Panasonic Network Camera and Pet Cam (BLC1A)

Reviews of Panasonic Network Camera and Pet Cam (BLC1A)

1.) Great for Home Security
Reviewed by: Rob Kansas City, MO
Rating:
I recently bought 2 BL-C1A's and 1 Panasonic Remote Video Monitoring Webcam (BL-C10A) , the big difference according to the specs is the BL-C10A can pan/tilt, the BL-C1A can't. The BL-C10A is double the price of the BL-C1A thou. But after setting up all 3 cameras I was surprised to find out the BL-C1A's have sensitivity settings for the motion detection feature, and they work Great! The BL-C10A is missing the ability to adjust the motion sensitivity. Another difference I noticed was the BL-C1A handles low light better, althought it says both handle low light the same the images on the BL-C1A seem brighter in low light.

Setting the cameras up to see each other was easy and now i can remote in and see all 3 camera's at the same time. I have sensors setup on all 3 and they work great. Now when I am at work I can alway check on my house and my family. I have images emailed to me everytime the motion sensors go off. I have also tested the image to cell phone feature and it does work fine but even with a good phone its sometime hard to see the images on a phone. Email works best in my opinion, and sense most phones can check email you can still get to the image they are just not scaled down to a phone size.

I highly recommend this camera especialy if you want to use it for motion sensing. If you must have pan/tilt the BL-C10A is also great but you lose some control on the motion sensor sensitivity.



2.) Great Product!
Reviewed by: Goldens-rule
Rating:
This has been a wonderful product. We just got a 1 month old Golden Retriever puppy, and it's been a complete blast to be able to login from the office or my cell phone to see what the little guy is up to. My friends and co-workers keep stopping by to get a look.

It was extremely easy to set up, only took a few minutes and I had the camera up and running. Much easier then I expected for a fairly new technology. The motion detection and zoom make it a complete winner, and all for under $100.


3.) My BLC1A review after 2+ years use...
Reviewed by: E. Bush Dallas TX
Rating:
We use these in our retail store. We need motion detection for nighttime and snapshots during the open hours, the ability to push the images offsite quickly, and the ability to snag live snapshots from our web server via our blackberry phones, and connect directly via the internet.

This camera does it all at a really good price, especially if you look at other commercial solutions. Not a single problem with the stability of the camera, after 2+ years!!! The power supplies last about 2 years it seems, I have 3 cameras and I've replaced 2 supplies in the past month (no big deal, they are $15 at Fryes.)

They are small and not noticed by customers, since our walls are white. I have noticed other businesses are using them also (the local hooters!).

I used the provided software on an XP machine to give them an initial IP address and password, from there on, it's all via their web interface. Getting live snapshots is simply a matter of finding the right URL to use, and with some digging on Panasonic's site, you'll find a CGI/Developer manual that spells it all out, technically, but very thorough. The FTP (outbound from camera) setup seemed a bit tough at first but a bit of playing and I got it working.

Can't fault the camera or Panasonic. This is a really good value, and if youre a bit technical, you may really find this camera lets you do a lot of complex stuff like notification and web site integration for cheap!

Panasonic dropped their web service I think. I dont use it anyhow. And the IE requirement is only for the ActiveX control, which allows a pseudo zoom/pan feature anyhow. Other browsers work fine.

Get em before Panasonic decides to drop them for the next 'improved' model! It's about time for that to happen, they have been out on the market for a while.

-=RB

4.) Excellent easy to setup netcam
Reviewed by: CH
Rating:
The camera works as described with very good image quality and easy setup. The included free dynamic DNS service makes setting up the camera for Internet access a lot easier than other cameras. It took me about 15 mins. to install it even though I had to do a manual setup. I have the AT&T DSL 2Wire router and I had no problems viewing the camera from the Internet. One needs to add the camera as an "application" in the router to open port 80 for it.

One feature missing is a convenient privacy or on/off button on the camera.




5.) No need for Windows - works fine with Mac OS X
Reviewed by: btp USA
Rating:
I have a Mac network, with an Airport, so I was a little worried about setting up the camera. Turns out it was a 3 minute job. The instructions provided by Robert Hoare (earlier review) are mostly correct, except for one important detail: if the camera gets it's initial IP address from your router (via DHCP), it could get any available IP address. Robert said it would default to xxx.xxx.xxx.253. Mine was issued 192.168.0.91. So in my case, the URL for setup was as follows:

[...]

Just type that into your browser and you are up and running. But the trick is finding the correct IP address. On a different network, the camera will probably get a different IP address. With the Airport, you can go to the setup and get the list of connected devices -- I think most routers have a similar feature. Worst case, it would just take a few minutes to run through every possibility, 2-255. Once you connect to the web server that's built into the camera, and set the username/password, you can set a static IP address and whatever else you want to set up. It has a whole bunch of other features. No worries.

Another important detail: I was setting up the BL-C210A, but I suspect they are all similar in this respect.

