Reolink Home Hub and Argus PT Ultra
Reolink has long been one of the most popular manufacturers of home and small business security solutions. Their Reolink Home Hub and Reolink Argus PT Ultra product combination is the perfect choice for those looking for a truly wireless, 4K, PTZ and easily expandable camera system. Let’s take a look at what this pair can do, why it’s a good choice and how it can be integrated into a smart home system.
* Direct link to the product page: https://barnab.hu/reolink/hhptultrakit
Reolink Home Hub Combos
Before we get into the details, I thought it was important to point out that multiple combinations are possible. There is no feeling of being locked in, because the combos offered themselves can be expanded thanks to the capabilities of the Home Hub.
The test kit I chose is an ideal first set for almost any home or business in terms of quality and feature list, but let’s see why.
What’s in the BIG box?
When you first open it, you’ll see a package containing five boxes: two cameras, two solar panels, the Home Hub, and an included 64GB memory card.
In the camera box you will find:
- instruction manual, declaration of conformity and drilling guide
- Wall mounting bracket
- A belt holder for anywhere, this is a great accessory
- a wifi antenna
- USB cable and small package of screws/dowels
- Argus PT Ultra camera
In the Home Hub box:
- user manual, declaration of conformity
- DC wall charger
- flat LAN cable
- reset pin
- Home Hub device
And finally in the solar box
- instruction manual, declaration of conformity and drilling guide
- Wall mounting bracket
- A belt mount anywhere, this is still a very good accessory
- Waterproof connector
- solar panel with 4m USB cable
Let’s move on to the details and installation!
Reolink Home Hub
The Home Hub is a small tower-shaped device, white in color, that can be placed almost anywhere. It is responsible for Wifi communication with the cameras, local data storage, and easy management.
On the outside, on the front, there is a status light indicating the status of our device, on the back there is a power supply, a LAN connection to our local area network (WAN), a built-in speaker and 2 microSD card slots.
He is our smart hub to which we can add several different devices from the Reolink range, a modern NVR that we can access from our phone. It is easy and beginner-friendly to install and use, but let’s try it out together!
Technically
- Local smart NVR, records regardless of the internet
- Connection of up to 8 cameras (Wifi, PoE and doorbell can also be used based on the compatibility list)
- Supports 2*512GB MicroSD cards
- Wifi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax (Wifi6)
- 2.4 / 5 GHz
- Customizable Wifi settings
- 10/100 WAN port
- AES-128 encryption option
About our camera
- MicroSD or Home hub storage option
- 1/2.7″ CMOS sensor
- 3840 x 2160 (8Mpixel) image quality at 15 fps
- 355′ and 140′ horizontal and vertical movement
- PIR sensitivity max 10 meters, horizontally 120′ space
- IR LED and night vision up to 10 meters
- Built-in motion detection distinguishes between people, animals, vehicles and more
- IP 64 protection, for environments between -10 and +55 degrees
- microSD card up to 128GB
Install Reolink Home Hub
This part is probably the easiest. Insert the memory card you received into memory slot 1 on the back of the Hub, connect the LAN cable between your device and your internet router, and then connect the DC charger you received.
Our device starts up immediately and after a few thoughts we can launch the Reolink mobile app. Here we may be pleasantly surprised that if we are on the same network, the Home Hub is already waiting for us to install… no need to search for anything.
Let’s go through the screens one by one and enter a password. Once we are done with the installation, our various settings are already available.
Let’s install our Argus PT Ultra camera
In the app, click on the plus icon in the top right corner to scan the camera code. This can be found on the bottom of the device.
Flip the switch on the back of your camera to the on position and continue in the app as it begins to say the greeting text in 100 languages.
It will ask you whether you want to use it independently or connected to a Home Hub, here we select the latter and confirm. By clicking on the same LAN network, then continuing with the next option, we select which Wifi option we want to use.
This will generate a QR code that we can scan with our camera. We will hear a BIP signal and after a few moments the option to continue will appear in the mobile app. Give it a name, update the firmware if it is available and we can start installing it physically.
