Side by Side Comparison of: Jooan vs VIMTAG

Excellent camera. I have this mounted on my front porch. Visibility at night is really good. I prefer the IP based camera's over the cctv type. I would like to find a cloud based DVR that could store my recordings so if anyone knows of something like that I would appreciate it. This camera is also quite rugged. Much better quality than I would have expected at this price point. Disclaimer I recieved this product at a dicounted rate for a fair and un-biased review. My opinions are my own and are not influenced by the vendor or manufacturer;

Great low light performance, not the best night vision but gets around 20ft. Good enough for a back door camera.Beware:Device is configured with a 192.168.1.XXX address. So make sure you have a router that will support that.

Great camera. Amazing camera for the price. For the security conscious folks, I would caution that I did monitor the traffic from the camera and it "calls home" to two separate IP addresses. One appears to be to monitor cameras remotely (located in China), I'm not sure of the usage of the other address, but it is located in the US. I just blocked those IP addresses to be on the safe side. I'm powering the camera with a PoE splitter so I only need an ethernet cable going to it.

For those of you who jump to the reviews and skip the full description: this camera does not come with a power supply.For the price, it is a very good camera, very nice 720p image, nice features and GUI. Couldn't get cloud services registered or DDNS but I have a DynDNS account so I didn't bother too much with that. Decent quality product, kinda bulky and may not be the prettiest one available but it does the job very well and por under $40 I cannot complain.

Update Feb 7, 2016
I now have 3 cameras!
There are so many different reviews about this product and many are not accurate or updated.
If you want tech support go to the Vimtag website and NOT fujikam. Vimtag is located in NY state and their support is really good. At least that has been my experience so far.

The quality of the camera/s for the price is beyond what you pay! We have one camera mounted on a wall up as high as possible so no one can touch it. The "reverse" image works perfectly. I can pan the camera in any direction which is a god send if I need to see if my father is on the floor somewhere.

The picture quality is really good for the price of the camera. Not perfect all the time but for my purposes I can tell who is there and what is going on. The color is true. The night vision is strange but it works!

The app might be the issue for me. I have an iPad and iPhone. I find the iPad is much more reliable most of the time. The iPhone is too small to clearly see but good enough. The iPad is so much better for details and it seems to load faster.

I use the motion detection all the time to see if and when aids, nurses and possible unwanted people come and go from my dad's apartment when he is asleep. There is usually, but now always, a still and a 15 sec (more or less) video clip. The issue for me is there are times that motion is missed or not recorded. the still is not always of the person but the video often shows who it was that came and went.

Often there are phantom stills of things from months ago. many of the stills are blank.
My feeling is that the app needs updating? I am going to bring this up with tech support.

I do recommend this camera. but it has had its challenges

(This review began with 2 stars. I changed it to 1 star and now give it 4 stars. It has been a long journey but please read or skip down to the November 26, 2015 update. The company is now Vimtag. They have great tech support and their tech people return phone calls and responded to my email via phone as well and on Thanksgiving day to boot! I am much happier. See below for information that they gave me to help with some issues with this camera.)

I have a very mixed review and experience. I purchased one camera (from Amazon) at first but now have 2 (both from amazon).

I have a 94 year old father that lives in assisted living. He has been there for 4 years now and the things that have happened will curl your toes and hair! He is a fall risk and has alzhimer's. He uses a walker in his apartment. Part of the reason that I wanted a camera was to see if he was safe at night when his private aids were off and to see if the facility staff were doing their checks that we pay a hefty fee for. In the 3 nights that I have used the camera I have learned that the staff is only checking him one time over night. Not good for someone that is on oxygen and is a fall risk! So the camera has been a great help.

My current experience with the cameras... I tested the first camera at my home and everything worked well. Setting up with my father's internet/wifi was not a good experience. It took 3 different days of attempting to get the wifi to work/connect. I am not using the facilities wifi. I am paying for a high quality private system. Finally that is working and working very well. Well at first it was. It is now very intermittent. I believe it is the software.

I set up the motion alert for both cameras. There is a still photo that shows up but... there is a delay evidently and half of the pix do not show who was there. In other words...there is motion but by the time the camera records the still the person is gone. Well what good is that? That does not help me at all! Also a large number of still photos are blank. I have been in the rooms with the cameras and one can clearly hear the camera clicking away taking the stills but when I look online or via cell Phone or tablet there is no human to be seen. Sometimes there is a blur of a hand. I am so disappointed as well as upset.

I have a question. Is there any way to turn off the clicking sound that happens whenever the camera detects motion and takes a still? I really don't want the people that are caring for dad to know this is happening and it is also very distracting. There must be some way to turn it off, the same way one can turn off the shutter sound in a cell phone. This is a digital devise so there should be no moving shutter parts right?

The good points...
The picture quality is really quite good. There are choices for quality in the setup area.
I have tried to get a hold of customer service or tech support but so far no success. Maybe someone else has had better success.
I'm sticking with this system for now, hoping I can find assistance. If not then for someone that needs reliable alerts and still photos this is not a good match.

I would use the record function if it went to the cloud but it does not. :-( The recording quality is good actually but to have to remove the card every time one wants to save a recording is not going to work for me. It would be fantastic if the camera/s are in your own home. Easy. But not for someone that lives away from the location with the cams as I do.

If this was in my own home I would give it all 5 stars I think.

For the money it is a good quality system/camera.

Bad news is...if someone unplugs the camera it resets and you loose anything stored that was not recorded on the internal card.
Oh and another thing... if you have lots of movement the still pix from motion detection only stays in the "record" section for about 2 hours or less. Then they are erased! I find myself checking the darn feed way to often so I can save to my phone or computer the photo/pix with the time stamp and date.