6.) Great Camera - Uverse is Challenging
Reviewed by: R. Bell Outside Chicago, IL USA
Rating:
Was able to set up the camera locally in no time at all. Turns out AT&T Uverse is a pain in the backside. I finally had to call into Panasonic support and they were great. Took about 15 minutes for them to walk me through a new setup. I had already spent 2 nights trying to configure the firewall on my own but they pointed out I had to change the setup in the camera as well.

To make this work you need to go to setup tab
choose static connection mode
change port number to 5000
for mine IP Address 192.168.1.253
subnet mask 255.255.255.0
default gateway 192.168.1.254
DNS server 1 192.168.1.254
DNS server 2 4.2.2.1

You will then need to go to the firewall of your router and setup an egress rule for the device using port 5000. This worked for me and I can now access the camera from anywhere.

I further setup up limited user access. For this you need to go to "administer" and choose "Do not permit access from guest users"

Then you go to "general user" tab and create the user account that you want to allow to access the camera. I set mine up to only allow "guests" to access the camera M-F 8a-6p. That was pretty easy to figure out as well.

Finally, if you want to buffer the images you can set that up on the "trigger" tab. I chose to just have it store the images in the camera at 1 per minute and get just over 4 hours that I can replay. I am playing with trying to get it to email tonight.

If you have AT&T then I hope these settings work for you. If not (or if you have any other problems) I highly advise you call Panasonic support before you give up. They are great and did not take too much time.

Update - 1-27-10
I struggled with the email settings for a while running multiple tests. Only after some time on the internet did I find an article detailing how to set up webcams to email. I found an excellent link[...]

However, if you are using [...], Yahoo you are probably out of luck b/c the camera does not support SSL login. My ISP is ATT and that defaults over to [...] so I am out of luck on both my accounts. Will poke around to see if I can find another way.

7.) BLC1A is a great, cheap camera
Reviewed by: Johnny Dyer Rural US
Rating:
BLC1A is a great, cheap camera. Easy to set up, good quality picture for the money. Didn't install any software. Configured via web browser. Camera uses DHCP, but substitutes .253 for the last three digits of the IP address. For most home users, just copy the IP address of your PC, and substitute .253 for the last 3. Built in software will ask you to create an administrator access account. If you mess up, or move to a different network, just press the reset button on the side and start over. To enable access over the internet, you must consult your router/firewall documentation to use port forwarding.

8.) Works great!
Reviewed by: Neil Quinn San Diego, CA USA
Rating:
The unit works as advertised. it gives you 320x240 or 640x480 resolution and is perfect for monitoring a room of people or pets.

9.) Exellent camera
Reviewed by: Moises Venezuela
Rating:
This is an exellent camera , i used for look my children in house from my office,
i have four of them and recommend to everybody

from Venezuela
Moises .

10.) It is Great
Reviewed by: Jeffry L. Martin
Rating:
I bought another company's Net Camera but it was not easy to setup. Then I read the reviews for this camera and figured I would give it a try. It was very EASY to set-up. I was watching my house on the internet in 15 minutes. I like it so much I am buying another for the back door.

11.) Worth the money!
Reviewed by: Christopher M. Blount San Antonio, TX USA
Rating:
This camera works really well. I have been using the D-Link 900 series cameras for years but this camera is a breath of fresh air. It's very easy to setup. It will stream video to just about any web browser. It will also stream motion video to the iPhone!

Night video is very clear for a camera in this price range. It will pickup any object in very low light conditions. Much better than the D-Link cameras.

The buffering feature is awesome. You can set the camera to take one snapshot every minute giving you the ability to view a time lapse video of the past 4 hours (320X240) or 2 hours (640X480). Have it point outside and it makes a very cool video of clouds changing shapes.

Excellent camera and well worth the price.

12.) customer support via telephone is excellent
Reviewed by: jt
Rating:
I have 2 of these cameras, and the installation of just one camera is fairly straightforward if moderately complex. Adding a second camera was more challenging, but this is just about as easy as it can possibly be. The best part so far is the technical support available via the 800-number at 800-211-7262. I have used the phone support 3 times and spoke with 3 different representatives. Each one was professional, patient, courteous, and very familiar with the product. If you're wondering whether you can set up this camera, you can do it. (and if you can't, the support representatives will get you the help you need.)
Picture quality is better than i expected, and the video isn't as choppy as i thought it might be.
Ability to view your pet via cell phone is this product's best feature, in my opinion.
Highly recommend!


13.) Very good value.
Reviewed by: reviewer
Rating:
I bought this before I went on a 2 month vacation to India. It has served its purpose very well. The setup was easy (but, be sure to forward ports 50000, 50001 and so on...from your router to the IP of the appropriate network camera) and setting up the timers and motion detectors is easy as well. I made it upload the snapshots to ftp site and once a week, I download to my Mac and use one of the photo slideshow applications to skim through all the photos to see what happened.

