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submitted 1 week ago by Dave@lemmy.nz to c/newzealand@lemmy.nz

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Welcome to this week’s casual kōrero thread!

This post will be pinned in this community so you can always find it, and will stay for about a week until replaced by the next one.

It’s for talking about anything that might not justify a full post. For example:

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[-] Dave@lemmy.nz 2 points 3 days ago

I have a whole range! All are POE because I am using them with Frigate and all the recommendations are to avoid wifi cameras for that.

The first one I put in was this TP Link one. I was pretty happy with that one really. I got a 4mm focal length and didn't really understand what that meant at the time, for the place I put it I'd probably go for the 2.8mm version if I did it again for the slightly wider angle, but it does what I need it to. Noting that wider angle means pixels are spread across a wider area so identifying people is harder if you're using it for security.

The second camera I got is this HiLook one. I got it because it's a Starlight camera, working in very low light. However, it doesn't seem to have a setting for automatic frame rate, so if you have it set low for low light then it's blurry all day whenever anything moves. In the end I have it using the IR light at night and don't really make use of the Starlight capability.

My most recent camera is this Ubiquity one. It turns out you need a device with Unifi Protect in order to enable the RTSPS stream to allow Frigate to get the video stream, it's not enabled by default. I have a device capable of it (Unifi Dream Machine SE) so it wasn't an issue for me, but if I didn't that would have been a shock! But I only got the camera because I have that Unifi ecosystem for some other stuff. It's a bit nicer build quality than the others but it's a lot more expensive than the TP Link and I don't know that it's any better.

The doorbell camera is this Reolink POE one. I only paid $120 for it in the black friday sale (only just got around to getting it installed). It can do cloud stuff if that's your thing but I have it running all locally with the video streaming to Frigate and with Home Assistant notifications for when someones at the door or if they press the doorbell button. The Reolink app lets you talk through the doorbell with the person at the door, when someone presses the doorbell it rings your phone like a video call and you can accept or decline. Two way audio is apparently doable through Frigate to Home Assistant but we decided we don't really want to do calls with the doorbell so I haven't looked into it much. All in all pretty happy with it though, maybe my only complaint is that I think the HDR could be stronger, the sky is bright in the shot and people approaching it have shadowy faces so facial recognition doesn't work that great unless it happens to get a properly lit shot of them.

These cameras all come with AI detecting of people, animals, cars, etc, but I'm not using it because I've got Frigate so I can't really comment on their effectiveness.

[-] nsh@lemmy.nz 2 points 3 days ago

Thanks for sharing the info, much appreciated. Frigate sounds like a great idea - no need for cloud subscriptions, privacy concerns, etc.

[-] Dave@lemmy.nz 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Yeah Frigate is pretty cool. Really I got the cameras to play with Frigate, I didn't get cameras first haha. I also got a Coral TPU as a dedicated processor for object detection.

It has been fun playing with the driveway one this past few days. Using number plate recognition in Frigate I can have Home Assistant send me notifications (with a photo) of when our cars arrive in the driveway. Over time I'll add common visitors too, then maybe I can have my Home Assistant Voice PE (smart speaker) announce for the kids when Grandma has arrived or things like that.

I currently have the camera send me any detections. and I had no idea how often a neighbours cat chills in our driveway.

this post was submitted on 23 Apr 2026
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