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I just changed my rating to 1 star. I can not begin to share how upset and frustrated I am.
Last night, when I need the camera the most so I can know if anyone is checking on my 95 year old father, the camera in the bedroom area went dead. I thought that someone might have unplugged it but NO. The app and website just was black. Nothing on my cell phone app. I went to the website via my computer and the camera was working! I had to shut down my phone can start it again. Then magically the live feed was back.

Before this all happened the camera was clicking and buzzing away every second. Then the camera died. It was crazy!

Now I can't even log into the website. I have also been logged out of the app and when I try to log back in it does not accept my user name and password!!!! This is horrible!!!
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November 25, 2015
FYI - the company is now VIMTAG. It is located in New York.
I will update after I talk to customer support. Fingers crossed!
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November 26, 2015 update
New experience and so much better. Now give it 4 stars but the jury is still out!

Evidently the app and web sites for the cameras were down last night for updating. I asked if there was a way for them to notify customers. There was a huge silent pause and then i was told they would try to have an announcement via the app in the future. What?

The right website to go to is VIMTAG.US that might be [...]
You can find customer support on the home page as well as a tab for products. Both the contact 800 number and the email will get you a real person. Today I talked to 2 of the 4 tech support people.

The first tech person that I talked to was able to answer most of my questions and issues. One that he did not know the answer to he referred to the senior tech person who called me back at a time we agreed to. Who knew??

In case you are having some of the same issues here is what I was told:

I was told to make sure the camera/s is on 50hz for america use.

To turn off the clicking that can be heard in the camera every time motion is detected you need to make sure I/O is turned off. I/O alarm. If you have it turned on there will be an audible sound similar to a shutter click. Trust me if you don't want anyone to notice the camera you need this turned off! You can get to it via your app or on the website where you view the camera/s feed.

I was told to change the night time sensitivity to "50" for the motion detection notification and to "37" for day time.

I did not get an explanation for why many or several of the stills show a gray icon with the word CAMERA in it. When I click on it the display is black. I have a time stamp and date to indicate there is/was motion but no was of knowing who/what it was.

I was also told to change the length of the alert still to 6 from the default of 3. I don't quite understand but will be testing this over night tonight.

Don't give up if you have this camera. DO call the Vimtag tech support.

Vimtag (Fujikam) 361 HD, IP/Network ,Wireless, Video Monitoring, Surveillance, security camera,plug/play, Pan/Tilt with Two-Way Audio and Night Visionexcellent camera, after purchase and test some cameras of security, I can say this and really the best of all and fulfills WHAT promises, simply the best, fast delivery and the product is everything as described. and the installation of reamente 5 minutes without complication and can still access the camera on your computer or cell phone and free and very efficient and easy comprehension REALLY am very happy and grateful and I will definitely recomVimtag (Fujikam) 361 HD, IP/Network ,Wireless, Video Monitoring, Surveillance, security camera,plug/play, Pan/Tilt with Two-Way Audio and Night Visionmend this product to friends and relatives,. thank you

I really love this camera and to look at a room anytime on my phone. Will get more sometime to cover other rooms.

The Fujikam model 361 is a great wireless security camera with reliable web software with a lot of features that you might want or expect in a security camera. Some of these include:
• Remote Live Video Streaming Via Smart Phone, Tablet, PC
• Remote Pan and Tilt, Motion Detection Alert
• Video Recording To SD Card, Digital Zoom
• Real Plug And play 5 Minute Setup, Night Vision,
• 2 Way Voice, HD 1280 X 720 Clear Image Quality
There are no extra fees for cloud service and everything resides on a mini 32 GB SD card which must be purchased separately. It works very well and it is remarkably easy to set up. The setup instructions are good and I had no problems during setup and installation. I had it working within 15 minutes after taking it out of the box. The picture is good, the remote rotation (side-to-side and up-and-down) works and the sound quality is good. The camera comes with a mounting kit so that you can put it up wherever you need it. It is a really nice camera for a very reasonable price and I am going to buy some more of them. Note: This camera is primarily for indoor use although it will work if placed outside. However, it will not be able to withstand bad weather. An outdoor version that is designed to withstand bad weather will be released sometime in the future.
The product customer service is great! I contacted them with a question about the infrared feature and the customer service agent answered without a long wait. He was very patient and helpful in explaining the camera features and software settings.
The Fujikam model 361 is an excellent camera, its customer service is great and I would highly recommend this camera.

I travel for a living and have always been concerned about leaving my house empty for days at a time without knowing what's going on while I'm away. So recently, I began comparing and reviewing about 10 different surveillance camera options, most of which required a DVR with wired cameras. I settled on this camera because it was both wireless and did not require a DVR, because of the reviews it received, and because its price point was hard to beat.

Setup was very easy, requiring only a brief direct LAN hookup to my DSL router to establish the connection to the camera. Then you simply download the app on your smartphone, create an account, scan the QR code at the base of the camera, and voila, you're connected! You can now remove the Ethernet cable and place the camera anywhere you like, as long as it's in wireless range of your router.

Most of the setup was straightforward, though the online documentation could provide better descriptions of the features and menu options. For instance, if you just want the camera to record only when it detects motion (which is what I bought it for), you have to disable the "schedule recording" option altogether (I had it set on the "24/7" option thinking it would always be ready to record but not actually record until it detected movement--I was wrong).

Also, the camera requires an SD card (not included) to save the videos it records. It mentions using an SD card in the documentation, and there is a menu option for it as well, but for the first two days I was under the impression that it was referring to the SD drive on my laptop and that the videos would be saved to the SD card I inserted into the laptop. As it turns out, the camera itself has a Micro SD slot to store its own videos, and that's what the instructions are referencing. NOTE: Be sure to get a "micro" SD card (smart phone size), not the standard size SD card that you might use on your laptop. You can pick these up at Best Buy (about $15 for a 32GB Samsung card).