For apporx $90, its worth the price.

14.) Home Cam
Reviewed by: Magilla Pennsylvania
Rating:
I have a severe water problem in my basement, with this camera I can watch my basement condition from my office. I have 2 other Panasonic cameras and I have found them very easy to use and set up. I would recomend the Panasonic brand of cameras to anyone who has "some" computer experience. Excellent picture quality for the money and really easy to set up. They do almost set themselves up. Way to go Panasonic a real winner!!!!

15.) I use these at my vacation rentals
Reviewed by: Jason Miller, Weekend Oasis Vacation Rentals Linden, VA
Rating:
I own a few vacation rentals and I couldn't live without these cameras! I point them on the driveway so I can keep an eye on things and check weather conditions. For the house with highspeed, I use the live video feature. I also setup motion detection to upload photos to my FTP server for photo monitoring and in the event something happens at the property, I have stored photos. For another rental in the high mountains of rural Virginia, with NO high speed, I only use the FTP upload feature for still photos. It works perfectly through a HughesNet satellite internet connection. I love these cams!

16.) Setup a breeze, excellent image
Reviewed by: Vegas user NJ United States
Rating:
Compared to previous webcams I've setup, this was a breeze. No fooling around assigning and re-assigning IP addresses and still not having them work. It took about 10 minutes to fully setup. I set it up to view over the internet using the [...] "service" that the software points you to. This was a little confusing, as it asks you to setup an account, so I assumed when I go to the url, that I need to input the username and password for [...] but it was really the camera's username and password that it wanted. It only took a few minutes to figure this out. The setup was very easy and I never had to login in the router to open any ports, everything was taken care of by the installation software. fyi, I am on FIOS.

The picture quality is really very good for $78. I plan on picking up a few more of these, or the wireless version.

17.) NICE camera and very fair price.
Reviewed by: Bicycle Guy Syosset, LI, NY, USA
Rating:
A little tricky setting up over the net and multiple cameras; had to get tech support's aid, because documentation STUNK. BUT they got me going. Great image now and great price.

18.) Great Idea
Reviewed by: Em Los Angeles, CA USA
Rating:
I love this camera because I'm able to easily monitor my home and my dog, from my laptop or even my cell phone. The setup was easy BUT I had to go download more info from the Panasonic website, because the instructions are really confusing. It's quite simple, but they make it confusing. Otherwise, great, totally worth it for my peace of mind with my pet.

19.) WORKS BETTER THAN EXPECTED
Reviewed by: Lisa Steiner Philadelphia
Rating:
This is an EASY cheap way to check in on your baby/sitter. FORGET it if your a mac user. I have two macs and 1 PC on my network, after an hour reading the Mac directions here I gave up. Took 5 minutes to set it up with the cd on the PC. After set up YES you can see it online, log in online anywhere to see it, even tried on an iphone. The night time feature is not so hot so I set up a small 15 watt light in the baby's room and it was a-ok :) I purchased a 2nd camera and it does not want to go live online, have to give panasonic a call to see what's what. The free service they give is awesome for going live online but I'm not sure if you can use it with multiple cameras. I have to say it was worth every penny when you look at what some of these cameras can cost.

20.) No need for Windows or Internet Explorer, it's a Network Camera
Reviewed by: Robert Hoare
Rating:
The BL-C1A is listed as "requiring" both Windows and Internet Explorer. After a bit of experimenting, it seems it doesn't, and is perfectly usable with Ubuntu (or indeed any OS) and Firefox. No need for Windows at all.

So, for anybody else who wants to use the BL-C1A camera with something other than Windows here's how.

First, ignore the shiny Windows CDROM in the box. Plug the camera into your router with your own network cable (they don't supply one!) and plug in the power supply. Wait a minute. If your router is 192.168.0.1, the camera should default to 192.168.0.253 (or 192.168.1.253 for a 192.168.1.1 router, etc).

From Firefox on the local network just go to the IP addess of the camera (as above) followed by ?mode=local and you should get the camera's built in web server. (The mode=local is essential, to activate it). Create an admin userid/password, hit enter. That's it.

Configuring the cameras for static addresses, different ports etc is all done via the web interface after that point, so still doesn't need Windows or IE in any way.

With a few lines written in the manual they could drop the Windows/IE requirement.

Camera works very nicely, and so does emailing, and the viewnetcam dynamic dns service (after a bit of a battle with router settings). One warning: you can't test the viewnetcam service from the same network that the camera is on, so before you think it's not working try it from elsewhere!

Camera does the job fine for the price, one point deducted for not having any non-Windows installation instructions.

