When you work away from homeor travel often, it’s nice to beable to check in on things athome for security and peace ofmind. That’s why I have installedvarious WiFi security cameras inmy home that can be accessedby web browsers and mobileapps. The newest camera thatI’ve been given the opportunityto review is the SpotCam Wi-FiVideo Monitoring camera. Itreminds me a lot of anothercamera which has been myfavorite for several years but I’lltalk more about that later. Let’stake a closer look at theSpotCam.

Included in the packageSpotCam HDAC adapter with 10ft cableSnap on base for wall mounting and hardwareQuick start guide

Hardware specificationsVideo: Up to 720P HD(1280×720) at 30 frame/secStreaming: H.264 encodingField of View: 110 degrees (diagonal)Audio: Speaker and microphoneNight Vision: 12 High-power IR LEDs

The SpotCam HD ismade of whiteplastic and hasbeen designed forindoor use. There’salso a SpotCam HDPro that can beinstalled outdoors.The camera has alens on the frontwith a status LEDbelow it and amicrophone belowthat.

The camera can pivot forwards and backwards to adjust the viewing angle.

On the back is the power port and a switch that is used during the setup process.

The SpotCam has a non-sliprubber base so that you canset it on a flat surface or youcan use the included wallmount that snaps over thebase.

Setting up this camera is veryeasy and straightforward. Thequick start instructions guideyou through the steps whichtake less than 10 minutes andrequires no knowledge ofnetworking or anything elsetougher than plugging in thepower, switching to the WiFiaccess point that theSpotCam creates, flipping theswitch on the back of thecamera, and then connectingback to your normal WiFinetwork.

The next step was to locate the camera to the area I wanted to keep an eye on. Forpurposes of the review I set the SpotCam next to my Dropcam Pro pointing out a window.

I then visited the SpotCam web page which allows you to view livevideo and past events depending on the cloud storage plan youchoose. Each camera comes with a free 1 day plan that will let youlook back on 24 hours of captured video. Other plans include:

3 day recording – $3.95/month, $39/year7 day recording – $5.95/month, $59/year30 day recording – $19.95/month, $199/year

When I first logged in to my SpotCam web page, I had a feeling of dejavu because the interface looks very similar to the Dropcam webinterface down to the layout and similar colors.

When you first login you are shown a thumbnail list of your cameras. You can then click ona camera to go into the live viewer like you see above.

And here’s the Dropcam viewer. See what I mean about them being verysimilar? You also will notice that the SpotCam has a much narrower fieldof view compared to the Dropcam’s wide view.

I can forgive the narrow viewing angle and even the copycat web interfaceif the camera worked well, but unfortunately, it doesn’t. First of all look atthat image of the SpotCam web interface again. See the timer/spinner inthe center of the picture (it’s over the chime hanging from the roof). Thatspinner is all I ever see when I try to see a live view of the SpotCam. I’vetried restarting the camera, relocating the camera and clearing the cacheon my web browser all without any improvement.

Let’s take a look at a few other features like the motion detection alerts. The SpotCam candetect motion or audio events and email you to let you know about them. The email isn’tvery useful though as it just includes a link back to the web page to view the event whichdoesn’t work for me…

Let’s compare to the Dropcam motion alerts which actually include a thumbnail image ofthe detected motion. Much more useful don’t you think?

Luckily the SpotCam can be accessed with a mobile app. The app is free for iOS or Androiddevices. I tested the Android app on my LG G3. Again, I was really surprised how much theSpotCam app is like the Dropcam app even down to the app icon.

Unlike the web browser viewer, the mobile app does work. It’s sluggish though and seemsglitchy. It crashed on me a couple of times or showed that the camera was disconnectedwhen it wasn’t. It’s also annoying that you can’t make video snippets from the mobile app.You can only do that through the web browser viewer – which doesn’t work… at least notfor me it doesn’t.

Final thoughts

I was hoping that the SpotCam might be a good alternative to the Dropcam given its betterpricing on cloud storage. But with the web viewer issues, narrow field of view and generalclunkiness in features and mobile app, I’m sticking with my Dropcam. It’s the one to beat.

Product Information

Price: $149.00

Manufacturer: SpotCam

Requirements: WiFi

Pros: Easy to setup

Free live view and 1 day cloud

recording

Night vision

Two way microphone

Cons: Mobile app is glitchy

Web app doesn't seem to work at all ( this has

been resolved, see update above)

Emails of motion events don't show

thumbnail views (this has been resolved, see update above)

Narrow field of view compared to other

cameras