You can control the camera via your smartphone or your desktop/laptop. One great feature is the ability to control the camera's direction remotely. You can set the camera to a live shot, and pan it up, down, and side to side for a nearly 360 degree viewing radius.

I actually purchased two of these cameras and set them up in different locations of my house, and I can control both of them through the same GUI and account. Although you can only actually see one camera view at a time, you can switch between cameras very easily and very quickly (all cameras are in a list and you just click the one you want to view). I will very likely add a few more to my collection very soon (I believe you can have up to eight on the same account, but you'll want to check that).

All in all, this is a great little surveillance system for a great price.

Great security camera for my little apartment! Just a couple of things to note: The camera must be connected to your router ONLY for the duration of the setup. The little light below the "router" symbol on the camera should flash green three times if it is connected properly. The little light below the "wifi" symbol will flash red, because you haven't set up the wifi yet. Follow the instruction card in order to set up your camera account and hook it up to your wifi. After everything is set up, the light under the "wifi" symbol should be flashing green. It is now ok to unplug your camera from the router and set it up wherever in your home! Unplugging the power supply to move my camera from one spot to another did not ruin anything. To set up the camera's options, open the MIPC app and press and hold the screenshot image from the "Camera List" screen. A menu with Settings, Records, and Delete will pop up. Click Settings to tinker with the options. My favorite way to use the camera is to go to Settings>Alarm Action and toggle the Turn Alarm On button whenever I leave the apartment. That way, the alarm is activated whenever I am gone. When I come back home, I toggle the alert off. Simple. I have set off the alarm a couple of times by accident. It doesn't call the police or anything, but you get a snapshot and a recording of whatever the camera is looking at. If somebody broke in a stole the camera, you'd still have these things available on the app. I had to adjust the motion sensitivity a few times, but everything works great!

The camera itself is very nice. It feels well built.

Bought this to replace my similar security camera, and I have not regretted it. It has a very solid build, the video quality is outstanding. My only complaint is for motion detection, it wasn't very intuitive.

Not as clear at night, day vision is good.

Good value. I've now installed enough of these that I've figured out how to do it, and this one held only one surprise: each one seems to come up on a random address in 192.168.1.xxx. Most come up on a fixed address, and lots of people with they'd come up DHCP enabled. What I hate is the use of the 192.168.1 subnet, with a mask of 255.255.255.0. The 192.168.0.0 network is a 255.255.0.0, and that's how my network is setup. Every time I get one of these things I have to setup a temporary net for it (or change my laptop to a fixed address and plug the camera into it).The software that comes with these is the usual junky CMS stuff, and you need to use Internet Explorer and soften a lot of Active/X security settings under Internet Options->security, in the Local Zone. You may need to put the device's address explicitly in the local zone by numeric value.The "device manager" hidden in the "updates" folder is semi-useful. It will find the device so you can configure it with IE. I haven't figured out how to use it to configure them.In practice, though, you'll be better off doing your setup with the "ONVIF device manager" software freely available, and using another ONVIF DVR program. I use Blue Iris, which has no problem setting these up. You could also use the free ISpy, that I find that uses more cpu on my PC and Blue Iris works better.For those who are on something that doesn't have Internet Explorer, you can use VirtualBox and a time-limited virtual machine that Microsoft makes freely available for testing from [...]

Work as needed and were very cheap compared to competitors. It says it requires an outside power source, but I just used a PoE data/power splitter and got a PoE switch. Worked without a hitch, and don't need each camera running to a power outlet in some way now.Works well with a Jooan NVR, which i would completely expect.

This was a good little camera. Bad part, is that it only works with the proprietary software.

I ordered this for use inside my home, but looking outside to my front porch as I don't have the greatest wifi signal. The picture is clear, the app is very handy and works better than the desktop program. I had no issues setting it up to my network. I like that I can change the camera direction from the app, talk to someone in the room, etc. What I really don't like about it is that the nightvision is useless if you're looking through a window. At first I had it on my windowsill (the base is quite large) but at night the image was only of the windowscreen. So I used a 3M Command Strip to secure it to the top of the window sash b/c the base is large as a temporary fix. But that did not help as the glare from the window creates a mirror effect so all you see is the camera. The "fix" seems to be to have a porch light on. While that does work, I'm not interested in changing out my vintage porch light to an automatic light or leaving the light on at all times. Other options would be to mount it outside, but it has to be plugged in to an outlet to work.

We have a new pup and she has a knack for getting into trouble. I wanted a surveillance camera I could use to help keep an eye on Maisie Grace. I also thought it would be cool to be able to check on the girls. Finally, I thought this would be something I could use when Maisie grows out of her puppy phase as an outdoor camera.

This was a good call.

The price is very reasonable, the process to synch to my network was simple, and installation was simple. You do need to connect the unit to your LAN for the initial setup but after that, it's a pretty straightforward process - I think I was watching from the camera in less than fifteen minutes.

The app is pretty robust and runs like a charm on my Pixel phone. You can also log on to vimtag's site and access your camera - or cameras (the app supports multiple cameras) from any browser. You can run it in a motion detector mode, an alarm mode, or set up schedules to record. A piece of advice - make sure you get a MICRO SD card - the camera needs this to save video. You can control tilt, pan, and zoom from the app and activate the microphone by touching the screen. All in all, it is a pretty reliable and simple app. The Auto mode works pretty well, but you can adjust the color and contrast settings as well as HD or standard definition. The camera boasts a night vision mode as well.

Vimtag's paper and online documentation are not the best, but there are several reviewers who have done a great job of walking you through the procedures if you have any problems.

