HomeKit Secure Video

[coxhaus]

Anybody using HomeKit Secure Video? I want to buy a camera and try it as I have HomeKit running on my AppleTV 4K. My wife already has an iCloud storage so storing the data will be a non issue. Apple allows you to store 10 days of video without it counting as storage space.

 

[sfx2000]

Good question... I suppose the first thing is find a camera that supports this, and it sounds like you need a recent enough Mac to support MacOS 10.15.1, along with an appropriate iCloud rate plan.

https://www.apple.com/ios/home/accessories/#section-camera

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210538

Seems to be a lot of caveats around HomeKit Secure Video

Streaming video and storing video clips don't require an iCloud storage plan. If you want to record your video, you need a 200GB iCloud storage plan to support one camera and a 2TB storage plan to support up to five cameras.

The Apple ID that you use for the Home app allows up to five total recording-enabled cameras across as many homes as you own. Members of a Family Sharing iCloud storage plan share this limit with everyone else on the storage plan. To record with more than five cameras, you need to use another Apple ID with another iCloud storage plan.

You can also change recording settings and view video clips and streams in the Home app with macOS 10.15.1.


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[coxhaus]

I hope to do this with my iPhone 11 and my wife's iPhone maybe an iPad. My thoughts are by using the iCloud We will have access when we are not at home. The HomeKit sends alerts to your iPhone so your can look at the video clips and decide whether there is a problem or not. I am running HomeKit on my AppleTV 4K. I am currently using HomeKit to turn lights on and off from my iPhone. We also have a schedule setup for when we are not home, HAHA.

The eufyCam 2 seems to be supported. I hope the system runs through wireless and the base station is just a video processor. They mentioned keeping the base station close to the camera.

 

[coxhaus]

I just found out the eufycam2 require their own base unit for the camera to talk on. They will not use my current wireless network. They require their network which would mean for me I would need multiple base units. I was hoping the cameras would talk on my multiple AP wireless network encrypted. So I guess I am still on the look out for Apple HomeKit cameras.

I wonder why security cameras use their own Z wave wireless? Is it because a lot of users have bad wireless? I am a noob at security cameras. Apple HomeKit sounds like an easy solution for security cameras. Maybe we need to wait for IOS14.

 

[coxhaus]

I think I have figured out some of this and if the cameras were directly on my wireless network the batteries will run down to fast as Apple HomeKit requires constant monitoring. The companies use the base station as a buffer between their cameras and HomeKit to extend the battery life. I still don't like the idea that I will have to install 3 base stations since my house is large. I guess there could also be a security aspect.

I still would like a system that used my multi-AP wireless system and had 1 base station that ran on my network and interfaced with HomeKit.

 

[coxhaus]

A friend of mine gave me a Wyze $25 camera. So I set it up in the front window kind of as a video monitor reporting only to my iPhone. It does not support HomeKit secure video nor HomeKit. But It seems like they will may be supporting HomeKit which is different than HomeKit Secure video. I guess I have to wait and see. I think IOS14 will give us some direction. The APP is pretty easy and no real expense. So I have my first camera and I can watch to see if I get packages delivered or not.