I’ve heard good things of Amcrest doorbell cameras. https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/amcrest/
this post was submitted on 13 Jun 2023
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Home Assistant is open source home automation that puts local control and privacy first. Powered by a worldwide community of tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. Perfect to run on a Raspberry Pi or a local server. Available for free at home-assistant.io
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Just set this up on my HA instance, works great. Easy to install and pretty easy to configure. You will need the Amcrest ios / android app for initial configuration, but after that you can delete it and just run.
Does it allow two way video chat? I've currently got a Google Doorbell and the thing that's holding me back from an offline alternative is how well it integrates with Android and Google Home - I can be out with friends and still answer the door from my phone, see what's happening etc.
Yes, it does. A family member grabbed a package off my porch while I was out of town. I got a motion notification, opened the Amcrest app and did the 2 way video +voice chat with them, worked well, like a poor mans facetime session
I'm using an Amcrest AD410 doorbell cam that I've firewalled off from connecting to the internet. I'm using it via Frigate in HA, but there's a HA integration for Amcrest / Dahua as well.
Edit to add: I've been using mine for about a year. No issues at all, it's warm to the touch not hot. Granted, I'm not doing any motion detection or anything on-camera.
Thanks! I'll take a look.
You don't need to create an Amcrest account or let it dial home at all?
I can't remember if I had to have an Amcrest account to set it up or not, as soon as basic setup was done, I blocked it from the internet. So it definitely doesn't have to phone home at least after the setup phase.
I use Amcrest doorbell as well but haven't blocked it from network access
I have the unifi protect stuff, I've been pretty happy, support has been okay at best. I host everything myself but I do think they use some of the info.... there TandC are pretty thick
I used Unifi Video for a long time until they moved away from letting me run the NVR on my own VM/hardware in the Uniti Protect world.
Yeah I was real real pissed about that. I have hundreds of TB of storage but I can't use any of it because they limited it to their shitty NVR
When my current Unifi APs die, I'll probably look at moving to MikroTik for WiFi. I'm still salty about them not supporting anything but their appliance.
Definitely took on the walled garden approach, and I'm getting real annoyed at how many of those companies are creating
Yeah. I'm trying to stick to open protocols.
Usually don't post Youtube channels, but "The Hook Up" did a good review on locally controlled doorbells: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XCu6L0xn4Y
I really hate YouTube reviews, but thanks. Maybe I should try another Reolink before I go elsewhere.
I have a reolink doorbell, but I don't use the onboard recording. I have frigate set up to do the recording and it works perfectly. If you don't want to buy a new doorbell it might be worth a shot!
@dbrand666 Personally I use the reolink doorbell with frigate and I can use my phone to talk back via Home Assistant using go2rtc. All local and my reolink is even in a separate camera vlan
I'm quite happy with my Doorbird D101S. You can use it with their app/cloud but you can configure it to work completely local.
Configuration can be a bit tricky to work out, but once it's set up correctly it works flawless.
That is one expensive doorbell!
Doorbird user here as well, wie got the D1101 and the D1101FV and both work flawlessly with Home Assistant :)
Interested as well. Looking for a battery-powered one
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