At some seventy bucks are you getting top quality? Nope. But to be absolutely candid, I worked in Loss Prevention for some years and have worked with cameras not a lot better than these - that likely cost the company more. You definitely get a good deal for the dollar.

I purchased this cloud box because we already have 2 Fujikam cameras in our home, and not only did we want to save more video footage per camera (they are limited to the SD card that is stored in each camera otherwise), but we also wanted to save that footage to something other than the cameras themselves, in case of a burglary, etc. Before this cloud box came out, if your Fujikam camera is stolen, you lose all your videos and photos--which defeats the purpose of a video camera in the first place, in my opinion (unless you're wanting it for live view only). Since we purchased the Fujikam cameras about 9 months ago or so, the name of the company has changed from Fujikam to Vimtag (I guess Vimtag must have purchased the company?). I would never have known this if I hadn't called the 800 number with a question about the cameras when I was setting them up. That being said--their customer service is wonderful. They are extremely helpful and patient. The only drawback is that they're open from 8:30-4:30 EST Monday-Thursday, half a day on Friday, and a partial day on Sunday, so if you need to talk to them for technical assistance, make sure you plan accordingly for not only the day of the week, but also your time zone. This must mean the MIPC (Fujikam) app that I had previously downloaded for the cameras must be obsolete, although it appears it's still working. There's also a Vimtag app, though, which seems both easier to use and user friendly-it tells you this in the installation pamphlet), so at this point--I still have both apps on my iPhone and iPad and go back and forth between them to look at the cameras and cloud box videos. You can also view the cameras for live view and the footage from the cloud box over the Internet on a computer, which is a bonus.

The reason I called their customer service/technical assistance department in the first place regarding this cloud box was because I thought it had wifi capability (looking back over the Amazon description now, I see wifi is not mentioned, so that was my mistake). When I talked to them several months ago about my camera question, I also mentioned that I would really like to have cloud capability in case the cameras were stolen, as I would have no video footage of the thief. That person told me they were coming out with this cloud box and to keep an eye out for it; however, I could never find it for sale on the Vimtag website, and I looked weekly for a long time. I finally did a Google search for it, which led me to this Amazon seller. I was under the impression from the rep I spoke with that the cloud box would have wifi so you could hide it somewhere in your house, away from the cameras, router, etc, which really appealed to me. When I set it up, though, I could only get it to work via Ethernet. That brings me to another point: one of the main sellling features of this cloud box on the product description says you can "hide it in a closet." Well, you can't do that unless your router is next to a closet and you have a power outlet next to it as well. This box has to be connected to your router and electrical power--so a person robbing your house is probably going to notice that it's next to your router, since most are left out in plain view. I don't see how it would be feasible to hide this box in a closet in its current configuration. I finally called Vimtag tech support after much frustration and gnashing of teeth, and a very nice man told me that they are working on making this device wifi capable and to give it a few weeks, because a software update would be available that will allow wifi connection. That was approximately May 19, 2016, so I'm (im)patiently waiting. My intention is to hide this box somewhere in my house where it won't be found easily once that occurs.

This cloud storage device was fairly easy to set up, but I'm also a techie person and know computers and gadgets pretty well for the most part (I still think most people would have no issues with it, though). You can either activate it from the Vimtag app or go to Vimtag.com and add it from there (you have to set up an account with a username and password first). If you already have their cameras, then you will need to "add" a new device first, though, before you can do anything else, which I don't think was the very clear in the instructions. To make things even easier, as it steps you through the process--there's a scan tag on the device that you can scan with your iPhone (not sure about android) to easily add it to your list of devices on your Vimtag account (or you can input the device code on the bottom of the unit manually) and give it a name (I used "cloud box").

Once you've added the cloud box to your account, then you click on each camera that you want to hook up to the box, choose each camera separately--one at a time--and select the storage device for that camera to be the cloud box (if you were previously using an SD card). Playback of the videos is pretty smooth and easy to figure out. I'm not sure I'm getting 60 days worth of video storage yet. It looks like the 2 cameras I have store up to about 3-4 days worth of videos, but I have my cameras set to record 30 minutes of video footage at a time once motion is detected, and they're both set up in busy areas, so there's a lot of footage for a 24 hour period. I'm not complaining about that, though, because that's a lot more than I had with the SD card, I just don't know if that equates to the 1 TB of storage this device is supposed to have, although I know videos can be notorious space hoggers.

As I mentioned, the installation guide that came with the box is pretty straightforward. I didn't have too many issues setting it up, other than the frustration of not having wifi when I thought it did, but I was able to get that figured out after a call to tech support. So far I'm really happy with its performance. The video and/or photo footage for each camera is easy to locate and plays back nicely on a phone or tablet, or a computer after you install their video plugin. One aspect I really like about the whole setup process is that you don't have to do it all via a computer like you do several other different brands of video cameras I've used in the past. Everything you need to set up this box is available using the Vimtag app. If you check the system settings on your cameras and cloud box occasionally, you will see a red tick mark next to the software update selection, which lets you know that a new update is available for that device, which is really convenient. You can update it right from the app and then it will restart that device with the new software features. I've had a number of software updates on my cameras already, adding new features and such, and it's been a breeze so far. No problems (knock on wood).

My biggest complaint I have about this box is the SMELL. It comes right out of the box with a strong chemical odor, and once you plug it in and get it running--it circulates throughout the whole room via the fan inside the cloud box. It literally made me nauseous. I had to try not to breathe in too much while I was messing around with it, trying to get the wifi to work. I've had it about 3 weeks so far and the smell has dissapated a little bit, but the whole room still smells like it. If you're sensitive to that kind of thing, you might want to watch out for that. Other than that and the wifi capability, which I hope will be resolved soon, this is really has been an excellent investment for our home, safety and security (the cameras are also excellent if you get a chance to try them). I don't think you can beat the entire package as far as price, camera clarity, storage capacity and ease of use compared to some others on the market that I've tried. I don't work for this company or have any relationship with them--this is an unbiased opinion and I paid full price for it!

