Guardzilla - HD Wireless Home Security System - Black

TL;DR: Bad camera, good price. Much needed room for improvement before I could call myself satisfied. I purchased this camera at my local Best Buy yesterday and I am already returning it. I bought this camera because I saw that it had several useful features fir a decent price, but it turns out that even though it is feature rich, you get what you pay for. The poor build quality was my first impression. Once I had the box taken off, I instantly noticed how light the device was and how it was made of cheap plastic. I initially didn't mind, because it wasn't something that would really be carried around or touched frequently, so I just passed it off. I then began setting it up on a shelf in my bedroom, and noticed that the only way to adjust the tilt of the device was through a plastic nut that had actually gotten detached and was sitting in the bottom of the box. After I got the nut screwed back in, I was quick to discover that the only way to really get it to tilt down at all without actually FALLING FORWARD was to find a perfect sweet spot by screwing it in tiny bit by bit until I decided that the spot it was at was *good enough*. Now it was time to set it up in the app. I downloaded the app from the App Store and was pleased to discover that it only took up a measly 33MB. Not bad! But I was quickly turned off again when I actually launched the app to discover that it hasn’t even been updated to support the large display of my iPhone 6s Plus. The graphics and text are all stretched and pixelated to compensate for the extra screen real estate. The company has said that as time goes on, the app will improve, but at the time of writing this review, it’s just a deal breaker for me. Thankfully, the setup process is relatively simple. You just connect to the setup network that the camera creates and the app guides you through the rest. It took me about 3 minutes to have the camera up and running. And now we get to the worst part: Actually using the device. This being my first security camera, I don’t have any previous experience in using these types of devices, but I do have a lot of experience in how they work and what they’re typically supposed to do. I mentioned earlier that the app will get better in the future, which I could deal with, but as of right now, most of the features just don’t work. I am only able to monitor the video feed when I am connected to my home Wi-Fi network. If I am on a different Wi-Fi network or connected through LTE, the status bar always says “Locating camera” and the monitor screen just buffers indefinitely. I have installed the app on two separate ANDROID phones to see if the problem persists, and apparently it is not. I will give the benefit of the doubt that it is only my phone that is misbehaving, but there is more to it than just the lack of connection for my poor review. When the camera records with motion detection, it only records five seconds of footage. That’s it! I was actually able to catch someone in my house stealing a drink out of my refrigerator, but they were able to claim “they changed their mind” because the camera didn’t actually record for long enough to show them actually reaching into the fridge and getting a drink out. If the camera doesn’t record long enough to show someone getting a drink, how would it be able to produce enough evidence to show someone guilty in court for committing an actual theft. Now I do acknowledge that there is a continuous recording mode, but in reality, I would not want to use this because 99% of my SD card would just be filled with recordings of my empty bedroom with nothing going on. It’s just not practical for my use case. The two way audio is nice, though. The microphones on the device are able to pick up sound decently well, and in my testing it is easy to have a conversation through the built in speakers. Although I would prefer the speakers to be a tad bit louder, and for whatever reason, in the app you can only listen or talk at one time. It would be nice if there was a “two way audio mode” where both the microphones and speakers were active at the same time, making it better for conversations, because at the moment, you must switch back from listening mode to speech mode in order to talk and listen. The night vision is very useful as well. It turns on automatically when the lights are turned out and deactivates when there is sufficient light in the room. I can see everything with it. The 10 IR LEDs light up the whole room and make it easy to make out faces and objects. In conclusion, this camera would be a very good option if it had a few improvements. The things it has wrong are just too big to be able to get by for me. For some people, if they were able to get the app working properly, it would be perfect for them, but it leaves me searching for something better.