21.) Impressive for the price
Reviewed by: M. Flocco Austin, TX, USA
Rating:
I was impressed with the quality of this camera for the price. I am currently using it as a remote baby monitor. It was cheaper than the video monitors they sell for babies, and it's more versatile once I"m done using it for that purpose. The best part of it is the back end functionality, but overall it's a nice camera. Some points:

1. Triggers - you can set the camera up to send photos via email or FTP whenever motion is sensed, or at a regular interval. I'm saving photos on my web server whenever the baby moves (with 10 minutes between each snapshot), and then I have a job that creates a time-lapse movie at the end of each day. Useful? Not really, but pretty cool regardless.

2. Web Server - The web server is solid, includes authentication, and is easy to configure for inexperienced users.

3. Image quality - The image quality during the day is surprisingly good - but remember, this isn't a large lens camera, it's a webcam. Don't expect your 640x480 images to look like they were taken with your digital camera. Instead, think camera phone but slightly better. Certainly good enough. Motion video is impressive. I don't know how it looks from a bandwidth perspective, but I'm guessing the wireless version of this camera would be comparable. "Color Night Vision" is a joke, though. It does adjust surprisingly well in low-light conditions, but overall you need light. If you have a very dim room, the image is literally black.

Again, overall I'm impressed with the camera and feel it's a good value.

22.) Great camera for the price, but helps to be technical
Reviewed by: cj San Jose, CA USA
Rating:
Hunting for a networked camera to use to check on our cats, this one turned out to be a good balance of cost and performance.

Initial setup was a breeze and the camera was quickly up and running. Hooking into the free web service to allow us to view from any internet connection wasn't as easy. Taking the Microft-ian approach, if the hardware plays well with your software, things work smoothly and you're ready to go. If it DOESN'T, you're on your own.

I admit I did NOT call for tech support, choosing to try things out myself first.

First, I'm not great at networking or the terminology used. The manual tells you to set up your router for IP Forwarding on the port you use. Not familiar with what exactly IP Forwarding means, I simply opened the port on my router for this device, and that seems to have done it.

Since the automatic account creation for the free account failed as well, it was only by accident that I discovered that this could be accessed via the 'Dynamic DNS' option on the Setup tab (hope this saves someone some time).

So, after all was done, I'm now able to keep an eye on the cats (and watch them dance across the table they're not supposed to be on), and with a clearance Powerline ethernet system, can set up the camera anywhere I can find a pair of power outlets.

And, perhaps the greatest indicator of my satisfaction: a second camera is on the way to me.



23.) Good, small package with some limitations
Reviewed by: Ray Stoecklin New York, NY United States
Rating:
I recently had something damaged ($$$$) in my apartment and both cleaning lady and Super denied involvement, so I figured that at least going forward I should be smart about my stuff. I was looking for a "small" surveillance solution ("small" in size, effort, running cost, intrusion, and wallet), and so far, the Panasonic seems to fit my bill. Details:

HARDWARE:

This device has a somewhat odd shape which, together with the bright white enclosure makes it stand out a little too much for my taste, especially if you planned to discretely put it on a bookshelf. Inside the (easily openable) enclosure, you'll find a single square motherboard where the actual camera is soldered onto. Bummer for those DIY-ers who perhaps hoped to separate the cam from the board in order to conceal it in a stuffed animal or something. The camera has a power led which to my surprise is software- controllable: it can be on, off, or on while recording.

The camera sensor itself is very tiny. From the picture it looks like you'll get 1/2" worth of camera, but most of it is ornaments (like space to prominently print "digital zoom network camera") and the CCD is no bigger than in a cheap cellphone. With that small a sensor, I would have hoped that Panasonic forewent the color filter and make the camera black&white, which would have increased sharpness and light sensitivity, but clearly engineering folded to the marketing department here. Also, the field of view seems quite narrow to me - surveillance should be as wide- angled as possible, even at the expense of detail. Finally, the resolution of the sensor is low (640x480), yet the digital noise is high. I'm subtracting 1 star for not putting in a better or more specialized camera.


SOFTWARE:

This product comes with some PC software, but frankly I haven't touched it after reading a the other reviews here. You can set up the camera entirely with a web browser once you figured out the address. As for making the surveillance available on the net, it is no different than exposing a web server using dyndns.org.

The in-camera software is better than I expected. I addition to some camera preferences like brightness, etc. you can set days/hours of
operation, and register other cameras so you can view them all on one screen. On the actual life view screen you can specify the refresh interval or "motion" to save on bandwith when you're monitoring remotely. In addition to live viewing, the unit can also buffer or transfer pictures. This works as follows: you have five "triggers", which can be configured independantly. For each trigger, you can specify hours of operation, how it's triggered (interval or motion), how many pictures to process, how long to wait to retrigger and whether to save them to internal memory, or transfer them via email or ftp. I find this concept very versatile yet understandable. The internal buffer is very small though, holds barely 90 pictures in lowres(!).