I have now had this Fujikam 361 HD security camera for 5 months. Here is my experience with it. It is solid and well made. It is bigger than you might think. It is easy to set up. The live feed image quality and audio is excellent. Remote pan and tilt works extremely well with a swipe of the live image on a smart phone. Price is excellent. I do have a few gripes. Motion sensitivity is extremely difficult to set and I'm still trying to get day and night settings that do not over-capture or under-capture. Sometimes I get no recording at all with motion and other times I get a recording every 2-5 minutes for hours for no apparent reason. The clicking sound when the motion sensor is activated is kind of annoying and makes visitors inquire if you are snapping their picture. It rarely and unreliably sends a motion alert to my Samsung S5 phone. My biggest gripe is the software. You must use the manufacturers software to view any recorded imaged. It is difficult to sort through captured images and video with the manufacturers online software especially if there are dozens of "false alarm" motion recordings. As I said above, it is very difficult to get the motion sensitivity setting just right so I tend to over capture rather than risk not recording. It is not possible to download any recorded video or pics to your computer without removing the SD card and inserting it into the computer. You can then save the recordings by copying the files over to your computer from the SD card but still so tedious to sort through them there. I wish this camera would allow me to email images to myself. The camera hardware and software does not allow email of motion triggered pics or video to yourself. (More basic Linksys security cameras have this email function built in.) You have to use the manufacturers software to view any pics or video. Tedious and takes forever. If it emailed the recorded images you would not have to upload them to the manufacturers website and would also have more privacy. I'm still looking for something better but not able to find it at this price point.

I was very excited to receive this product. As soon as I got it I set it up right away (which took about 5 mins) and I was very impressed with the quality of this camera. I am very happy with my purchase though I wish there were a way to mount it without having to keep it directly plugged in to a power source. It works fabulously & I will definitely be purchasing more from fujikam!

**UPDATE**
After using the camera system for about 2-3 weeks I have to admit that the MIPC app is not very good at all. I'm constantly having to reset the app because the picture keeps freezing on my phone & the touch to pan and tilt doesn't respond on time , if at all. Also the app crashes on my Acer All in one tablet. Basically I HAVE to use my laptop... Which it still freezes. Disappointed with the app you have to use with camera.

Most reviews here for this camera are Fake. Check the user history for the reviewers. The only thing they reviewed are this camera only.This camera is the worst. After 4 hours of messing with it. Still unable to configure the camera.It is all in Chinese. There is no way to use this any way.Edit:Finally figured out how to get it working in blue irisHere are the steps1. Change the IP address with the included device manager software (installed from the CD) to whatever your network looks like. I changed mine to 192.168.3.xx2. Launch Internet Explorer and add the camera to trusted sites, and also change security settings as described here http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/ie/forum/ie8-windows_other/windows-has-blocked-this-software-because-it-cant/2e60d481-b8a3-4a1a-af73-afcb5a3f2e363. User internet explorer to browse to the camera at 192.168.3.xx4. Install the activex as prompted.5. At login, select the appropriate language before login.6. Go to "DeviceCfg" and then to "Advanced" and then to "Account".7. Change password for the admin account.8. Reboot as needed9. Once up, go to blue iris and add camera with the new IP 192.168.3.xx10. Select "Empire" as camera make and then "Empire IPC-1" as the model.Updated the rating to three star given that I was able to get around the hickups.

Camera is ok but comes without a power supply. That in itself sucks. Could of bought a different camera with power supply and saved myself the hassle if I had known!

I ended up retuning it.
I thought the features and function were great. The video quality was pretty good and the motion alerts with live video to my phone were very useful. I was able to be alerted when the dog sitter came and talk to her through the camera.
My two knocks, and why I returned it are: (1) the motion sensor was tooo sensitive. Even when turning it way down in the settings. To cover a room it had to be pointed in the direction of the window. Every time a branch or the power lines blew (a minimum 20 feet way) I'd get an alert to my phone. Let me tell you how that freaks you out at night in a new house you are still getting used to.
(2) No Zwave or Zigbee compatibility which meant that I couldn't connect it to a hub later for better and integrated functionality.
As a stand alone camera, I was still happy, especially at the price. But being unable to resolve the alert sensitivities sealed it for me.

We have this placed in our living room mostly to keep an eye on the 22-year-old when we are away. I bought this one because I didn't want my living room video stored in the cloud and the price was good. Also, I liked that I didn't have to have a separate hard drive and would just record to an SD card on motion. It mostly works well. Set up is pretty simple. The video is decent quality and the app is easy to use.

There are a few quibbles I have with it. 1. From time to time the thing needs to be rebooted or the video won't capture. 2. Getting the motion detection settings right is difficult. The challenge is getting it set so that it will capture video when someone walks across the room, but not too sensitive that it will start recording when a bird flies by the window. 3. It would be nice to have an on/off toggle in the app so that I can turn it off when I'm home without having to unplug it.

One thing I hate about this device is you have to download a PDF file to read instructions. Way too many pages to print.
Took me an hour before I gave up and called support to ask why the printed password wouldn't work.
I had to "reset" the device and nowhere on the PDF instructions even said this. I'm having a hard time finding a place to put it. While it looks small, it's not. I was planning to put in window but too big to sit on window sill. Dragged a table to window. Too low. So now it sits on top of the box it came in on table. I thought I could watch video by playback. You have to use one of those itty bitty SD cards, take it out and put in computer to watch video on what went on. If you can watch playback, I can't figure out how by instructions. This device will work for now. But as soon as I can afford it, I'm getting a security company to put in real camera's.

