REOLINKSecurity Camera Wireless Outdoor, Pan Tilt Solar Powered, 5MP 2K+ Color Night Vision, 2.4/5GHz WiFi, Works with Smart Home for Surveillance, Home Hub Compatible, Argus PT + Solar Panel

Arrived as ordered. Just fiddling around in my office for a few minutes and managed to scan in the QR codes. Downloaded the app on iPad and iPhone without issue. Fired up the app, added the device, and it's working. Video and audio are good but there's no optical zoom (which shouldn't be a surprise at this price point). Don't have a thrombo if the image is upside down--read on.Best mounting is on a vertical surface. The camera's bottom it its top so it seems upsidey-downsidey until it's mounted with the camera on the bottom and then the aformentioned reverse image undergoes spontaneous remission.Installing: mount the solar panel. Take its power cable and run it through the camera bracket from the top down. There's a narrow channel for the cable in the part that screws into the wall. Screw the mounting bracket into the vertical surface. Install the Micro SD card if you have one. Plug the power cable ino the camera. Carefully screw the antenna into the little port--be careful! Mount the camera on the bracket and finger-tighten the mounting screw with the conveniently-supplied hex wrench; "Reolink" logo should face forward. Assuming you're on a ladder, DO NOT take a step backward to admire your handiwork.Vendor included templates for drilling pilot holes for the mounting brackets--nice touch. Pan-title-zoom icon is small and I can't make anything zoom digitally. Not sure about the solar panel's effectiveness because I have trees that partially block my western sun. A wall wart may be necessary in the winter; the sun goes away for six months near Seattle. The power port is behind the camera and you have to unscrew the mounting bolt to get access; not a deal-breaker.Overall: so far, so good.Update: battery drained due to inadequate sunlight, a result of shorter winter days in the Pacific Northwest. I was unable to charge the unit, went through the warranty return process, and then discovered most USB-C cables don't make a proper connection. The supplied cable works; half a dozen other cables from Apple and others did not. IMO this is a design/engineering/manufacturing issue; USB-C is a global standard and cables should be interchangeable. The other issue is the solar panel doesn't provide enough power to keep the system working during short and/or dark days.

Unfortunately this camera while electronically and mechanically maybe sound it fails in delivering a sound windows base operating software as its with all Reolink Cameras. In the past I have used Reolink support but they really have not been of any help to me. The frustration of working with them is too much to bear. (At one occasion their fix changed all my picture extensions in my entire system". I am sure they are aware of the problems with their widows base software. Their IOS software also has some hiccups staying connected in WIFI mode continuously even though it shows highest WIFI signals at all times.As an experience engineer I was still willing to keep this camera but after a week I noticed that because the solar charger is inefficient and limited I probably have to charge the battery directly every two months. Unfortunately because the camera's USB port is connected to the solar unit which is hard wired at the solar end you have to go to the camera and disconnect the solar unit and connect a long USB charge cable to your charger. Because I just can't access the camera that easily I am therefore returning this unit.I am Updating my review based on response the I received from Reolink.Thank you for your response it is very hearth warming to see that as a company you care for customers. I do like your cameras because based on my experience they are well built and work well on IOS operating system. As I mentioned in my review, I was willing to keep the Argus PT camera because it provides the best overall video and picture. However, having to go up the ladder to replace the solar charging cable with a power charging cable was impossible for me. Presently I have two Reolink cameras.Again, thank you for your reply and I will edit my review based on your response to me.

I bought this as a secondary camera to monitor our backyard/detached garage/driveway in addition to the POE hard-wired Reolink camera that monitors the front of the house. The setup is easy, though I had a difficult time scanning the setup QR code outdoors. I did eventually get it to work without having to take the camera indoors, however. I used a high endurance name-brand 256GB SD card which the camera recognized and formatted with no issues.So far the solar charging is working great -- the camera has never been at less than 100% charge, even after running overnite. The wifi connection has also been very stable and strong, which I thought may be an issue after reading some reviews, and knowing our lead filled 100 year old house generally has poor signal outdoors.The 4k recording is excellent, the clarity is quite a bit better than our front door cam which is a couple of years older and maybe a 2k model? The picture is very sharp and clear.The Reolink software is highly customizable for alerts and notifications as well. We have three dogs, and my wife works from home frequently, so I have it setup so I don't get alerts for animals or people on certain days/hours to avoid unnecessary notifications.The downsides to this camera are it doesn't allow for continuous recording, which, as a secondary camera, isn't a big deal. I wish this would have been clearer in the description, though. The second issue is the camera doesn't track motion. Being a motorized camera, I assumed it would, again I wish this would have been clearer in the description. I maybe would have gone with a fixed wide angle camera instead.All in all a good product and excellent, customizable software. Really appreciate that there is NO SUBCRIPTION required to use the camera to it's full potential. I recently added a Reolink hub which has proved to be an excellent addition with multiple cameras, and was similarly easy to setup and use.