WyzeCam becoming more & more unusable?

Wow sounds like you’re system has issues, our company manages over 40 customers camera systems plus we have have 6 sites and I asked our technicians in the last 60 days how many issues did the customer have and we had his response was 1 the customer camera was unplugged so that falls under customer issue

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Chaz you are not alone, I get the same experience here. Search this forum and you will see that they are plenty that has the same playback issue as well. I am sure the DEV team could answer us easely on that one. As a DEV myself, I suspect that they change something in their code for the playback, If nothing has changed in your wifi at home, then a communication with their server instead of reading directly on the card would explain this behavior of the spinning arrow of death :frowning:

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Same here I’m about done with Wyze stuff 30 plus cameras I have plus sold probably or helped sell 100 more to friends that are not happy with the performance lately, SO I’m getting Wise and starting to look for another camera company that is stable this is a big letdown, too much time wasted trying to fix them I have some other cameras from other company’s and no issues WAKE UP WYZE

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I’ve been with Wyze since the beginning too. (I have Wyze v1, v2, V3, hand vac, robot vac, Wyze outlets, Wyze bulbs.)

With a 300 mb/sec connection I’m experiencing…

  • more cam drop-outs
  • cam 3’s not connecting with the app
  • having to unplug cam 3’s to get them to reconnect
  • frame freezing

This is definitely a drop in service quality as, in my situation, nothing has changed but the Wyze service.

Disappointing.

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Wyze has several major issues that they need to address. For a start up company they should concentrate on issues at hand,. No, I’m not a Monday Night Quarterback my firm specializes in DeNovo companies. Without going into details (most people already know Wyze’s issues) which are repeatedly mentioned in this form. . Wyze has 5 investing firms which they all know the problems, customers should reach out to them.

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@chaz

I have a number of posts where I was experiencing issues with the v3’s in and sometimes the v2’s in the past. I like you assumed it was not my router. However, when I reboot the router the camera’s started to work for a period of time. Of course, other devices seemed to work well which is why I suspected that it was not a router issue.

Here was my experience:

Everything streamed and worked well until there was a bunch of activity going on. This caused multiple camera’s to detect motion and start a Live Event recording. When this occured I was unable to connect to a live stream, the KB/S would go to 0 and my camera’s would start to show offline. This increased activity, be it Wind causing trees and bushes to sway, mowing company mowing my yard, kids playing in the yard, or whatever would always trigger the issue. After experiementing with a few of the Wyze Settings and adjusting my router I finally decided to contact Wyze. We worke don this for the better part of a month and I was appreciateive of the time they spent with me on it. But there was no final resolution, I will say that WEBRTC on the V2 is impressive and did not suffer as much from this issue.

What was my resolution

I tried everything I could as individuals recommended above. I originally had a TPLink P7 Deco Mesh Network and decided to upgrade to the Deco x60 Mesh Network. Upgrading my router to a more powerful and feature rich one seemed to clear up the issue to a point where it would work for a few days now. But it still was not perfect. I then decided to do one more Router Upgrade. I purchsed the ASUS ZenWiFi AX XT8 and was amazed at how it performed. All of my issues cleared, I was able to stream multiple camera’s at one time in my Camera Groups and from the Montitoring tab (Was never able to do this). It also provded me with the ability to lock devices to a specific Node and as an IT tinkerer, there is a lot of options you can tweak or tune, which is not needed. In any event, since switching to these routers, I found that all issues I was experiencing on my network went away.

What Led me to the Router

Researching the issues online, there were articles about the TPLink Deco’s. They are great devices, don’t get me wrong. However, all of the articles talked about how they have issues maintaining streams and with large amounts of connected devices. Switching to the X60’s worked better because it allows for more devices, but was more for WiFi 6 connected devices. Then I came across the Asus router, link below. The information on what it could do and how you could configure it for your needs is what I was looking for to isolate the issues. I then watched a number of Youtube video’s which convinced me to try these devices. I have not looked back and have been very impressed.

For another comparison, I have a 2000 Sqft ramabler and with the TPLink Deco’s, I needed to use 3 devices in order to get seemless coverage. With the ASUS, I only use 2 devices, one at each end of the home. However, I can get away with one but the signal drops. I also removed my FiOS router and use it as my main router.

Final bit of informaiton: If you are using FiOS and use the provided DNS, I would recommed changing that. The Default DNS entries routs traffic through a checker to see if the site is valid or not and increases time to get to a site. I would use Google or another DNS. or simply change the last Octet of the DNS from 12 to 14. In my area, the last octet of 14 is Normal DNS without injecting a form of checks.

Conclusion

This is not for everyone, but I would not rule out the routers as being the issue with connectivity, camera’s going offline, etc. Since changing, I have been extremely pleased with the performance and have not realized the streaming and camera issues.

Here is what I Purchased, if it helps. No, I don’t work for ASUS :slight_smile: there are other routers which work just as well

https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-ZenWiFi-AX-Whole-Home-Tri-Band/dp/B083Q45V1V/ref=sr_1_4?crid=9TGLYNV2M81R&keywords=asus+zenwifi+ax+xt8&qid=1637850023&qsid=145-7855585-2587157&sprefix=ASUS+zenwifi+%2Caps%2C160&sr=8-4&sres=B081GH8XRS%2CB083Q45V1V%2CB0979QB4L1%2CB07WNY2WKG%2CB086HJXKJJ%2CB092DWKK73%2CB085Z35GY6%2CB08Z2XXFFW%2CB08V2ZGBNK%2CB07RBBX5ZW%2CB08S8WZ9FK%2CB08L298Q5B%2CB08J6CFM39%2CB08GG9CMLR%2CB07YT5G7M7%2CB081ZWJ6FX&srpt=NETWORKING_ROUTER

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Helpful post, thanks @spamoni . Hmm, there has got to be a decent router under $100. I picked up a refurb Linksys EA7300 that has been okay, but I wonder if there is a budget alternative to the Asus.

