ADC V520ir won't stay connected

I setup the V520ir manually by entering the pass phrase and not by using the WPS button. I was able to add the camera to alarm.com and begin viewing. However, once I stop viewing live and try to re-connect it will not allow it. I have to unplug the camera and plug it back in. This allows me to watch for a bit longer before it drops out again. The light is solid green and still won’t allow me to connect. I have u plugged the modem and router to no avail. I have charter Internet with up to 90 plus megs, dual band with both 5g and 2g, and the camera is only approx 17 feet from router. Is there anything showing wrong on SuretyCam’s end? Can anyone shed some light? My encryption is WPA2-AES (recommended).

Ok guys/gals, I have some more info and I might be onto something. First of all, thanks for being patient with me while I setup this new Qolsys system. It’s been a learning experience to say the least.
Apparently I am currently using “DHCP” which is some kind of auto IP address something or another? I ran the remote access test and the “remote relay” says “available” which is good. The “Public IP” says “unavailable” which I’m assuming is not so good. I’m sure I sound rather elementary right about now. So it says that maybe I should have setup a static IP address for this camera? Is this correct? It then goes on to say that only “networking experts” should try this. Well that rules me out. Lol. Can anyone walk me through setting up a static IP? Can Surety do it remotely? Or am I completely on the wrong track here? Thanks.

Have you tried using the camera while wired to your network instead of connected via WIFI? If not, try setting up the camera as a wired camera and see if you still have the same problem. That will tell us if it’s a WIFI problem or an Internet connection problem.

No I have not done that yet. I do however see that on the website it says the signal is 99%. Is this referring to the wifi signal the camera is receiving?

Correction: it says wireless signal is 99% when it’s connected. I just tried to re-connect and it failed, and now the wireless signal says N/A. It seems as if I don’t have to unplug it to get it to connect. I just have to wait awhile and keep trying. There’s not much else going on in my house on the same network either. Strange. When it connects it works just fine. I didn’t setup any port forwarding or static IP address. Was I supposed to?

If you think your private/internal IP address is changing and that’s causing the problem then you can try setting up a static IP address within your network. How you would do it depends on your router. Often routers have a feature called DHCP address reservation that gives you the benefits of a static address (that it will never change) with DHCP so you don’t have to deal with the hassle of setting up a static address.

I would try deleting and re-adding it as a wired camera first and see if you can isolate the problem to the WIFI connection or if it’s an overall network problem.

Most people don’t have to setup static IP addresses or port forward to use Alarm.com cameras but it’s possible that you might on your network.

It’s not an overall network problem. I have the camera hardwire connected via Ethernet cable straight into router and it stays connected. I have deleted the camera, reset the camera, plugged in the Ethernet cable first, then the power cable and re-added it to the network several times. I even reserved an IP address for the camera using the 230 suffix and setup port forwarding on port 40925. The camera works fine for about 15 minutes and then the green light starts blinking and I cannot connect. The wifi signal is 99% strong at its location with 40 megs download and 5 upload consistently. I’m not sure where to go from here besides returning the camera. Any help would be greatly appreciated because I have already spent way too much time on this simple camera install.

I guess I have to ask but you did remember to screw the antenna into the ADC-V520IR, right? It sounds silly to ask but quite a few people have forgotten to do that and the camera still worked at close range but not very well.

It sounds like either:

  1. There is an incompatibility between the WIFI on your camera and the WIFI on your router. This happens less and less these days but it still happens from time to time.
  2. There is a defect with the WIFI on your camera.

If it’s an incompatibility problem you might try connecting with a different WIFI encryption protocol or tweaking the settings on your WIFI router. I can’t tell you how, that’s a tough problem.

Another option is to try connecting through a different WIFI router if you have another.

Do you have any network savvy friends or family who might want to help? WIFI issues are hard to track down.

If you can wait for a week day we can have a technician try looking into it remotely.

Otherwise, all you can do is exchange the camera and hope it was a defect or just return it. Using it as a wired cameras is always an option as well but then you have to run a cable to it.

