Cellular Game Camera suggestions

[lakngulf]

Thanks

 

[Garandman]

Anyone have a service that uses Verizon? We barely get AT&T service but have 5 bars of Verizon.

 

[scdeerslayer]

The Spartan Cameras have a Verizon version, and I believe you can just add it onto your existing plan. Go to the forums at chasingame.com and you can read everything you need to know about them.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

I will be hunting a new area this fall and decided I need a cellular game camera.

I started researching and it seems that there are very few, if any, good cameras that use 4G. All seem to still be using 3G.

I find that odd, because it seems that no cell phones use 3G anymore and 4G is so much better.

One camera that claims it's using 4G must be made in China. Your 1st Resource Of Trail Camera & Game Camera,Hunting Camera Store丨AcornCamera.com And the reviews are not good at all. I don't want to spend $400 to $600 on something that won't work.

I also found USA Trail Cameras STORE — USA Trail Cams but it looks like all of their cameras are either sold out or 'pre-order'.

Just wondering if anyone has any experience with any 4G cellular cameras?

 

[atomchaser]

You really don't need any high speeds for the cellular cameras. The pictures they are sending are relatively small so the slower 3G isn't a problem. If my camera takes a picture, it is messaged to my phone in less than a minute on average.

 

[audsp98]

I ended up with the Bushnell Aggressor Wireless. So far I've had it in the field for about a month and it's worked well.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

I know this thread is over a year old, but I just wanted to update my experiences. I ended up getting the Bushnell Aggressor Wireless also. It worked well for a few months, then just stopped sending pictures. My hunting area is 2 hours away from me and it took me a while to get back to it.

Apparently the card reader quit working, so I took the card out and set it back out in the woods. I didn't realize that as soon as the internal memory was full, it stopped sending pics again. Well.....actually it kept sending the last pic it took, over and over and over again. Every time something triggered the camera, it would send me the old pic. Well....it took me a few more weeks to go get it again, and I sent it off to Bushnell.

They received it about 2 weeks ago, but I never heard anything from them. I called their support number today and (after about 15 minutes on hold) they told me that it cannot be repaired but they will send me their newest model to replace it at no charge. But, today is October 19, 2018 and it is scheduled to ship in December. So it looks like I will not have use of my camera for this entire deer season.

Here is a link to the new camera. Looks pretty nice.. Bushnell - Impulse

I also ordered a ReoLink Go camera about 2 months ago. When I didn't get any shipping info on that camera, I called them too. They said it will ship mid November. Wish they would have let me know that when I ordered it....And they did charge my credit card at the time of the order.

Here is a link to the ReoLink camera. Reolink Go - 1% Wire-Free 4G Mobile Security Camera

 

[STx]

I'm a dealer for both Covert and HCO Spartan. I've had really good luck with the Spartan cameras and, more importantly, good support. When we have had stuff go back for warranty repairs during hunting season, they've usually turned them around in 2 - 3 weeks. If they got backed up much beyond that, they normally just send a new camera back. One thing they've both done a good job of is timing their inventory deliveries so that if they do have back orders, it happens in April or May, not October or November.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

My ReoLink Go camera shipped on November 6 from China and arrived on November 21, the day before Thanksgiving. I was headed to my hunting area on Thanksgiving day, so I hurried to the AT&T store to get a sim card for it.

Well after about an hour or more at the AT&T store, I purchased a prepaid sim card with 8gb of data for $50 plus tax. This is more than I was expecting to pay. And I have no idea how much data this camera will use. And, if I don't use all the data, I lose it after 30 days. I will be researching other options for the data sim card. It uses a micro sim card, not the nano sim card.

The camera was easy to set up and get going. I put the mounting hardware on a small piece of plywood I had laying around. One plywood for the camera and one for the solar panel. I drilled several holes in the plywood and attached them to a tree with a bunge strap.

It does send me a notice every time it detects motion. And the voice feature is nice, but it is delayed about 3 or 4 seconds. The video quality is good when set at 1080p, but where I have it set up, there is a weak 4GLTE signal and it keeps suggesting that I go back to the 'Fluent' quality setting which is not as good. I have no idea why the call it 'fluent'.

In my rush to get to the woods, I forgot to pick up a SD Card for onboard data storage. Without the Micro SD Card installed in the camera, I can view live video, but I can not go back and look at something that happened earlier.

I'll post some screen shots as soon as I can get some transferred from my phone to my laptop. Another thing is that the app is only available for use on smart phones, and not on a laptop or desktop.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

Here are some pics of the camera in the woods.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

Here is a screen shot from a few minutes ago.

Just before I took this shot I got a motion detection alert. There were 5 or 6 raccoons stealing my corn, so I activated the “talk” feature and yelled at them and they all ran off.

Kind of neat to run off the coons from 100 miles away.

 

[Jchonline]

I just bought, deployed, and returned a Cuddeback Cuddelink dual flash. I wanted it for security at a remote location. It was easy to setup and deploy. The problem I had was the way it uploads photos to save on battery life. You can either configure how often it uploads them (ie every hour, every 12 hours, etc) or how many photos it has taken (ie transmit after 30 pictures). For security neither of these work well. I wanted a picture as soon as it detected movement. Well it was a windy few days, and even though the field of view was narrowed I still got a ton of photos. I had it set to upload every 15 minutes. So every 15 minutes I got a hundred photos. Anyway, batteries were gone in a few days. It just was not a good use case for the camera.

