Eufy Solocam S40
Solar system
External security cameras broadly come in two forms – those that are plugged in and those that use rechargeable batteries. Battery-powered models are much easier to install, because you don’t have to worry about drilling a hole in your wall to pass the wire to an electrical socket inside your house. The downside is that you have to remove the camera or its batteries for charging, during which time you won’t be getting any security footage.
Chinese manufacturer Eufy has come up with a solution. The Solocam S40 has a solar panel mounted on the top, which captures sunlight to top up the internal battery. This removes the need to charge or wire up the device, as long as you can put it somewhere that catches two hours of sunlight a day. It shouldn’t need topping up every day because the battery will last for around four months on a full charge. In an emergency, you can always give it a boost by plugging a cable into its USB-C port.
The unit is weather-proof (with an IP67
SPECIFICATIONS
2048x1080-pixel resolution • 130-degree field of view • Night vision • 600-lumen spotlight • 980db siren • Compatible with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant • 50x85x114mm • 500g • One-year warranty rating, which should be more than enough to protect it) and has a 130-degree field of view. It has a 600-lumen floodlight that comes on whenever motion is detected. This lets the camera capture colour footage even at night.
In our tests we were impressed by the clarity and detail captured by the camera. Footage had a slight ‘fish-eye’ effect, but not so much that it detracts from the detail. It also has a two-way talk function, so you can speak and listen to anyone who approaches the camera – a feature that worked particularly well when we tested it.
One of the S40’s big selling points is 8GB of built-in storage. This is enough to store 30 days of motion-detection footage (based on 30 activations per day, each one recording 10-second clips), and means that you don’t have to subscribe to any online services in order to access your footage.
This is a big avantage over most rival models. The Google Nest Cam (reviewed in Issue 620), for example, costs an additional £5 per month for this level of online storage.