** Be aware that reviews for the Vimtag B-1 outdoor camera and the VT-361 indoor pan/zoom camera are mixed together in these reviews so be SURE you know which camera the reviewer is talking about. I review both cameras **

2/22/17 update - Today, FiOS updated my internet service with 150/150 service with a 2.4Hz and 5GHz dual band router. In order to update the Vimtag wifi on both the B-1 outdoor AND the VT-361 indoor cameras, you HAVE to run a CAT 5 cable directly from the modem to each camera and then drill down into the app and update the router name and password. What total a pain in the a$$ because I have 4 Vimtags, two B-1 outdoor and two VT-361 indoor cameras. Apparently you can also use a laptop with a CAT 5 cable as well but I was too far along in the first process to switch over and I was too aggravated at the clowns at Vimtag. To add insult to aggravation, the bozos at Vimtag DO NOT anwer their phone. It's "leave a message and we'll call back" or "email us". I chose the latter and got called back about 20 minutes later and informed about the CAT 5 cable from the modem to each camera. So if you order these from Amazon, put a 100 foot Amazon basics CAT cable in with the order because you're eventually going to need it.

12/26/16 update - I have two of these cameras front and back at my home. I just installed the Ring Pro doorbell camera and it blows the Vimtag B-1 cameras away. The Ring Pro is easier to install, a LOT smaller, requires one doorbell wire, can be mounted without using a doorbell at all with a 24vac transformer, has a 160 degree field of view compared to about 100 degrees for the Vimtag, The Ring Pro can pan and zoom and has audio communication which the Vimtag B-1 also lacks. I pointed my Vimtag front B-1 camera at my front door and the Ring Pro covers everything else. The Ring con is price - $199 versus $99 for the B-1 but I found the Ring Pro from a new seller for $99 but the jury is still out on that acquisition because the second Ring Pro has not arrived yet. But even at twice the price, the Ring Pro is 4 times the camera over the Vimtag. The final plus for the Ring pro is that rather than fooling around with a 32gb card and hoping you capture and event, for $30 a year, Ring will keep the data in their could for 6 months. I looked at the Nest doorbell cam but the monitoring for an outdoor camera is $200 a year!!!

In summary, give the Ring Pro a hard look before the Vimtag B-1 and certainly the Nest cam.

Original review -
This review is for the outdoor B-1 camera (NOT the VT 361 indoor camera!) that I have setup overlooking my driveway. It works really well but I have a requests for improvement

Pro -
Easy initial Set up but lots of "drill down" settings
Installation is not difficult, it you mount it upside down it has a "flip" control to invert the image
The app works well on my iPhone. It's better than the D Link app which cuts out frequently
Very Clear image
Highly weather resistant - I live north of Buffalo, NY and this camera can take weather beating
There are a LOT of settings and it takes a while to get familiar with all of them and figure out how to get it take snapshots and record.
On line upgrade is simple and only takes a few minutes

Con -
Wish it had a wider view.
Wish it would pan, zoom and tilt and voice/sound
Requires some skill to install outside due to the large RJ-45 coupler for set up. I used a Carlon 4" x 6" box custom configured for the camera.

Overall this camera is crisp and clear, has an on board 32GB card and the iPhone app works well. My one star deduction is for the limited viewing width, no pan and tilt and ingenuity required to install outdoors with the large plugs for the RJ-45 connector, power and reset button

VT-361 Indoor camera - This camera is a lot better than the B-1 outdoor camera because of tilt, pan, zoom and voice functions. Uses a 32GB storage card that works OK. I paid $99 for my VT-361 and for $69, it's a lot better deal. I have no issues with the VT-361 other than updating the wifi for a new modem/router or password change requires a CAT 5 hardwire hookup. If you have the VT-361 camera 20 feet in the air in a large entrance way, get the ladder out and practice your cussing right now.

I wanted a camera to check in on my dog and chose this one based on all the great reviews and it being an Amazon Best Seller. Perhaps all the hype raised my expectations too much. It's OK. It was easy to set up, sort of. The first day, I could only get a picture if I left it plugged into the router; it would go black when trying to use wifi, although I completed the set up process and it had said I could unplug the cable. Today I managed to get it to work without the cable allowing me to move it to a better location. A lot of reviewers talk about the HD video. Well, I have seen some moments of good picture, but most, especially movement, is pretty broken up, and the lag time for me is an issue. Sometimes the lag time is a few seconds, but sometimes the lag time is much longer, perhaps closer to a minute. So, if I see my dog doing something he shouldn't, I wouldn't dare to use the voice feature because it may be long over and he may be sleeping on his bed by the time I see it. The lag also applies to the pan and tilt. That feature may be useful if you decide you want to monitor a different part of the room, but if you are trying to follow something that is happening, realize it may have already happened and it can take a few minutes to have the camera actually turn to see the new area. At the low cost, I will keep it, but I don't see it being as useful as I had anticipated.

Buyer beware: This camera makes outbound TCP connections to web hosting servers. I haven't yet examined the contents of the traffic, but it sends ~ 250 Megabytes / week to a web hosting company. None of my other cameras do this. Fortunately, my router lets me disable internet access per device. The camera has a maximum of 2 connections, and was a rather pain to figure out the RTSP connection URL.The camera is mounted in my barn, but I would probably not use this camera for inside home security.The picture is good and so is the night vision, that's why I gave it 2 stars.

Won't power correctly even with standard POE splitters. Even when finally powered, doesn't communicate with network (no IP address, perhaps requires hard-coded subnet, MS Windows, browser plugins, etc). Extra star just because of specs, value price, and it looks like decent build quality.

