geeni

Bought the cw007 yesterday and mounted it to watch our front door from our window inside, since we have recently had a couple packages “disappear” from our doorstep. I wanted something cheap and easy to use until we can afford something better and saw that this model had good reviews. I love everything about it except for the fact that the playback won’t work on the app, it keeps saying “failed to connect.” We made sure the micro sd was empty on our laptop before plugging it into the camera. I formatted it through the app at least 3 times. Restarted the app. Restarted my phone. Restarted the camera. Etc. and even though it looks like playback is recording on the app it won’t connect. Preview which is live stream is working fine, but the main reason I bought it is so it can record and playback so I can see what is happening with our packages. Until this gets fixed or until customer service responds to my request I sent them yesterday I will be leaving a 1 star review. Update: within a few days of posting this review the playback issue has been fixed. Guess there was an issue with the app because we stopped trying to mess with it. Never received a response from customer service but overall just glad the issue was fixed.

But I’ll write another! I’ve had this little camera for over a year now, set it up in the office to see what my cat got up to when I wasn’t there and now have it in the living room pointed at my dog’s crate where he stays when we go somewhere. After the initial setup, it’s been a great little camera. I downloaded the wrong app at first, as I suspected a lot of people did who have this one star because it didn’t work, but called customer service and got the help I needed to get it straight. Btw, app is Geeni, NOT Merkury. Also, I recall I had to make sure the camera was synced to the 2.4 wifi and not the stronger 5 (we have both, and at first I automatically put it on the 5, apologies that I don’t recall the actual name but every time I sign into my account to get my internet connection I see both so I remember the numbers, I hope if anyone reads this they know what I mean) so that was also something I had to straighten out. Once done everything’s been fine, but recently I switched phones and have a new number, and I can’t see any place to change that, so I contacted customer service in-app and am waiting for a response. If I can’t change it I’ll have to create another account, I guess. Minor annoyance but doable since it doesn’t involve set up of the product haha. I hope this helps someone out there. It’s a good product, give it a chance!

My home network contains so many devices that no router made can allow them all to connect at once. I have to have 3 routers using double NAT on each to keep everything online. Many of the cheaper IoT devices have to be regularly unplugged and plugged back in to maintain functionality/connectivity. The Geeni system, for being one of the cheaper lines, somehow is one of the most reliable of all the different manufacturers and brands that I have interlinked. Stays connected better even than the Belkin and iHome products. [Update: Somehow just realized I was writing a review for the app not the camera...I have 2 White scale bulbs, 2 smart outlets, and one of their cameras. Also, I have a different manufacturer of smart camera in every room, including 2 in the hallway (one at each end) and 2 outside) - explicitly TO test them against and with each other and demo differences and compatibilities to potential smarthome builders. Review applies to all 5 devices that use this app as well as the app itself. ]

So first off I will start by saying I myself have not had any issues with this app and it’s ability to connect to my Wi-Fi or any issues with my Wi-Fi to connect the app to any of the Merkury LED bulbs, WiFi plug-ins or cameras that I own. To be honest with you it’s great knowing the fact that I can turn any of my lights on or off in any room at any given time with the push of a button on app screen is just amazing and then add the fact that you can change the color and brightness of these bulbs on screen sliders to adjust the brightness as well as the on screen color wheel to set the color of your choice. Also I love the fact that you can set a schedule so you can program a schedule for your lights to turn on and off while you’re at home or while you’re away this is great if you’re away from the house and you want to program your porch lights or garage lights to come on and off at certain time intervals. It’s been a game changer as well as innovative and fun for our family. The only issue I had and this has nothing to do with the app or the product is if someone manually turns the light off by the switch itself while the device is on and been turned on through the app this puts the light into off-line mode and you have no control over it until you that switch is turned back on.

Picked up the indoor security camera from a BIG BOX store. Setting up I hit a snag. I have both 2.4 GHz and 5.0 GHz networks in my home. My particular camera is designed to operate on using the 2.4 GHz network of only. Went thru the setup many times with many devices and it would not work at all. Double checking every time that I was connecting to the 2.4Ghz network. I could get ally the way thru to a solid blue light, but the app would give an error msg that it can’t connect. Just about to give up and return the camera I had an “Ah Ha” moment. My two networks (2.4 GHz and 5.9 GHz) have different SSID’s. To simply things around the house I gave the two different networks the same password. When setting up the camera I would select the 2.4 GHz network and type in the password which is the same for both SSID’s (network names). Would not connect at all on the app, but the camera would go from flashing red, to flashing blue, then solid lit blue as if connected. So I logged into my router and changed the 5.0 GHz password by adding an extra character to the end. Two separate passwords fixed the connection problem. * * * TLDR, will not work on 2.4 GHz network if the password is the same as a 5.0 GHz network.