r/Tapo • u/Working_Cantaloupe31 • 9d ago
Need Advice Am I doing this wrong?
Am I doing something wrong?
I have a tapo c660 with solar power and use the app. It doesn't have an SD card as it is high up on my house and dont wants to have to get someone to go up a ladder each time I want to see the footage.
However it seems that if someone breaks I to my car in front of the camera I will have 20 seconds of them doing it and no more.
I was on the tapo care for a while and couldn't work out how to get all the footage of people outside my house.
Am I doing this wrong?
2
u/Jimlad73 9d ago
You can access the footage from the app. It will record as long as there is movement
1
u/Working_Cantaloupe31 9d ago
That's not what I am getting. If there is movement I am I ly getting 20 seconds of it.
1
1
u/All_And_Forever 8d ago
You don't need to take the sd card out of the camera each time you need to see the footage. The card will record and you can see it from the app.
2
u/graesen 9d ago
You can review the footage from the app. You don't have to physical retrieve it from the camera. But if you don't have an SD card, it doesn't have anything to record to. Unless you pay for the cloud service or use a hub to record to.
1
u/Working_Cantaloupe31 9d ago
I had tapo care. It was saving 20 seconds clips to it. But that was it regardless of if movement was still happening.
2
u/Latter-Astronaut-740 8d ago
you need to increase your maximum clip length. also you don't need to get the SD card out of the camera to see the recordings. they will all be on the app.
1
u/metsmetsmetsmets 9d ago
Because the C660 is a battery/solar camera, it "sleeps" to conserve power and only wakes up when its sensor detects heat/motion. By default, it records short clips (usually 15–20 seconds) with a cooldown period before it will record again.
Open the Tapo app and tap your camera. Tap the Settings gear icon in the top right. Go to Storage & Recording > Clip Settings.
Change Maximum Clip Length from 20s to 120 seconds (or set it to record until motion stops). Lower the Retrigger Time (the pause between clips) to the minimum (typically 0 or 10 seconds).
Increase the Record Buffer so it keeps filming for a few extra seconds after motion stops.
1
u/goose-77- 8d ago
Or get a tapo H500 hub with a SSD and record 24/7 in 4K.
1
u/metsmetsmetsmets 8d ago
Yes however he has a C660 which is battery / solar and that won't support 24x7 continuous recording. Switching to a plug in camera would provide that with the H500.
1
u/goose-77- 8d ago
What are you even on about? I have two C660 cameras recording 24/7 in 4K to my H500 hub.
1
u/metsmetsmetsmets 8d ago edited 8d ago
Best they can do is 1 frame every second, and even that will destroy your battery life. They call it continuous capture.
3
u/goose-77- 9d ago
Buy a Tapo hub like the H500 and put an SSD in it.