Been thinking of installing one at the front door and one by the back door along with a camera in the garage. Keep leaning towards the RING but wanted to get everyone's input. If I have a functional doorbell it's just as simple as checking voltage, hooking up the ring and their included power supply "if" I don't have enough voltage? You need to "pay" for their cloud storage? Or is that just "optional"?

I have a Ring Doorbell Pro. Works great. Easy to set up, excellent support.

I'm not a fan, my wife loves it. I find it intrusive. It was cool, though, that when I was in Israel, I could speak with people at the door of my house in NY.

I needed the WiFi extender to get it to work, which they sent for free - YMMV.

They have newer models now - not sure what the difference is.

Space,

My parents, brother and I all have Ring doorbells. My parents have a wired model. My brother and I have the Ring Doorbell 2 which operates via hardwire or battery. We had to go battery because we didn't have wired doorbells in the first place. Cloud services are required for functionality. Fortunately, the cost of the service is very reasonable.

One nice thing about Ring is that it isn't just video doorbells. They offer a slew of products that all work together. Cams, spotlights and, very recently, an alarm system. That and I can vouch that the Doorbell is Alexa friendly. If you have a fire TV device, Echo Spot, Echo Show or a Fire Tablet that supports "Show" mode, you can watch live footage from the doorbell on it.

That said, I have one _huge_ beef with Ring doorbells. Doesn't matter which version. The WiFi hardware built into them is friggin' awful! My parents, brother and I all have excellent wifi speeds and reception in our homes. Yet, I had to install a wifi booster in each location to ensure the video doorbells worked properly.

I contacted tech support about it and each time was told it was an issue with our networks. Ridiculous. If the networks in our places were that bad, _nothing_ Internet related would work properly. Computers, Smart TVs, phones, tablets, etc. Yet, all of that hardware performed flawlessly. The wifi hardware built into the doorbells just sucks.

On mine, the doorbell is on the wall next to the door. I had to place a wifi booster (Airport Express) on the inside wall directly opposite it to ensure it could connect to the network. Imagine I punch a hole through the wall right next to the video doorbell. I could push my hand through it and tap the Airport Express. That's how close I had to put it to ensure the doorbell could connect to the network. Even then, it's not a particularly strong connection. It works, though.

That said, I'd still choose a Ring over the competitors. Once you've got a solid wifi connection, I can say without a doubt, they just work. Kinda like a Wyzecam. Get it connected, do some basic configuration and you're set.

FYI, Ring is owned by Amazon.com. I'm sure this is one of the reasons they are Alexa friendly now. Hopefully, it means they'll continue to improve the devices and really do something about the wifi hardware built into them.

Robert

I have a Doorbell Pro, installed it mostly to use as a security camera - wasn't looking for a connected doorbell, but wanted a front door security cam (fair amount of packages stolen from stoops in my hood), so this killed two birds...

I have an old house, and even though my existing transformer measured fine, I ended up having to replace it as well as my chime to get everything to work 100%.

Cloud storage, if you want anything stored, is $30/year I think.

All things said, I like it. It is a little slow to connect and stream video to the app. I'm not sure if that's because of bad wifi hardware, or possibly if it's just underpowered in terms of processor hardware.

It can be as intrusive as you want, which is to say my wife didn't like that it *could* be set to notify me of motion any time, which is to say I could see when she comes/goes. So I have that turned off, unless we're on vacation etc.

One stupid thing - since it can be hooked to Alexa, you'd think you could make all your Echos act as doorbell chimes. Not the case.

Owned by Amazon now? No wonder they are offering a "free" dot with a purchase of a RING 2 or RING PRO.

Echo Dot - Black + Ring Video Doorbell 2
[www.amazon.com]

I guess I just want some added security. Tempted to forget this project and just spend the $$$$ on a Hiksvision security camera system.

Bill

I have one. I didn't check anything about the current wiring/power. I just hooked it up and it worked fine. I paid the $30 per year for optional cloud storage. I used a 1-time use credit card and after a month I got a red notice that "Your credit card has expired. Your subscription has been cancelled." I called and they said that it meant they cancelled the auto-renew but my 1-year subscription was active. That's exactly what I wanted.