Gave this product a go. Needed something not too expensive and remote viewing capabilities for home security. I will say you need to have a little patience with it at the beginning, but here's the experience and review of it, including networking, setting up, the app, etc. Networking: For me, I had to move my cable wireless gateway into the living room and provided a almost clear line of sight to the camera. This increases connectivity reliability as well as made the setup very easy. I first tried this product by having it connected to a router which was connected to a Ethernet hub and that was connected to my cable modem. To say the least, too much transferring of data and chances of packet loss. That setup resulted in crashed app, non-responsive camera, etc. So, if you can, give your Guardzilla the best chance at success! Setting Up/App: I set this up using an Android phone. The app got stuck twice on setting up the account. The workaround is this: go to the Guardzilla website while the app is stuck on setting up account, and try logging in with the email and password you put in the app for setup. It logged me in. I then went into my phone's settings menu-Apps-Guardzilla-Force stop-ok/yes. I then relaunched the app and instead of selecting setup account, I chose login. If got stuck logging in. Again, logout of website and login. Then force stop the app. Relaunch app, select login, and badda Bing badda boom it went through good :) From that point on, the app is awesome with short videos and text on next steps. Simply follow it and I had no issues setting up the camera. Video Quality: I did my research before buying this and watched those YouTube reviews....most said video quality isn't that great....I say good luck streaming 1080p from a camera 30 miles away while you are on cell data! Besides that, the picture quality is actually really good. Oh did I mention you can rotate your phone longways and it'll fill the entire screen? And then standard figure gesture for zooming in and out! For the first day, I 'broke in' the camera logging in and out of app, live monitoring, alarm test, etc. I noticed that after doing this for a few hours of stress testing the connectivity of the camera through the app, less hiccups in the overall app and camera. Yes, when I'm on my cell data network, the app occasionally does stop, usually when I tried telling at my cat to get off the kitchen counter or listening in. No worries-just open up the app and good to go. Also should note you need a phone that has storage space left, and a good processor with enough RAM. Aka the LG Coolpad will result in the app barely working, crashing, etc. If you have a processor like the Motorola G4 or G5S Plus, works flawlessly. As for not detecting pets, if you have a pet that jumps up higher than a couch, the Guardzilla when armed did pick it up and record it. I had that fear so I turned off the alarm. Makes it a kind of silent alarm system cause it'll text you and email you when the motion detection goes off. Simply log into the app, hit event history and there ya have a 8 second video of the event. You can save that to your phone too. There are also apps in the android store for free that allows you to record your screen aka open up live monitoring, turn phone longways, enable the app, hit record and BAM you have recorded monitoring of your security camera! Conclusion: little patience and giving your Guardzilla the best chance for success with your network is key, but this is awesome! I will be buying more and adding them all through the same app. Bravo to Guardzilla! P.S. If you have any issues with the product, app, networking, etc, feel free to post a comment and I'll try to help.

This is a fantastic security device for someone with basic needs, and who does not want to pay a monthly fee. Setup was very easy. I followed the directions given to the letter and I was up and running in no time. I was also easily able to add another cell phone user so that we could both get alerts and monitor the same device. Once set up, you run this device from the Guardzilla app on your phone. The menu was easy to navigate and pretty straight forward. There was nothing that I found terribly confusing, or annoying, about the interface. You can set this in any number of ways to accommodate what your specific needs are. You can have it continuously monitor 24/7 where it will send a "video" (not so much a video as snapshots with a second delay between them which implies movement) to your SD card. It will keep recording until it runs out of a room, then it will begin to overwrite the oldest footage. I was told buy a Guardzilla rep that if you have a 32g SD card that you can store as much as 5 days worth of footage. Another option and the option we have chosen is the "Alert" mode where it will only record the "video" if the device detects motion once armed. You can also select no video. Once armed, and the Guardzilla detects motion, it does not make a noise from the device (although there is a faint clicking noise if you listen carefully, which is the Guardzilla snapping photos). It will immediately send you a text and an alert to your phone with a still photo presumably of the person who is setting it off. You can also monitor what is going on at any time from the app. You get a live feed from the camera. From this window, you have some options as well. You can take a still photo, you can listen through the Guardzilla's microphone to hear sounds, or you can even click the microphone icon and broadcast your own voice through the Guardzilla. This was great fun when my husband went to work and out of the blue began speaking to me through the microphone, a little creepy but also a little cool to have that feature. I suppose you can talk to your pets or any would be criminals when you are not home. It does have various sensitivity settings and a pet setting so that your pets won't set it off accidentally if you have it armed. Trial and error for these is going to be what it takes to get the right balance so you don't get false alarms. It also has an alarm feature. I do not recommend trying this unless you really are serious about using it. It is painful and it is LOUD. It that were to go off accidentally you would know it. Probably the whole block will know it. It is a high piercing sound. You can set it to alarm for any disturbances OR there is a panic button to use as needed. I will not need this I don't think! Finally, in addition to being able to have more than one cell phone access the same camera, you can also add MORE Guardzilla cameras to the mix. I only have the one so I can't comment on how easy that is to set up or work with but I can't see how it would be difficult.

