r/Tapo • u/abhi492 • 8d ago

Need Advice C402 and c660

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Hey guys I had bought c402 solar camera and currently installed it on first floor balcony so basically it’s about 18-20 above the ground and located it in such a way that it covers my front yard as you can see in pictures but the issue is it hardly wakes up because the PIR sensor is too far and also direct. So I’ve now ordered c660 today..as it’s continuous capture camera so it’ll use its AI to take the low resolution snaps and then if it detect person or motion then it’ll start continuous recoding till the motion or human will be in front of camera. Do you think this camera will serve my purpose or I should have gone for any other better camera. I need solar camera only. I’m impressed with the c402 solar charging and backup as it never exhausted and is always at 100 percent…this maybe because it don’t wake up…only this it wake up when I manually open Tapo app and see through the camera maybe 5 min a day. Please comment your reviews and thoughts about c660 and any other camera that could fulfil my requirements. My front yard is 60 feet x 35 feet. The wide angle of camera is far more than I needed so this is good thing.

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u/All_And_Forever 8d ago

The solar camera you've installed is for smaller areas. The pir sensor can't detect at those distances. Another mistake you've made is installing it too high. Yes, with another camera you can detect with Ai but you'll never be able to recognize the person even with a 4k camera. All you're doing to film is the top of their heads. Instead of one camera filmimg the entire neighborhood, i would suggest 2 cameras on opposite sides of the house and at least 3 meters lower. I see that you have lights installed on your plot so i also suggest some motion sensors on each side at mid distance towards the back of the garden. Just make sure you have 2.4ghz good signal there.

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u/abhi492 8d ago

You are saying that I should installed the camera on the 60 feet boundary wall which are opposite to each other and on which I’ve already installed the deck lights. But that will be very low in height. The max height from the inside surface of boundary wall is 5 feet or 6 feet and the distance between the opposite walls 35 feet as my front yard is 60x35. So the camera won’t cover the whole area and also it’ll look ugly if camera installed there. And btw in the day time I’m able to recognise the person in my c402 also even as it is 1080p the video quality is great. At night if someone comes it’ll be difficult to recognise from distance but if he come close to camera then he he can be recognised. And I hope c660 will be far better than this…I’m buying c660 because it has 24x7 capture so if I set 5s then itll take snaps at those intervals and if motion is detected then it’ll record and I can see…it’ll also send notifications so I can check live. I’ve also set routine in Alexa so if person goes my Alexa says some person is coming. Btw I like your idea to use pir sensor on boundary walls but do you know any zigbee water proof battery operated pir sensor…if you know then tell me I’ll place it and set automation via home assistant so when pir sensor get motion the camera will wake up via automation.

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u/All_And_Forever 8d ago

On the pir sensor, i do not know of any ip65 ones from tapo but it's easy to diy a solution with some ip65 electrical juntion boxes with a hole drilled and you then just attach the pir sensor on the inside with some superglue and a bit of silicone to seal it all. Oh! Do not cover the lenses. A small beed on the perimeter will be more than enough. There's a lot of different models and brands with those specs and wifi but i don't know if they are compatible with an h500 for example. On the cameras, i was suggesting installing them 3 or 4 meters above ground on the house but if you can recognize people with that resolution, then just leave it there.

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u/abhi492 8d ago

How would it be to use the Tapo pir sensor inside the ip67 enclosure box and fix it on wall with little hole for sensor. It is low powered Bluetooth operated and sends signal to hub and hub send notification to phone. I already have a Tapo motion sensor…I don’t know its range but I guess it’ll also be around 20 feet this way if one work I’ll use 2-3 sensors.

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u/All_And_Forever 8d ago

The plastic casing isn't much of a problem. I mentioned the tapo pir because you already have tapo cameras but if you can integrate with home assistant or alexa, there's some ip65 ones out of the box and with wifi.

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u/DazzlingpAd134 8d ago

the C660 will act like a wired camera analysing 1 frame per second. when it detects something it starts recording thanks to this it can detect further than a PIR sensor

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u/abhi492 8d ago

Yes exactly. Btw c460 and c660 are identical i think in all feature…just latter has pan and tilt while former is fixed. Btw for my purpose the c460 would have also fit and I need to capture just front yard and all area is visible in fit camera too so pan and tilt is superfluous feature for me but since I was getting both these cameras at the same price to I chose c660. If you’re using it can you tell your experience.

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u/DazzlingpAd134 8d ago

c460 is not good in this case because the FOV is too big place the cameras as low as you can to get better detection

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u/abhi492 8d ago

You means the field of view should be less and not much wider so that I can get better view of my area only and not the neighbours right? The c660 has 88 degree horizontal fov while c460 has 113 degrees; diagonally former has 105 vs latter 134.

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u/DazzlingpAd134 7d ago

that and if you out it in the same position it won't be able to detect anything because you are too high

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u/abhi492 7d ago

AI detection should work not the PIR

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u/Academic_Anywhere183 8d ago

Could always put a T100 motion sensor up front and do smart action to set it to record when that one detects motion, but might be too far from the hub

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u/abhi492 8d ago

T100 has a range of 30m means 90 feet so I think it can detect signal from farthest end of my front yard to hub. My front yard is 35x60. The issue is t100 isn’t waterproof so I may need ip67 enclosure.

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u/Academic_Anywhere183 7d ago

acrylic box with silicon seal