I have had to reboot it twice in the last year. That's a minor pain because you have to unscrew it.

I use Wyze cams for the other cameras. Much cheaper and they work fine.

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spacescape
I guess I just want some added security. Tempted to forget this project and just spend the $$$$ on a Hiksvision security camera system.

If I was starting over, that's what I'd do. Get a dedicated 4k security system.

I started with Arlo Pro's which were super convenient since they are battery powered and the service fee was pretty reasonable ($150/yr for up to 15 cameras, 60 days of motion recordings).

Just this weekend I added some Ring Floodlight Cameras since I'll also be adding a Ring Security System when I get around to installing it. Ring is even more reasonable at $100/yr for unlimited cameras and the security system for 60 days of motion and live recordings (note this price existed before the Amazon buy-out).

I've only had the Ring cameras up for a couple of days, but what is nice is that since they are hard wired, they have a bit of pre-roll before the motion and after. The Arlo recordings occur when the motion starts (the Arlo Pro 2 can do a 3 second pre-roll if plugged in).

But Arlo has better alerts that include an image so you know if you can ignore it or want/need to watch it. Ring just has text about motion at x location. Arlo also makes it MUCH EASIER to find videos you may need since the online and app include a preview still. With Ring, you'd have to keep watching videos until you find the one you need since it's just a text listing of "motion - location".

Arlo has added types of motion recently, i.e. "Person detected" or "Motion detected", except it still thinks my cats are people. Oh well. I've tried reducing the motion alerts in Ring down to "People Only" but I still get alerts for every car that goes by. I could use a motion zone to exclude the street, but a recording from the street would have come in handy recently when my girlfriend got into a car accident right outside my house (didn't have the cameras up then), so I still want the recordings, just not the alerts.

THEY ARE BOTH MISSING A CRITICAL FEATURE: They don't burn a timestamp into the video! Downloaded videos from both will have the Epoch (Unix) time as the filename. Don't know if that will be good enough in a court of law, should you need it. I just realized this yesterday and in my brief research, it appears to be a much requested feature yet neither company has done anything about it.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2018 02:00PM by Gareth.

I have Ring camera's surrounding our house. I do pay the annual fee for cloud storage. It's only $100 for unlimited camera's and that seems like a no-brainer to me. I am very happy with them. I even used the footage in court one time. I am sold on them.

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Ukulele music I couldn't find anywhere else.
[colquhoun.info]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2018 03:55PM by davemchine.

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spacescape
Been thinking of installing one at the front door and one by the back door along with a camera in the garage. Keep leaning towards the RING but wanted to get everyone's input. If I have a functional doorbell it's just as simple as checking voltage, hooking up the ring and their included power supply "if" I don't have enough voltage?

Correct.

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You need to "pay" for their cloud storage? Or is that just "optional"?

Correct again. Ring's "basic protect plan" is $30/yr:

[ring.com]

I have had the Ring for 2 years. It has terrible lag when it comes to the motion activation. When it pick up motion what ever set it off is almost out of view by the time the camera can see it. Also my mailman can come to my door place mail in the mail box without setting it off.

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spacescape
You need to "pay" for their cloud storage? Or is that just "optional"?

You don't need to subscribe to cloud. I haven't, and the doorbell works, the app works, etc.

You need to subscribe if you want access to the video later.

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qdog2
I have had the Ring for 2 years. It has terrible lag when it comes to the motion activation. When it pick up motion what ever set it off is almost out of view by the time the camera can see it. Also my mailman can come to my door place mail in the mail box without setting it off.

Basic Ring will do that. You have to mess with the proximity settings.(my friend owns the basic ring)
I have the Ring Pro and the only time it didn’t work was on a extra bright sunny day. The Spotlight cam above the garage picked it up though. Both are wired. Heard there are problems with the battery powered units even with solar panels.