I got these and they do not stay connected to wifi. I called Gaurdzilla tech support and they finally said to send them back for an exchange. They were 7 days old at the time i returned them. I was told 5 to 6 days turn around. I called after 3 weeks and they said they were waiting for more units. I called at the 5 week point and they said they shipped. I waited till the 6 week point and finally got them back. I set them up and in 1 day they both were offline and would not stay connected. So i called Gaurdzilla and told them what the deal was and the guy asked is it past 30 days since you bought them. And i laughed and said yes because you took 6 weeks to send them back to me. He said sorry if it is past the 30 days He can not give a refund. I said wait a minute, your company is the reason it is past the 30 days and your not going to give my money back? He said with an i dont care voice,,,"thats correct sir". And i said WOW thats amazing. I thought about giving them to someone i know but i do not dislike anyone that much. DO NOT BUY THESE. They are not good. And as you read there customer service stinks. BAD!!! I got Net Gear ARLO cameras and they are perfect and only a few bucks more. I guess i will use these for dummy cameras. Maybe they will work for that.

We were looking forward to using this camera as the design looks great. Saw it had mixed reviews but took a chance. BIG Mistake! Camera stopped working after ! week - spent 2 hours on several calls with their Customer Service and they had no explanation and cannot fix the problem. We were told all cameras have problems - is that a proper response? Also was told the problem would be escalated and we would receive a callback - it never came! Also tried reaching the CEO - TED SIEBENMAN - impossible and Customer Service would not take a message. They also didn't know who he was! We made the mistake of buying the camera before going on a 2 week trip - and it stopped working after 1 day! Received continual error messages that the password was invalid - after no changes were made! Camera then went offline and Customer Service said they couldn't do anything about either problem. We have a Samsung camera in another room and it has never gone offline in 2 years! It was out of stock when we went to buy another one and bought the Guardzilla instead - BIG mistake!

I've had this camera now for almost a year. I use it mostly when I travel to keep tabs on my cats and to know when the pet sitter arrives. The quality of the video is good, and it picks up most of the motions of my cats (I have it set at the maximum sensitivity). This is my first security camera and I'm pleased with it. I've had no issues with connecting it, and the only time I couldn't view footage was after there was a power outage. Then I had to unplug and replug in the camera and my wifi router when I got home, and it worked fine after that. I also like that I don't have to subscribe to anything and that I can use a microSD card to store video on. I think the only feature that is irritating to me is that the talk and listen feature is not two-way. You can only listen or talk, not both at the same time. But then again, if you just want to listen in, you don't have to worry about anyone hearing you. Also, this camera doesn't have a mounting system that I'm aware of. My camera sits on my dining room table. You can zoom in on the video feed through the app on the phone, but the camera itself doesn't have any tilt or pan features. Overall, I've been pleased with the camera and I'd recommend it to folks looking for an easy to use indoor camera. At some point, I will probably upgrade to the new 360 camera for my main living area and move this particular camera to a smaller room.

Disappointed about the quality of this item. During the first week of use the LEDs around the lens started to go out. My knowledge of LEDs is that they require low voltages and are a very unlikely item to burn out UNLESS they are cheaply made. All the new cars have LEDs in them and they are designed to last. A friend of mine who manufactures electronic items went over the details comparing one manufacturer to another. He went over one electrical part and compared it in quality to another. Long story short.....if this camera has LEDs burning out the first week of use? What else is built cheap inside? I took it back. I bought a Samsung Smartcam HD plus....yes it was more expensive but the quality is far superior than the guardzilla. I said WOW what a difference...others who saw the difference agreed the Samsung was WAY Better. I have to say though....I liked the guardzilla app for the phone better than the Samsung. Guardzilla had a smoother user friendly interface.Both cameras had a microsim slot, motion detection and microphone capabilities. Samsung had a barking dog, siren or lullaby you could set enable. Samsung had sound only recording detection as an option too. This new smart home/phone technology is great! I believe some 5 star reviews about the coolness of the this technology rather than a comparison with other cameras. Get this one and another one...then you will know.

I bought one camera at Best Buy and another at Walmart. Set up on my IPhone 6s went fairly smooth and for nearly two months I was pleased that I could monitor my house and man cave from practically anyplace I had cell service. I have T Mobile. Then for reasons in known, I had nothing away from home. Just "buffering". Since I like you, bought the cameras for the good feeling of seeing that all is well since you left home. I lost that feeling over two months ago! I have been on hold with Guardzilla support so many times from home and on the road that the stupid elevator music sometimes plays in my head for hours after waiting on line so long, so many times. Every possible excuse that can be imagined, and some you cant, have been given me. For a while all I was told was the problem was "definitely due to the last IPhone update". And they had a work around for it, but for what ever reason, it was not ready or working or something. Guardzilla support told me they had tried everything possible and that I was being "upgraded" to major technical support that would call an try some other magical, worthless, thing and failing that they would replace my cameras. Never heard a word! If what they said was true, looks like a lot of people with IPhone 6's and junk Guardzilla cameras would be calling. Pass these over priced and over rated junk piles by!