Annke WCD600 assessment: Huge safety cam protection for a small worth
At a look
Skilled’s Ranking
Execs
- Twin lenses cowl wide-angle and zoomed-in views
- Easy pan-and-tilt motion
- Very reasonably priced worth
Cons
- Conspicuous industrial design
- Depending on a wired energy provide
- Constructed-in power-surge safety
- Generic third-party app with pushy upsells
Our Verdict
The Annke WCD600 presents spectacular protection and sturdiness, making it a sensible alternative for broad outside monitoring, supplied you’re comfy with its wired energy requirement and a less-than-polished app expertise.
Worth When Reviewed
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Finest Pricing Immediately
Finest Costs Immediately: Annke WCD600
The Annke WCD600 is a dual-lens outside safety digital camera constructed for individuals who need to cowl a variety of floor with out cluttering their area. Every lens captures a three-megapixel view—one wide-angle, one telephoto—serving to scale back blind spots throughout driveways, yards, and aspect tons.
This digital camera connects to your 2.4GHz Wi-Fi community (i.e., it’s not a dual-band digital camera), is weatherproof, and prices far lower than most cameras that supply related protection.
The Annke WCD600’s dual-lens setup offers you two complementary views moderately than one stitched panorama.
Design and options
The WCD600 isn’t designed to mix into the background. With its two uncovered antennas, bulbous decrease housing, and rings of LED lights round every lens, it’s one thing intruders will discover instantly, and a few folks will contemplate that a part of its enchantment. The white-and-black shell feels strong, weather-sealed, and constructed to deal with the weather. It carries an IP66 ranking for defense from the weather, which means it’s dustproof and might face up to highly effective jets of water, reminiscent of from a strain washer, from any route. (Learn our IP code information to study extra about that matter.)
An uncommon function that can be of curiosity to owners dwelling in areas with frequent lightning storms is the digital camera’s built-in surge safety (as much as 2kV).
The WCD600’s dual-lens setup offers you two complementary views moderately than one stitched panorama. The highest 3MP lens delivers a static wide-angle view of your general scene, whereas the decrease 3MP lens is mounted to a pan/tilt motor to comply with motion. The decrease digital camera pans 300 levels horizontally and tilts 90 levels vertically. Collectively they supply context and close-up element concurrently, so that you see each the massive image and what triggered an alert.
At night time, the WCD600 switches to its dual-light system: a pair of infrared LEDs for discreet video seize in low gentle. It additionally has red-and-blue strobe lights and a built-in siren that set off on movement. These deterrents might be set to run mechanically or manually from the app, supplying you with the choice to scare off trespassers or simply gentle up the driveway while you step outdoors.
The WCD600’s two lenses seize vast and telephoto views for contextual protection.
Annke
The digital camera can detect each basic movement and human exercise. When it identifies an individual, the decrease lens mechanically pans and tilts to comply with them, preserving the topic centered as they transfer. You’ll get an prompt notification by the iCSee app, and tapping it opens a dwell view so you possibly can see what’s taking place in actual time.
Video might be saved regionally to a microSD card as much as 128GB, letting you retailer footage straight on the digital camera with out a subscription. The digital camera additionally helps cloud backup through the iCSee app, with subscription plans that begin with 7- or 30 days of storage at a price of $3.99 or $6.99 a month respectively. The digital camera additionally integrates with Alexa and Google Residence, permitting you to tug up dwell video on a sensible show or management fundamental capabilities with voice instructions.
Setup and efficiency
Every thing you should get began is within the field, together with a mounting bracket and screws and an influence provide. As a result of the digital camera attracts energy from a 12-volt adapter, you’ll want an outlet close by or a weatherproof extension twine.
The WCD600 makes use of the iCSee cellular app for setup, dwell viewing, and storage administration. iCSee isn’t unique to Annke—it’s a third-party platform utilized by a number of finances and midrange digital camera makers. When you create and account and begin the pairing course of, the digital camera’s booming voice prompts information you thru the steps to attach the digital camera to your community.
The app shows each digital camera views directly, stacked vertically in portrait mode or aspect by aspect while you flip your telephone horizontally. The daytime picture high quality is excellent, and the dual lenses seize a broad, balanced view with out seen distortion. The digital camera mechanically switches between day and night time modes primarily based on ambient gentle, or you possibly can modify it manually within the app. Night time Mode prompts the infrared LEDs for clear black-and-white video, whereas Day Mode disables gentle enhancement solely.
The third-party ICSee app makes it straightforward to regulate the digital camera and handle its settings, nevertheless it feels generic in comparison with Annke’s personal software program.
Michael Ansaldo/Foundry
Human detection labored nicely in my testing. The digital camera reliably distinguishes folks from shifting timber or passing vehicles, and movement monitoring retains topics centered with out extreme motor noise. You’ll be able to configure the app to border folks with a yellow field for simpler visibility on playback, and there are a number of choices for taming notifications together with interval settings and detection sensitivity.
The iCSee app handles every part from pairing to dwell viewing, video playback, notifications, and the digital camera’s many settings. However it additionally doubles as a storefront for iCSee’s “value-add” providers. When you open it, you’ll see outstanding prompts to activate “AI” capabilities and cloud storage, together with a countdown timer on any free trial. It’s useful and responsive, however the upselling can really feel a bit aggressive—particularly in the event you simply need to use the digital camera’s native recording options.
Must you purchase the Annke WCD600?
The Annke WCD600 usually lists for $79.99, however as of this writing Annke has discounted it to $39.99. That low worth makes it a straightforward gamble. My foremost reservation is the third-party iCSee app. It’s useful and responsive, nevertheless it pushes add-on providers too aggressively for my style, and the interface lacks the polish of Annke’s personal software program.
Nonetheless, this digital camera delivers sturdy efficiency and adaptability for the value, making it a sensible, reasonably priced possibility if you need broad outside protection with out overcomplicating your setup.
This assessment is a part of TechHive’s in-depth protection of the perfect dwelling safety cameras.