On the minus side regarding the software, the translation is sometimes challenging, especially in important sections. For example, there are two sliders on the motion detection tab, the explanation reading: "Threshold: Adjust the threshold. If the threshold is set low, this software sensitively detects changes. Sensitivity: If you set sensitivity high, amplitude of motion detection bar gets jumpy.". I assume these sliders are meant to configure the camera so it doesn't take your small pet for an intruder, but good luck figuring those out! Also, you cannot define any dead zones for motion detection. However, the firmware is upgradeable, so perhaps these things will improve.

This would be a 5-star device if it wasn't for the weak and narrow- angled camera. The only two ways to go up from here though are to either shell out four times as many dollares for an Axis megapixel camera or buy a good webcam for the same price as this panasonic and then use surveillance software on an always-on PC.

24.) Great Camera
Reviewed by: Michael Louisiana
Rating:
I have two of these cameras and they do a great job monitoring the front and rear of my house. I acutally have them outside, under the porch, though they aren't made for outdoors. We'll see how well they work when the temp drops this winter... I have them set to e-mail images while we are gone. havent' been able to get the viewing over the internet to work yet, but I think it's a router issue. Worth every penny...

25.) Nice quality for price
Reviewed by: M. Marks Up North, USA
Rating:
I'm using the BLC-1A as part of my home security system. I first bought the D-link dsc-900. The Panasonic has a higher quality feel to it when holding it in your hand. The picture quality is quite a bit better as well. Setup was simply and worked well on both my mac and xp box. I will be ordering 4 more.

26.) Panasonic Pet CAm BLC1A
Reviewed by: Heather Ramsey
Rating:
I thought the camera worked great. The set up was not difficult but be aware you will need to purchase a router and a cat 5 cable if you do not have one.

27.) Great Little Camera
Reviewed by: mountain man Butler, TN USA
Rating:
The Panasonic BLC1A was easy to install in my Local Area Network and produces clear pictures even in dim lit (not dark) rooms. The motion on the video is of course, delayed a little but better than I expected. I especially like the option to email pictures at chosen intervals. The directions to view the camera output over the internet is confusing. I am network and Internet literate but still have not managed to view the output over the Internet.

28.) Excellent Value
Reviewed by: Nitpicker San Antonio
Rating:
For the price, the picture quality is very good. Installation and use over a local LAN is simple. Setup for viewing over the internet is more complex and can be frustrating if you have never done it. I use a free dynamic dns service for other cameras I own. I simply added this camera as a new host onto the existing account which provides for the port forwarding. For myself, I used the provided Panny software to manually setup a STATIC IP with the port I wanted to use. I have an ATT Yahoo DSL 2wire router which then must be accessed to allow access to the Petcam's selected port. This is pretty much a pain, but once you do it once, it takes about 10 minutes.

For convenience, I ran a powerline ethernet adapter from my 2wire modem. I can use the Petcam from pretty much any location with a plug for a powerline adapter and the power supply for the camera. Low light capability for this camera is pretty good. Again, for the price, this is a very good camera.

29.) Simple and gets the job done
Reviewed by: D. McCartney MA, USA
Rating:
This camera does what it claims. I'm using two of them to monitor the outside of a vacation home and am just pointing them out the window. They work perfectly. Easy to set up, easy to use, and it provides a decent if not great picture. Setting up a second one was a bit harder, but only because the instructions were vague. But calling support provided the info I needed (support was excellent, although it took a long time to get to the right person). I've also set up the system to FTP a picture every 30 seconds to a web site so that others can see our view as well as FTP a picture that get's saved every seconds so I have a record I can look back on should there ever be a need. A month of images hasn't even filled 10% of my 1 GB of space on my ISPs alloted disk space. Yes it helps if you have used FTP and generally understand how your router works to get it all working, but skin deep knowledge will get you through - probably on your own or certainly with the telephone support (which even has weekend hours). Even with no knowledge, you should be able to get it working. For me, I had it working in about 10 minutes. The only hard part is pulling a wire to where you want to set your camera.

30.) Good bang for the buck!
Reviewed by: jr MS
Rating:
Pretty dang good quality for $85.00. You can afford to buy multiple cameras later down the road at this price. Unfortunately, the DVR software that comes with the camera will not export a compressed MPEG video unless you purchase it for $350.00. All recordings will remain locally on your hard drive.

31.) I'm a picky person.
Reviewed by: E. Mattar CA , USA
Rating:
Setting up this camera was hard. I had to call customer support for it.
They were patient and nice and made it work.
Thanks.

.

32.) This is the low-end version in Panasonic's lineup
Reviewed by: tomk1 Brookeville, MD
Rating:
This is the 2nd network camera I've purchased from Panasonic. The first I purchased about 6 months ago, and it is the Panasonic BL-C131A, which I rated very highly (and is discontinued).

This one isn't quite as good, but it's also less than half the price. Let's talk about what it doesn't do:
1) This is a wired camera only (obvious from the description)
2) There is no ability to remotely swivel the lens (which is obvious from the pictures)
3) It does not do sound
4) Some software options are missing, the one that I find frustrating is the time-stamp on photos which lets you immediately see when they were taken
5) The motion sensing is significantly less sensitive and you have to fiddle with settings to get it to work.