Placing our camera
We have several options, we can use the spacer bracket using the dowel/screw provided, or if we don’t want to do much damage, we can drill the small circular bracket into a wooden surface or tie it to a more difficult environment.
Charge your camera in advance or attach the solar panel bracket to your camera and leave the charging part to nature. Here our cable is 4m, which should be enough for most placement options.
Let’s see what options our tool park has.
Home Hub options
In the Settings menu, we can modify the Wifi settings, change the notification and siren volume under Sounds, turn the status LED on/off, send a Push message in case of an error, set Email notification and FTP settings, and manage our memory card.
Language selection is not possible at this time…
We can set the alarm options between scene modes. This can be off, home mode where only recordings are made, or away mode where we receive the set notifications, or we can trigger an alarm.
In addition to these, it is possible to put together specific variations. Or, with 1-1 clicks on the main screen, put the entire jet into a given state. This would be difficult with 6 cameras one by one…
In Event History we have the option to filter and review everything our cameras recorded. We also get statistics in a small hidden icon (top right)!!!
File encryption menu for encryption and list of cameras.
It is important to highlight that the Home Hub also works offline, meaning that if we are in a place where the internet is not available, the system will still work and we can use the various options as usual by connecting to the Hub’s wifi from our phone. This is great if we have a solution on a farm, in a forested environment, or perhaps in a caravan.
Camera options
When you click on our camera, you will first see a fresh live view, above which you can access the siren, spot light, multiple camera views and settings icons.
Below that is the sound or mute, photo or video capture, quality level, and full screen view.
In the bottom row, we can start audio transmission if we want to talk to someone or our little pet, PTZ control options and playback are available.
Our PTZ options include four-way movement, a monitor point where it can automatically return, and preset positions that allow our camera to navigate to with the push of a button.
Playback: This is the menu where our recordings are available. We can filter by date and switch between appearance and storage medium.
Our camera’s settings options
I could go into quite a bit of depth here, but I’ll try to summarize.
- Wifi where we can configure our current Wifi connection
- Our battery charge and its statistics
- Display where we can set everything related to the image to be displayed and if necessary, we can create masking here.
- Light for status, infrared and spotlight settings
- PIR and detection options to fine-tune the sensitivity of our sensor and the type between human, animal and anything else
- A wealth of notification options, siren options
- Time lapse option if the panorama or environment allows for such an opportunity
Quality tests
So after all the tech details, let’s take a closer look at what the cameras can do for quality.
First, daytime recording and distance test.
What you can see is that the image quality is great even at 3-6-9 meters. I chose the insulating sheet I held up because of the poor contrast, but it is still perfectly readable.
For more details, it’s worth watching the video and navigating to the quality test section for the recordings.
The power of Wi-Fi
This is a rather subjective area. In my current test, the Reolink Home Hub was placed in the living room and the first camera is separated by a 38cm brick wall, with perfect signal strength. The second camera faces the yard, where there are 3 structural support walls, or a minimum of 30cm or about 20 meters away.
Here, I get good speed by setting the quality to Balanced, but I have difficulty following the highest quality in the live view window. Everything is going well, there is only a 4-5 second delay in the feedback for me in the form of live video. It is important to note here that as soon as the Home Hub was moved to a better position by just 10cm, everything became lag-free.
It is also important to mention that this camera type can also operate as a standalone unit, independent of the Home Hub. Because of this, the wifi signal strength may be better depending on our network and the device can still save to its own SD card. If you need a remote wifi camera at the far end of the garden…
Home Assistant and connections
We did well on this front because Home Assistant can be connected to the Home Hub and through it to our cameras. There is also an integration available for this.
With FTP / RTSP connection, you can even use a NAS for secondary recording.
Negatives
This is quite difficult, because as a complete system, with every little thing left adjustable, equipped with accessories, it is difficult to complain about anything. The only thing I would like to see is perhaps the motion tracking function, but this cannot be considered a negative, it is more of a wish list.
Summary
The Reolink Home Hub and Argus PT Ultra kit is a very good deal in terms of price / value. At the time of the video’s release, it was still available in the spring sale, so it’s worth taking advantage of it if you like it too!