Yes I screwed in the antenna. When it’s connected, the alarm.com site tells me the signal is between 96-99% strong. Just to be sure, I deleted the camera again, set it up again, and this time placed it directly next to the Charter Netgear R6300v2 router. It connected as always wirelessly, had a strong signal and was performing as it should. I could access it online, from my iPhone or iPad. Then inexplicably after about 15 minutes it either drops off the network on its own or is booted off. This is even after reserving a unique IP address for the camera and opening a port for it. If I wait awhile, sometimes a half hour or so, I can once again connect to it and view the live feed. Then awhile later it will drop off again. I’m using WPA2-AES I think it’s called, and am apprehensive about dropping down to a lesser encryption. I suppose I will wait until Monday so an expert can access it remotely. What needs to be done to initiate a remote access session? Thanks.

This is my router:
https://www.myaccount.charter.com/customers/GETBINARY.xbin?ID=3371

You wouldn’t happen to have an additional wifi access point somewhere in the home do you?

If you use an extender with the same ssid and credentials the camera can attempt to connect back and forth between the two.

I have one powerline wifi adapter, but it’s not wireless and requires no credentials to access. One end is plugged into the router, and then plugged into a standard outlet. I have a bedroom at the far end of the residence that doesn’t get wifi signal. So in that bedroom is the 2nd half of the device which plugs into a standard outlet and then a hard wired Ethernet cable is plugged into that and connected to a laptop. Everywhere on the main level of the house near the router gets blazing fast speeds. The main level is where I have the v520ir located. In fact, right now it’s actually in the same room as the router and still having the same intermittent issues.

Out of curiosity, I ran a couple speed tests with my iPhone from the same location where the camera is sitting, at the same time it was having connection issues and the blinking green light. The speeds were 40 plus megs consistently. So it’s not as if my entire wifi network is having intermittent issues. It’s only the camera. I can log onto the alarm.com app right now (I’m at work) and can view the camera just fine. However, if I keep logging in over the next hour, it will fail several times.

I just used a wifi analyzer to see the competing traffic in the neighborhood. There was very little, but I went ahead and changed the 2ghz channel from Auto to Channel 1 which showed the least amount of traffic. I have by far the best signal in the neighborhood. The camera worked fine for about 15 minutes and then removed itself from the network. It no longer shows up as an attached device when I log into the router. It will reattach itself in a little while and repeat the same process. If you guys have no further suggestions, I would like to know how to send this thing back ASAP and try to get one that actually works. The frustration after spending this kind of money is beginning to get out of hand. Thank you.

You went from not knowing about DHCP to running a WIFI analyzer? I’m impressed! I understand the frustration. I’ve spent many hours of my life trying to make devices talk to each other.

It sounds like an assumption to say “The camera worked fine for about 15 minutes and then removed itself from the network.” It’s also possible your router removed the camera from the network. Let’s hope something is broken in the camera because that will be an easier fix.

The warranty and return policies are shown here:

Thanks Ryan. Am I to assume I have to pay the shipping cost to return the camera?

Yes I spent an enormous amount of time trying to teach myself and reading all over the Internet about troubleshooting IP cams. I was trying to get it done without bothering you guys in this forum too much. I apologize if my frustration shows up in my posts.

On a brighter note, somehow between working 12 hour shifts and troubleshooting the V520ir, I was able to finally stop playing with the IQ panel and actually get it mounted today. I’ll attach a pic. Turned out nice and clean.

As soon as possible this morning, could you have a tech read over this thread and as soon as possible this morning, could you have a tech read decide if it’s worth a remote troubleshoot attempt? Let me know before I package the cam back up and head to ups store. Thanks. I’m off today so I’ll be available.

Can you please provide the model of the Wifi powerline adapter you are referring to?

TP Link model TL-PA4010
http://www.tp-link.com/en/products/details/cat-18_TL-PA4010.html

Thank you. You are right, that should have no impact.

We would recommend first resetting this camera to defaults and re-learning it into your Alarm.com account. This would rule out a number of software-caused issues.

If you have reset the camera and it still malfunctions, a return is likely the next step.

If you have a second router, we would definitely recommend trying to connect the camera to it instead to exonerate the current router.