However, it worked just fine, took clear pictures, and held up in 50mph winds and blowing snow. Not bad at all. For a game camera it would be great.

 

[STx]

The Spartan Go Camera and Covert Black Ops are both good options for security. You have to make some adjustments to the sensitivity and trigger interval to get your batteries to last a reasonable amount of time, set incorrectly and the batteries will go in a week, set correctly and you can get a couple of months out of them without sacrificing security.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

So far, I am enjoying my ReoLink Go camera. I have added an SD card for storage, and now, it automatically records for about 6-12 seconds every time it detects motion. And I can go back and view any of these clips anytime from my phone.

I still have not received my Bushnell Impulse camera.

Here is a video from my ReoLink Go. I call this video 'Boss Hog", watch it and you will see why. The flash you see at the beginning is from another game camera.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

UPDATE....

I am really enjoying the ReoLink Go. I'm glad I got the solar panel to charge the battery. I suspect that without the solar charger the battery would last about 2 weeks.

Dealing with AT&T for the sim card has been a real PITA. My first card was a prepaid card for $50 for 8 gb of data. Well, it expired after 30 days and I had used 1.4 gb of data. I tried to renew it online but could not. So I called them to see why I could not, and they said they could send a code to the camera so that I could use that code to renew it online. I said "IT'S A CAMERA!!! IT CAN NOT RECEIVE A CODE!!!" So, she said I could put the sim card in a phone, receive the code, then put it back in the camera. From then on, I could renew it online. Or I could renew it on the phone. I renewed it for $25 for 3 gb of data for this month. UGH....

I still have not received my new Bushnell camera yet, so I called them today too. After 25 minutes on hold waiting for someone, a guy came on and told me my new camera should ship mid February.......UGH......

 

[Complete Turf Care]

I still have not received my new Bushnell camera yet, so I called them today too. After 25 minutes on hold waiting for someone, a guy came on and told me my new camera should ship mid February.......UGH......

Well....it is now late February and I still have not received my camera. So I called Bushnell to check on it and was told possibly May or June. The person I spoke to was obviously frustrated that they have been getting lots of calls asking when folks will get their cameras and not being able to give a good answer. I think Bushnell jumped the gun on this new camera and tried to get it to market before it was ready.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

Well....it's been 8 months since I sent my Bushnell camera for repairs and I received my new Bushnell Impulse replacement camera yesterday. I have not set it up yet.

I did look at some recent reviews of the Impulse and they are not very good. I will post updates when I get it set up.

 

[audsp98]

Well....it's been 8 months since I sent my Bushnell camera for repairs and I received my new Bushnell Impulse replacement camera yesterday. I have not set it up yet.

I did look at some recent reviews of the Impulse and they are not very good. I will post updates when I get it set up.

I've got the Impulse camera as well. It was a 6+ month process but it's finally working and, so far, it's been a good camera. The only issue I'm having right now is the camera will go "dark" for a couple days every now and then. I've got the Verizon version and it's got 4 bars of service where it's mounted but I'll stop getting messages from the camera when I know it should be getting notifications. Then the next day it'll send the "camera hasn't checked in since X date" message. Then a day or so later I'll start getting pictures again. Because of this, I can't rely on this camera as the security solution I'd hoped for. I'm going to go with another solution in the long term for our gate security at our farm.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

When I first set up the Bushnell Impulse, it would not stay on. I could hear a 'crackling' noise when I put the batteries in, and discovered there was moisture inside the camera.

I put it in an area so that it could dry out overnight. After I got it dried out, I turned it on and it seems to work pretty well. I had it on 'tracking mode' which makes it take a picture every 5 minutes. That's not what I wanted and it took me a couple of days to figure out why it was taking so many pics.

I've had it set up in my garage facing my main entrance to my home for about a week now. I have it set on 'low' motion sensitivity, and it does not capture a picture every time someone goes in the door, which is about 15' from the camera.

One nice feature is that I can send it a message to take a picture any time I want to, from my phone.

Also, when I set up my data plan with Bushnell, they give you 30 days for free, but it automatically signs you up to charge your credit card every month after that. And the only 'free' plan available was the $14.99 a month plan. There is a $9.99 a month plan, and I can go back and change the plan if I want to, and I almost certainly will change it.

On a scale of 1 to 10, right now I would rate this at a 6 or 7. I'm just not real impressed with it yet, but I've only had it at my front door. Hopefully, when I get it out in the woods looking at some deer, it will be better.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

Another update on the Bushnell Impulse camera. DO NOT BUY ONE!!

I set it out in the woods about 6 weeks ago, and the batteries lasted about 10 days. So I got back to the camera about 2 weeks ago and replaced the batteries again and they lasted 2 days.

I went back to the camera yesterday and put new batteries in it again, but decided to bring it home and I put a different camera in that spot. It's about 100 miles from home to the camera.

Today, I opened up the camera and noticed a strong smell of burnt wire, and the plastic around the batteries is melted. I removed the batteries and set the camera outside, because the smell is too strong for inside the house.

I have sent an email to Bushnell support and will see what happens, but I'm not happy at all.