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I am sure there is. Linksys is a great model/brand. I know others are using the TPLink Gaming Routers successfully as well. My needs drove me to a Mesh network.

Going through routers like I did kind of exceeded my budget :). But since I wanted WiFi 6 and something which I could tinker with and connect Wyze to, the decision was simple. The logs and graphical traffic analyzer has helped out to see what is using the badwidth.

I still have the x60 in my closet. :slight_smile: figure I will get rid of it soon.

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4 cams here, and I’m getting the same inconsistency you are. I’ve noticed over the last week or so they all go out at the same time, too.

Dude, you wanna go in on a Asus together? We could do joint custody, I get it for the first three years, you get it thereafter, waddaya say? :grin:

/edit

Wait, I just heard I had a lot of money in my savings account but nowhere to spend it…

…Woohoo! Hedge fund girl was right, score!!

image image :clap:

image

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I wish you luck finding a company that you’ll be as satisfied with on day 1000 as you are on day 10.

You’ll probably have better luck with a company that is long established, but even then, at some point as growth begins to slow, someone will think it is a great idea to start cutting costs (and thus support, development, etc.).

A granular time lapse of the principals’ faces since inception might be interesting

image 's version is kinda scary.

Well said……

Very good statement. Wyze HAS to get this act together. Ever wonder if management reads these post. If they did, something would hopefully happen…NOT!

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A speculation.

What percentage of customers never budge off the ISP-provided WiFi router?
What percentage upgrade to a Costco-level ‘premium’ product?
What percentage upgrade to a true premium (or enterprise) product?

Razor and blades

The razor is the low-margin devices.
The blades are the recurring services.

Why wouldn’t Wyze add a customized router to the razor lineup?

Wireless stability would improve
Customer support costs would fall
Customer satisfaction would rise
Additional purchases would increase
As would sales of essential services
And profits

Stable connectivity is the IoT linchpin.

Why leave it so much to chance?

 
Thoughts, @Customer , @spamoni , any others?

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I agree, in spite of the absolute glut of routers out there, if Wyze were to produce or rebadge something quite good (as they did with the original V1 and V2 cameras) it could be a worthy competitor in that “space”. Signal strength, capacity, and stability are key, possibly in reverse order. As a bonus they could incorporate the low power segment that wakes and talks to the WCO models.

I gotta wonder whether the newer routers are better partly because they push the limits of FCC signal strength in these bands. "Mesh* shouldn’t be significantly better than my two access points connected by Ethernet, but from most accounts it is?

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Interesting Thought.

First let me say that I believe very few actually change from their default ISP provided routers. I would also venture to say that a percentage of individuals who say they do, actually leave the router in place and add WiFi Nodes and turn off the ISP Provided WiFi. I think the Percentages decrease as you go through your list. Note: We are talking about Home users not businesses, correct?

  • Keep ISP providers: about 70%,
  • Upgrade to Costco-level Premium: about 20%
  • Purchase the more expensive routers: about 10%.

I like to tinker with Technology and figure out how it all works and what the limits are. I used to run my own PBX with ViaTalk VoIP service. It was fun, but required a lot of work. It also required a lot of tweaking with QOS on the routers. Yea, I am sick that way. :slight_smile:

I seem to recall that there is a possibility that Wyze may be looking into providing a router in the future. I remember so survey where tey were asking about routers. But I may have been dreaming. Now I need to see if I can find it.

I agree that it would be a great idea for Wyze to come out with a Router. One which could provide the necessary stability and efficient streaming of their devices. It would have to be a valid competitor though: WiFi 6 or even 6E, Mesh Technology which can support Ethernet Backhauls and possibly even Power. Available Ethernet Ports on the Nodes and even a USB ports to attach a potential Wyze Hub. :wink:

Heck, I would be happy with a Hub Like Hubitat or SmartThings. You can then connect your camera’s to the Hub or WiFi, which ever you want. In addition all devices could then utilize the hub and perform local processing. I think it would bolster the experience as well.

Either way, I would purchase a Wyze Router and a Hub.

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I would say that the router would be a loss leader bad investment on there end,what we don’t understand is that we are a service company and we manage over 12 sites,87 cameras and customers that we have maintenance contracts with and our service technicians are busy installing new cameras for customers and we rarely get service calls for cameras not working,if we do get a call its allways customers did something wrong, in the 2.5 years we only replace 1 V2 camera,I would say the majority of people that have wyze cameras have no clue about there cameras they just want an item to work

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I was thinking of replacing my isp provided router with this one from Asus: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B084BNH26P/?coliid=I34C4ZTHT73RZO&colid=114BLLBZVZTSH&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

Anyone have experience with this or similar re: using it with Wyze systems or have any other thoughts in general?

You will get need to be able to have separate SSID 1 for 2.2ghz,1 for 5ghz. I don’t know if that item will do that