It makes up for it in that the mounting bracket is nicely designed and was easily screwed into the top of window frame with two supplied screws. It also looks decent, and not too "techy".

But for the money, all things considered, it's a great choice.

Here's my tip if you buy this: Don't use the software supplied with it. It's useless.

Instead, plug it into your internal network and type this into a browser:

[...]

Very first time only! It will prompt you to create an ID & Password

After that, access it by typing:
[...]

It does include the [...] DDNS service and uPnP (Free for Panasonic customers), which makes setting up your router a breeze and sets up the correct URL for you to access the router from outside your firewall.

I wish this camera had more features, but for the price, I'm willing to live with the compromise over the more expensive Panasonic camera.

33.) Inexpensive and works
Reviewed by: George VW Palm Harbor FL
Rating:
Setup went quite easy. Works as promised. Getting harder to find a wired (not wireless) camera that can be used where wireless is verbotten.

34.) Fun Little Camera
Reviewed by: Mariah Lytle
Rating:
It was easy to set up, not so easy to view the cam from anywhere else but home. Took 4 days to get everything up and running and included several calls to tech support from panasonic as well as my internet provider. Didn't like all the things I had to do to set it up but once it was all was well. The picture is pretty good and always updated. However they said you could view it from a moblie phone and I have yet to find one that will actually display the live camera feed. Also, this model does not come with an ethernet cable.

35.) Good Camera ..bad manual
Reviewed by: Kennedy De Silva
Rating:
Bought this camera and got it installed in no time. Camera images are clean, and low light images are very good. That surprised me giving the price. It's totally configurable by web browser, and I've adjusted settings and viewed images via explorer 7 and fire fox.

The issues I have with this camera is its documentation and remote access over the net. Documentation is weak and if you run into config problems......you're dead. Unless you are versed in network configuration etc. I thought I was until I came across this camera....boy that took awhile. Accessing it over the internet requires configuring my router to allow port forwarding etc.

As for getting emails..?....I've yet to get one with images. The only emails I obtain is its reports of how many pix it takes everyday. I really wish that I have better support somewhere for this side and I would be fine.

But again, over the local lan...its great.

36.) Beware of ATT 2wire router
Reviewed by: yosemite yosemite
Rating:
The unit was very easy to get working and configure but I could never get it to work with the 2Wire Router that comes standard on all ATT/ Yahoo DSL accounts. The 2Wire Router does not support UDP so you can not view the images on the internet through the free provided service. There was a supposed work around for the 2Wire but after a lot of time with tech I could never get it to work.

It did work fine when viewed on the local network but some of the feature options seemed to lock up and I had to reboot it to be able to change them.

37.) Using my Apple wireless router.
Reviewed by: Donald W. Jacobson North Branford, CT
Rating:
The camera does a good job, hooks into my wireless home network, but I still haven't been able to see it online, appears to be a problem with the Apple wireless router and the camera's format or something. Not quite sure how to make it work. Since it has worked on my home network, I am not sure why I can't get it to work online too.

38.) Check your router before buying
Reviewed by: J. Jackson GA
Rating:
The major issue I've had in trying to get this camera to be accessible from the internet is that it requires UPnP. The manual isn't much help and the camera controls aren't well translated. I don't know much about networking, but it looks like I'm going to have to piggyback routers in order for this to work properly. Simply typing in your router model followed by "UPnP" in google should give you the info you need.

39.) Power supplies die too easily
Reviewed by: just a guy San Francisco, CA USA
Rating:
The camera is a good camera for the money, and I own three of these, and a couple Axis cameras ( see Axis 0199024 206 Surveillance Cameras Bundle) which are way better, but three times the price. The Panasonic is good bang for the buck, especially if the lighting is decent.

However, of the 3 cameras I own, two of the first ones I bought have already had their PQLV206 power supplies die. :-( Although to be fair: I've had power supply failures with the Axis cameras too; although Axis had great support and replaced them all with an upgraded version for free even after the cameras were out of warranty.

40.) Day good, Night So So...
Reviewed by: Music Lover Michigan
Rating:
I picked this up new but clearance at office depot for $24, plugged into my router, setup the software, enabled upnp as directed but still get failure messages when trying to view thru the web, customer service is clueless, no email response either.

The recording feature works and I can view the cam (just not remotely thru the net yet) daytime shots are pretty decent, the zoom pixels things up but overall gives a nice front parking area view of my home. Night time is well, so so, you can see but its pretty grainy even zoomed out to full picture.

Certainly worth the $24 I paid, have gone thru the books and searched google still cant get that upnp error to go away (and i do have upnp enabled on router).

If you need this for a place that has lighting go for it, check office depots too since i scored this one for $24 recently there.

