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tlhacker's profile

Thursday, August 1st, 2024 12:07 AM

Camera Offline Issues

I have had the outdoor camera for about 3 weeks now and the wireless indoor camera for about 2 weeks. Both of them, within the last couple of days, have stopped sending activity alerts and when I open the app to see why, the cameras say they are offline even though I can connect to them and get live video. Once I connect to them via the app, they will show online again and I MIGHT get an alert before they go offline again. They worked perfectly fine for a while so why now? Appreciate any insight and/or remedy. Thanks.

Accepted Solution

1 Message

1 month ago

These are simplisafe backend issues. The aws instances supporting the cameras are under provisioned and over utilized. The speed tests pass but cameras are offline. It's just getting worse and worse. About to toss all my simplisafe cameras and drop down to the basic monitoring plan because if it's my internet why are my  4 blink cameras all fine? Only the two simplisafe cameras have issues? No. Sorry. It's an issue on simplisafes infrastructure. 

5 Messages

Based on what I'm seeing, I'm inclined to agree with your assessment and thanks for sharing your experience.

Captain

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6.1K Messages

2 months ago

@tlhacker I always suggest that on types of issues like this, just pick up the phone and call support. Please post your outcome here if you get a chance.

1.2K Messages

2 months ago

Your possibly still inside the 60 day return window and possibly long wait for a refund, that's also an option.😉

Community Admin

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3.3K Messages

2 months ago

Hi @tlhacker, 

If a camera is showing an Offline error message, that generally means that it is having trouble connecting to your Wi-Fi network. The first troubleshooting step we like to recommend in these instances is to use the SimpliSafe mobile app's Connection Check tool.

The tool will run a scan of your cameras' connection to your network and provides additional troubleshooting steps to take depending on your results. This will point us in the right direction of what could be causing this error. 

For more details on how to use the Connection Check tool, and what your results mean, check out the How to Troubleshoot Your Camera's Connection article in our Help Center!

5 Messages

The outside camera is currently showing offline. I ran the connection test and have attached the results.

5 Messages

2 months ago

Also, when it does show offline, I can immediately connect and view live video (no issues) and when I do that it will show online and work for a short time before it goes offline again.

1.2K Messages

@tlhacker​ If it was working ok and if you haven't already.

Shut down the router and then the modem unless its an ISP combo then both probably happen at once. Unplug it for 30 seconds or so and restart, see if that helps.

Reboot, power them back up after a few minutes. Wait until they fully reboot and get blinky and happy.

If that doesn't work, try removing the cams from the app and reset, reinstall them.

An admin might point you to their procedures if your not sure how to.

Some of my 5 outdoor cams are in the slowwww...process of updating to 1.30 firmware. Check your firmware version, reset might help update them if their not at 1.30 or at least 1.29 firmware.

I don't have indoor cams, can't help with those.

Things that matter, wpa2 security only, 31 alpha numeric characters or less for SSID name and password, no stange characters in either.

Sometimes a reboot is enough, I've had the problem.

If you know how to log into your router, thats where you check if its Wpa2-AES or other wpa2 security etc. lowest IEEE 801 available.

Or as captain said call and trouble shoot with support, ask for a supervisor, but as per this forum, I imagine they're very busy fielding support call backs. Good luck with that.

My tech gave up weeks ago. Have not heard anything lately. Because the issues arise out of nowhere and probably aren't fixable.

I have 12+ other brand cams that never have any of these issues. Ever. Period! Lol

(edited)

1 Message

1 month ago

Having intermittent trouble with doorbell cam, and sometimes outdoor cam, including various combinations of not connecting, no video, no cell phone notifications. Connection tests show Good signal and Good upload speed. Per SimpliSafe support today: this is happening for several customers. Their engineers are working on it and hope to have it fixed in a couple days.

5 Messages

Thank you for the update.

1.2K Messages

1 month ago

Well, when I wasn't looking today, yesterday, the outdoor cams went from 1.30 firmware to 1.32 so maybe that'll help y'all. Maybe not. 4 of 5 updated anyhow.

Frankly, I see little difference from 1.29.

I've not had the issue with 5 outdoor cams, well, I have but it was intermittent, happened a couple times over a couple months for several hours here and there. Not lately.

First I usually check down detector for Simplisafe or ISP server issues. Then go thru the reboot, restarts

Now the doorbells do get blinky and drop to offline and come right back online regularly.

The doorbells also will work well occasionally for a day or two. Then will get finiky on first live view, but once opened the first time after "many" seconds, I can bounce back and forth and open them each in 2 or 3 seconds, or less. And they're wired cameras. Repeatedly.

It's that initial first view🤔 same for the outdoor cams, sometimes first view on a couple are worse than they ever were before, and then first view, 8 seconds+-, 2nd view 3 seconds+-, 3rd view a couple seconds+-. Solar powered.🤔 But then they get sleepy again.

It's close, but not there yet for any of my doorbells or outdoor cameras. But it's been that way for "quite some time". 19 months+-. Some improvements to live view speed.

If outdoor cams start disconnecting I can "usually" clear things with a wifi system reboot, clear out the app cache & reboot phone, but not always. But, I clear my phone cache a couple times daily, all apps.

Being a mesh WiFi, reboots usually take a while for all cams to settle to their final best connection point, if they ever settle.12 other brand cams, never have these issues, but with a new app just released from Beta for those, there's still some minor bugs to fix there as well.

But my others are 98-99+- percent uptime and opening 4 cameras simultaneously in 2-3 seconds, 1 second to 2 for a single live view. So there's a difference in this hardware and firmware. In my opinion.

Some of it is battery powered cameras, I'll never buy another battery operated security camera again. Ever. POE or USB powered, no batteries. Battery powered are almost all slow regardless of brand. Sleep, battery saving etc.

And no, I'm not ever going to have a dedicated 2.4ghz setup just for Simplisafe equipment only. It's not possible on my system.

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