Well... it works ok I guess. The included software is nothing short of terrible. No support for any browser but IE. Even then, you need a sketchy unsigned active X plugin. Once the camera is up and running, it actually looks and works quite good. It's ONVIF compatible so works great with Blue Iris or Tiny Cam Monitor. For the price though, I would buy the HOCAM brand instead.

*Video quality is ok.*Night vision is primarily in the center of the camera view.*Keeps losing network connection.

After reading all the good reviews I bought 2 of these cams. Unfortunately the cams only work with their own software. Nice, clear picture, but that's the only reason I gave it 2 stars. First, a minor problem; no power supply. Fortunately it works with most any 12v power supply as long as the connector is compatible. Second, I won't say that I was mislead, but the cam is not designed to work with wifi. There aren't any configuration settings for wifi in the supplied software. Third, it doesn't seem to work with any of the preconfigured cams in Blue Iris. I wanted to use this cam as part of my security system that I control with Blue Iris. I'm planning on returning the cams and buying some that will work with my system.

Very hard to get it setup to record correctly. I have had 4 calls with the technical support. They are very nice but I can't get it to record at a specific time. The tech resets the paramaters each time and then reboots my camera. I lose whatever I have recorded but that doesn't really matter because I can't get it to record at the right times anyway. It seems to keep changing the time zones. I'm pretty technical but this camera is too buggy and I'm spending over 2 hours with the help desk. 30 minutes a clip. I haven't tried other cameras but this is very hard to schedule a recording.

Half of the time I can't get it working and I have to wait until I go to my mothers house to reset it. It's very buggy. I often can't move the camera

**Update**
Dropped one more star. I still only use this for live monitoring since the motion detection feature gets really frustrating. In addition to all other issues, one of my cameras periodically shows offline and can't be accessed. It comes back on its own after a while. Also trying to use these for live monitoring with audio on gets annoying after a while because of the constant device generated background noise. It must be a noise from the tilt/pan motor but it comes through constantly even when the camera is still. They should find a way to filter that out. I am definitely looking for a better security camera now.

The good:
- It was fairly easy to set up
- Tilt/pan feature is nice and has a good range
- It's nice to be able to listen in - I have not had a chance to use it for a two-way conversation to see how good the speaker is

The bad:
- The motion detection feature has been the most frustrating part. It just did not work for me. I ended up getting so many false notifications that I disabled the alarms and just use it for keeping an eye on things when I am away. I played around with the sensitivity settings and still could not get it to work. I put one in a dark attic with no movement and it would still send me motion detection alarms.
- The software is not that good. There are no controls on the video playback. You don't seem to be able to select videos/images you get with the notification on your device to delete the ones you don't want. Given the false notification issue, you end up with a bunch of useless images/videos.
- One of the units seems to have an issue with a flash of light that gets captured on the videos and snapshots. There is a sudden click that you hear along with the flash and a couple of seconds of the video or some of the pictures get completely blurred because of it.
- No cloud storage. You have to use the SD cards, but you can also save the images/videos on your device.

Also the "Super HD" title is misleading. The picture is just ok, but definitely not "Super HD". Overall it's an ok unit for the money, but I will be looking for one with better motion detection capability. If anyone has any suggestions for a better unit, please comment.

It has been a year and I really can't stand this thing. It would seem easy enough to set the sensitivity to capture motion from a person and not from a leaf dropping from a tree or dust in the air, but I simply can't reliably. It either captures everything sending notifications every few minutes or seconds, to absolute ignorance of motion. It does not help that after each adjustment you need to turn it off and turn it on to make the setting changes take effect - really you do even though it says you don't. But there is no guarantee of this and after a year I have given up. It is not reliable. You ask it to record from one time to another and nothing happens. So you try resetting the setting to ask again and it works once. Then it doesn't. Why? I don't know. You get the sensitivity of motion close enough and ask it to stop notifying you then bam - it fails to notice any motion whatsoever. Why? I can't tell. You think - I will just record for a set amount of time to capture the entire babysitting time expecting to fast forward through the footage to save time - but no - no scanning. What I ended up doing was to use the screen capture while showing the video feed on the screen. Well this lets the entire household know you are filming and whatever is said by the computer is picked up on the screen capture. So you are looking at what is being filmed but experiencing ghost vocals during playback (who is talking?). Any way, maybe this would work in another household where motion and playback is not important so I gave a second star. But for me, it is a frustrating piece of red glowing purposeless plastic.

PROS:
1) Easy to setup.
2) Nice & simple design.
3) Showed a good image when it worked.

CONS:
1) Stopped working after day 3.
2) Could not get it to work again even after resetting it to manufacturer settings, re-downloading the app and trying to set up a new account.
3) I noticed it did not always record moving objects/persons as I programmed it to when I sat in the same room with it while doing my computer work. Neither could I get it to record me as I blatantly moved in front of it.
4) Camera head which rotates on the black base felt like the movement was not smooth.
5) The original made for packaging/box did not look like it came brand new from the factory due to the multiple etched impressions and smudges I saw on it, and I then suspected that it was previously owned or used by someone else.
6) Expected a brand new camera but believe I got a refurbished one.
7) Customer service had odd hours opening at 10:30am the earliest on the weekday that I called.
8) Customer service personnel said they had to have someone else call me back to help me reset my password, which lead me to believe the company was not entirely professional or well established.

CONCLUSION: I returned this item for a full refund.

The features and quality of this camera are decent, but there are 2 major drawbacks: both the Android and iOS apps only allow you to remotely view for some variable amount of time before the streaming just stops without warning, and the apps sometimes cannot connect to whatever "account" needs to be created. In the latter case, the app must be force closed and, in the case of our iPad, the device must be restarted in order for the connection to the service to complete successfully. Another drawback is the fact that the "MIPC" Android and iOS apps do not maintain their settings each time the app is opened - you have to unmute the sound every time you look into a camera feed, for instance.