Bill :)

41.) glad I got it on special
Reviewed by: BklynBabe
Rating:
For me, using XP, it was easy to set up. I was able to view from the internet also but then something went wrong and I had to reset it and now I cannot view it from the internet, only local access. I bought it because I have a sneaky child and I busted him being bad not even 10 minutes after setup LOL. I spy with my lil eye! There is no "night vision"; it works well in the day, and you can't see a thing in the dark. That is not good for me because half of what I need to watch is that he will go to sleep when he is supposed to. I also wish it had pan/tilt, so obviously I will need to upgrade. But for the basic purpose it does well and I do like that it records! I can also see the dog LOL! She's sneaky too. For $50 gold deal, it was a good bargain. It was supposed to be "silver" though and it looks white to me.

42.) For a seasoned Mac user, this was a difficult install; better systems exist that are easier to install
Reviewed by: A. C. YAN Philadelphia, PA United States
Rating:
I purchased this as a baby monitor/nanny cam. The video quality is not bad, but the installation on my Mac required me to run it via a PC emulator (I tried both Parallels and VMware Fusion). The manual did not provide adequate instructions for me to get it to work, but Panasonic's phone support line was very helpful in providing assistance.

The main issue I have with this device was that in order to use it, I had to downgrade the network security on my home system to WEP since the Panasonic system is not compatible with WPA. I was uncomfortable with this and ended up ditching this in favor of the Mobicam. Then, realized that the Mobicam install wasn't easy on a Mac and the video quality was very poor.

In the end, I ended up spending a little more for a system that was much easier and more robust - the Wilife (Logitech) system. This system uses a hidden camera within a clock, took 15 minutes to set up (using either Mac with PC emulation or the inexpensive PC I got for this purpose), is easy to expand up to 6 cameras, and didn't require me to compromise security on my network. It also records and shows me when activity occurred within the camera's field of view. It just doesn't have sound, but the video quality and ease of use were excellent for this system.

43.) IT is not so great
Reviewed by: rcswrc San Jose, Costa Rica
Rating:
Well in performance I don't think it is a big deal, but I'm comparing it with an axis 206. For it's price it is ok, at least if it is all that matters, but I rather prefer an axis camera.

Pros:
nice look
price

Cons:
not so high fps
not so well quality of image(but ok for it's price)

And about the software, I don't know, I don't use it.

Conclusion:
If you just want it for monitorig not so big areas it will do the job, and about it's zoom not a big deal.Just remember that it is cheap!!!!

44.) A bit misleading
Reviewed by: Notalawyer Atlanta, GA
Rating:
The camera works as advertised, but I find the advertisement(s) to be a hint misleading. I wanted to set the camera up, have it buffer the images locally, and I would then plug it back into my router at the end of the day and review the images.
1. The camera requires a network connection to boot up/initialize. Since it's not wireless, that means a wired connection to a router must be present at all times in order for the camera to operate.
2. The onboard cache of the camera is tiny, so storing images locally is not a viable option anyway.

So, again, the camera works as advertised and perhaps I simply purchased the wrong tool for the job. However, when they wrote that no local computer was necessary, I mistakenly assumed that (also) meant no constantly connected network. I'm off to buy a (much longer) Cat5/6 network cable.

45.) automatic setup is not too easy
Reviewed by: mim Bogota, Colombia
Rating:
the camera does not work with my router, the setup is not easy ...

46.) BL-C1A-S set-up on Mac Pro OS X 10.5 Leopard?
Reviewed by: PhotoLogic.com Minneapolis, MN USA
Rating:
Sorry, not network savvy. Anyone help here?

Thanx in advance for your help.

Customer service walked me through connectivity problems.
Works fine now. WooHoo!

47.) Good Camera - Lacks SSL
Reviewed by: Matt Jacksonville, FL
Rating:
This camera was easy to set up without the need of the set up disc. All you need is a web browser (see other reviews). You should note that if the camera's ability to send e-mails is important to you, it does NOT support SSL. Most e-mail providers now require SSL to be able to send e-mail, so if your does, this camera will not work for you. I returned the camera.

48.) can't make it work correctly
Reviewed by: beancat159
Rating:
The camera is very nice, and was easy to install and be able to view on my home computer. However, it is supposed to be able to be viewed over the internet from other computers or from internet enabled cell phones. I have spent hours trying to make it work. I downloaded manuals for the camera, for my router and anything else I could think of. I emailed Panasonic, Verizon, and the camera web service and nothing has worked, so I have given up.

49.) Not so good
Reviewed by: scott10169
Rating:
Takes pretty good pictures in good light. Low light performance is pretty bad and the only avaiable format is mjpeg which is pretty bandwidth intenstive. Frame rate is also pretty low.



