conscientious person anyway, but this strengthened that. And I wondered how often owners of video doorbells look at their recordings and how many had watched me deliver their packages.

I know several houses in my suburban neighborhood have video doorbells but my husband and I have never even talked about them. We're slow to adopt new technology, for one thing, I guess. And we've been lucky, our area is pretty secure. Although in 2003 two teenagers stole our front porch wicker sofa. I was even home and went out and shouted at them from my lawn, holding my newborn baby. Would a video doorbell have helped in that situation?
 
HavaDrPepper said:
So how do you watch past videos? They aren't saved if you don't pay for a protection account and are only available at the time of the live notification. At least according to what Ring says.

By paying for my plan, I can save videos from 6 cameras up to 180 days.
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I have never needed to save it, so I don’t know.
 
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