Okay, so the other day I was trying to set up my Eufy camera at my parents’ house. I already had one at my place, working fine, no issues. Thought it would be a breeze to add this new one to my account and keep an eye on things over there, too.
Boy, was I wrong.
I started by plugging in the camera, got the app open on my phone, and went through the usual setup process. You know, the basic stuff where you connect to the camera’s Wi-Fi network and then switch it over to your home Wi-Fi.
But then, nothing. The app just kept searching and searching, like it couldn’t find the camera. I tried a few times, but same result. It was like the camera wasn’t even there.
So, first thing I checked was the Wi-Fi. I made sure I was using the 2.4GHz network, ’cause I know some of these cameras can be picky and only work on that frequency. The router was working fine, my phone was connected, everything seemed okay there.
Next, I thought maybe the camera needed a reset. I found the little reset button, did the whole press-and-hold thing until it beeped, and tried the setup again. Still nothing.
- Made sure the camera was close to the router.
- Checked the power.
- Tried connecting to a different device.
Frustration
At this point, I was getting pretty frustrated. I even tried using a different phone, thinking maybe it was an issue with my app or something. Nope. Same problem on the other phone. I started to check if my Wi-Fi router was switched on and also tried to check if the camera was situated within the wifi coverage range or not.
Finally, I decided to dig a little deeper. Turns out, each Eufy camera needs to be connected to a HomeBase, which is like a central hub. I already had a HomeBase at my house, but I didn’t realize you can’t just add a camera from a different location to the same HomeBase. Bummer. You know, I had to reset the Eufy camera once again.
So, I ended up buying a new HomeBase for my parents’ house. Once that arrived, I connected the camera to the new HomeBase, and it worked like a charm. Setup was smooth, and I could finally see the camera feed on my app.
Lesson learned: You need a separate HomeBase for each location where you want to use Eufy cameras. It’s a bit of a hassle, and an extra expense, but it is what it is. I wish I had known that from the start, would have saved me a lot of time and frustration.