50.) Not for automation - good for on-demand preview
Reviewed by: Nidiya Gaspar
Rating:
1) Automatic Setup does not work in Windows XP. It never completes. Defaults to static ip connection. It is easy to setup manually. 2) IE friendly. No zoom functionality on Firefox 3) Inherent problem with camera taking pictures. Camera periodically delivers a snapshot in greenish filter and hence considers it a motion . This is a camera problem. This affects both built-in motion detection and Motion software in Linux. Another issue is that sometimes the snapshot crops top 20 rows of pixels and appends that at the bottom of the images. This also triggers a motion. Due to this, you get bogus motion alerts. Hence, it is not worth for security automation. Bottom line: waste of money

51.) waste of money
Reviewed by: Rabin Caven Temple City, CA United States
Rating:
well, this cam has a clear view, but it generates video as flipping pictures. The proxy server settings didn't work for me, so it's totally useless after all. And for motion sensor feature, even if the cam detects something and recorded the event, you'll unlikely to identify what's in it, images will get blurry if the object is moving

52.) confusing internet setup
Reviewed by: Doon Eng
Rating:
i wanted a camera that could email photos but this camera will not go out through the router and the manual setup , to punch a hole thru router is confusing.

53.) DO NOT BUY Motion detection does not work!
Reviewed by: Averatec owner Ohio USA
Rating:
Generates video with 3 second stills. Motion detection generates hundreds of blank files along with the ones that have motion. The setup of the camera went pretty quick. The web site setup went smoothly.
The product is useless. Software in the camera does not work and/or is poorly designed. It will not buffer images. Motion detection does not have a hot zone. Client viewing software motion detection places hundreds of small null files in the directory. Every 10 seconds. So there is no good way to quickly view motion files. Video files are in proprietary format so you cannot view them without going to their software. The software is crippled, but you cannot buy an uncrippled version. Are you serious that you could actually ship software this bad with a product. It's worse than a joke. I'll never trust the brand again.

54.) Crappy webcam should work on any computer - it is the 21st century!
Reviewed by: Felter32 Philly burbs
Rating:
I'm so mad at this thing. Even mac gurus could not help me to get this thing working. I thought that it could be accessed just like any other IP device, and hacked into working, but this thing would not work with my fios router. It was so frustrating to find out that the valentines gift for my wife was nothing more than a paperweight.

55.) Don't Buy This Product
Reviewed by: L. Mclane
Rating:
When you try to set up this pet cam it looks like it will work great. Then, when you try to set it up through Panasonic's system, it is impossible. After spending several hours on the phone with "tech support" I gave up and sent the item back. It's sad when a large corporation like Panasonic can't
even make the set up through their system work. Don't waste your time and money on this product!

L. McLane

Features of Panasonic Network Camera and Pet Cam (BLC1A)

Package Contents:
Panasonic BL-C1A Wired Network Camera, bracket, power supply, mounting hardware, CD-ROM, software and instructions.

The Panasonic BL-C1A Wired Network Camera handles your digital photography needs at a price that won't hurt your wallet! This color surveillance camera allows remote video monitoring of a home or business. Remote home and business surveillance just got a lot more affordable. Receive an e-mail image when the home security camera detects motion--you'll always know what's going on at home or at your business. The 10X digital zoom and color night viewing makes sure you don't miss a detail. It's easy to install, easy to operate and requires no additional software for viewing on your PC. Indoor use only.

Server Features:
Image Buffer--About 250 frames (320 x 240, standard image quality). Image transfer via e-mail (SMTP) or FTP. View snapshots and control them from a compatible cellular phone Supports up to 12 cameras IPv4 Multi-Language Interface - English, German, Spanish, Italian, French and Japanese

Camera Features - 1/4 320,000 pixel CMOS image sensor 10 digital zoom Viewing Angle - 53° horizontal, 41° vertical Auto exposure Aperture - F2.8 Illumination - 10 - 10,000 lux (normal), 4-10,000 lux (night view) Motion Sensor with Email Alert Auto & manual White Balance Network Connection - RJ45 Ethernet (10Base-T/100Base-X) System Requirements - Windows 98SE, 2000, ME and XP; Internet Explorer 6.0 or later Camera Dimensions(WxHxD) - 3-3/8 x 3-3/8 x 1 Weight - 0.22 lbs Networking Protocols - HTTP, FTP, SMTP, TCP, UDP, IP, DHCP, DNS, ARP, ICMP, and POP3 before SMTP

1.) Color Video;
2.) JPEG image compression & video streaming;
3.) Video Resolutions - 640 x 480, 320 x 240, 160 x 120;
4.) Frame Rates (Max.) - 7.5 fps @ 640 x 480; 15 fps @ 320 x 240; 15 fps @ 160 x 120;
5.) Authentication - ID/Password authentication (Administrator / General Users - up to 50);

Package Height x Length x Width: 9.2 in. x 9.2 in. x 7.2 in.
Package Weight: 1.55 lbs.

Accessories for Panasonic Network Camera and Pet Cam (BLC1A)