Using Power Over Ethernet for Nest Cam Outdoor or DropCam Pro

Power over Ethernet (also called PoE) is an alternative power source for a home security camera.  Power over Ethernet need a wired Local Area Network.  PoE carries power and data over the LAN network.  This means you can power your camera using an Ethernet cable A few home security cameras are PoE ready meaning they are ready to be connected without any additional accessories.  An example of one that supports Power over Ethernet is the Amcrest ProHD Outdoor 1080P POE Dome IP Security Camera.  A nice camera.  It’s weatherproof and supports a Power over Ethernet connection right out of the box. Naturally, the … Read more

The Importance of High Definition Video on a Security Camera

Ever watch the news where they have video of a bad guy and you can’t make out what the guy looks like?  That’s what happens when poor video quality is used on a security camera.  If only they used high definition, the video would actually be useful.  A hundred people would recognize the bad guy and he would already be in custody. The author of this article recently fell victim to bad video quality.  The accompanying photo to this article shows someone taking off with my patio furniture.  This video, courtesy of my Yi Home Camera at night was using … Read more

What To Do When The Internet Stops Working

It all started with overnight alerts from my Honeywell RTH9580WF Wi-Fi Smart Thermostat telling me the system was unavailable.  That’s the first time I ever got those types of alerts.  I immediately jumped into the Nest App to view one of several Nest Cam indoor cameras.  Yup, my internet was down in my second home and I wasn’t planning to be there again for several weeks. Now, I would have expected the Nest Cams to tell me about this via email alerts as I have it setup to do that but they never did.  I have not looked into the cause of this but … Read more