I was really only looking for a simple solution here to replace a baby monitoring system - a camera in a room that I can view on a smartphone/tablet at all times for any duration of time. I need to be alerted to movement of a child - even in the middle of the night - and I can do this with this camera and app. Perhaps there is another app that can connect to this camera without the need for some account to be created, certainly seems like our video feeds are going through some offsite system somewhere - doesn't give you the warm and fuzzy, that's for sure.

Could never get it to work.Might be me.

Trash. It did not appear on my network when plugged in. Lack of PoE support makes this harder to install than it should be. Look elsewhere.Sorry, but I am NOT installing a program from a Chinese vendor with a broken website to configure an IP camera. Better webcams configure over DHCP and have web interfaces. Skip this one.

the camera relies on active X and or flash which windows or most cell phones don't use any more, would not recommend this camera.

I can not believe the extent some companies will go to falsify their user reviews!!! There is no way that this camera earned all the positive reviews posted. I bet that this review of mine will become obsolete shortly as a new listing appears with 47 more 5 star reviews and just a shight description change.THe build quality is toy like and flimsy. The picture quality is lower than a 10 dollar analog camera. The set up is in broken English like garbage text. The application fails to run on my PC. The web interface requires antiquated plugins that are full of security holes... Garbage, absolute garbage.

Camera might be ok but it comes without power supply.........couldn't use it without power supply.........that's why I couldn't tell how good it is, I sent it back.

This has not been a reliable system. Cloud box seems to record ok, The data labeling has been erratic. Cameras purchased for this system are not reliable as well. First camera worked great for three months then stopped recording. Confirmed this by purchasing second camera. Second camera records but has software issues. Would definitely not recommend purchasing if you want to be sure it is going to work every time it is activated.

Impossible to completely deactivate the microphone on the camera. This is very important if you don't want the sound to be transmitted. You can go to setting and turn the volume to 0, but sound still can be heard. For example, if you connect to camera from your office pc with speakers attached, you WILL HEAR the conversation. I called their tech support twice and explained the problem and asked if anything else can be done. They couldn't help.

I ordered this quite awhile ago when it was called "Fujikam". I still have that camera, which works flawlessly, and wanted a second. I'm disappointed to say that the Vimtag seems to be unable to connect to Wifi. I tried a replacement and got the same issue. How do I know it's not a problem with my home Wifi setup? Because I have the previous model that was called "Fujikam" that IS able to connect to my Wifi. I had to troubleshoot this myself because the "product support" doesn't really have the capability to help troubleshoot issues like this beyond suggesting a return / refund and a few obvious fixes. I AM able to connect to wired Ethernet but that's not going to cut it for my situation. The setup process using the Android app doesn't even work, either. You're supposed to hold the phone near it as it plays a sound or show it a QR code, neither of which worked for me.

Avoid this. If you run into a problem during setup, you're going to have a hard time resolving it. Also, I heard that it's very easy for someone to hack in and view your camera.

I can't believe this camera gets good reviews. When it arrived (late) I thought it looked well made, and after reading all the positive reviews
I was it expecting it to work well, that was not the case.
I had to use the included cable to set it up, it would not connect via wifi. Once I got it working all it would do was display real-time video,
with no instructions and no customer support available I could not get it to do what it's described to do.
After two hours of trying to get it set-up I re-boxed it and sent it back. What a waste of time!

This was such a useless purchase. Overall the camera is fairly user-friendly however no matter how much you adjust the sensitivity of motion detection it constantly records from the slightest change in lighting, etc. I had hoped to use this as more of a security device while away on trips etc but when my home is empty, lights off the motion detection is constantly triggered by as far as I can tell by watching the videos, absolutely nothing at all. I could have gone much cheaper than this but should have looked at more expensive systems/cameras. Avoid this at all costs unless you feel like sifting through hours and hours of useless videos of absolutely nothing at all.

I cannot believe Amazon even sells this item... The worst possible thing that could happen with this product happened to me, 1 day after setting it up. Ironically, using this camera for peace of mind actually put me at more risk of criminal activity. Here's why...

I read other low ratings for this noting that people gave high ratings for discounts, and that this camera does not encrypt your wifi password when you set it up. I'm no expert so google it- lots of expert info online about how risky these are. So I see all these warnings and I'm like, tons of people rated high so it can't be THAT risky. I even called Vimtag and asked their tech guys about it. He claimed "bank level security", but could not offer my any documentation, encryption methods, nothing. I ignored my paranoia and installed it anyway. Then it got weird...

It worked for a day, I was liking the image, and alerts etc... I had it pointed out my front window sitting inside on the sil. I got a movement alert to my phone and later checked the live image. Somehow, the camera was now facing the opposite direction pointing up my stairs. The recorded video on the SD card was of me, walking down the stairs. It turned all the way around and recorded me in my house. I was the only person home and absolutely did not move the camera myself.

I then noticed that my 2015 Mac Pro which was closed/asleep, had gone from 100% to 75% battery within an hour or so - again, while closed/asleep. I had JUST taken it off the charger. My router records also showed thousands of access attempts from IP addresses all over the world had just happened.

I called tried to change my wifi password and someone had already done so. They also changed my device access code for the router. I factory reset and within minute it had been changed again. Now my net is disconnected, pending replacement of my router for security reasons.

Why Amazon sells a product with known security risks speaks volumes about their priorities to me. I thought people were being paranoid, but turns out exactly what they warned about happened to me within a day. DO NOT USE THIS PRODUCT. So shady... I now have the pleasure of resetting all my passwords and info and not having access to the net for several days while I clean up this mess. I only hope there are no other precautions I'm missing that will pop up later... Ugh...