Hello
I recently mounted the latest pan camera on the corner of my garage to monitor two sides of the house however i didnt take into account a big ole tree blocking a portion of the view when it turns.
Im now thinking of just getting a v4 camera to just mount to stay stationary up there.
I dont want to run any more wires, and seeing one cam is already up there i was thinking
Is there a usb micro (i think it is) spmitter and use both cameras via one power supply and it will be sufficient?
Can you get a USB splitter? Yes.
Will it work? Likely not.
Especially with one of the cameras being a pan can. The biggest issue is not the power source (getting a high current USB wall wart is fairly easy), but rather that wire. The voltage drop is going to kill the idea.
I have several Anker 40 watt 4 port wall warts for my outside cameras.
Jeffy says I bought 3 back in December 2020
They aren’t exposed to the rain because they are under the deck. They do see hot ~100F and cold ~10F and have been working fine for over 3 years. In fact, several of the power cables are 40 feet long and even with the voltage drop, the Anker supplies enough to make the v3s and v4s happy. I have all the WYZE wall warts in a drawer.
Thanks for the idea but this will involve me running another long cord from the roof, thru the garage door, into the garage to then plug into this power strip or to the strip i have mounted in the garage already. I was trying to avoid having to do this. Thanks gor ur timely reply
I was just trying not to have to run any more wires from under the roof into the garage, where the power strip is…but it seems like its not possible.
If you do need to share a power brick, I would get a beefier Amp one and not use the OEM one that came from Wyze. Here is a good discussion on power adapters. Good luck.
I have a v4 in a weatherproof hinged plastic box with a RAVpower 30000 mAh USB power bank inside. I have the camera turn on at sunset and off at sunrise. It is mainly so we can see the wildlife (raccoons, foxes, skunks, coyotes, deer, and the occasional groundhog). This setup would not work in your situation.
I am getting that you want the camera on your roof. You might have to relocate the power strip to where the camera is closer which means it won’t be on the roof. Are there any other possible locations that the camera would cover without needing to be so high?
If you can get a 3AMP USB power supply, a splitter cable should run them both fine, however the stock flat USB cable uses very thin conductors and may experience voltage drop if the pan cam is moving around at the same time you try to use the spotlight, IR lights, or speaker on the v4. It will probably be fine but if you experience issues in high load situations like that, you may need to get a thicker USB cable (ideally just do it from the start).
A 2.4A supply would probably also cut it but I’d rather have some “headroom” and not cut it that close.
If you are running a longer length cable than the stock 6 footer, then it definitely needs to be a heavier gauge one.
This was what I used when I had 2 cameras powered from the same brick. Very compact and should accommodate pan cam V3’s need for more power; 12 watts on either port.
Sounds like OP only has one cable run and wants to split it off. It is doable with a big enough single port power supply, but only if the cable isn’t super long (15-20 feet max, maybe 25) and/or one of the flat, small gauge ones.
3 amps (or probably even 2.4) shared between those two cams should be fine as long as the cable run isn’t too long/thin and/or they don’t try to use a bunch of power hungry features at the same time on both cams.
While not the same thing, the “OG Stack kit” comes with a splitter cable and a 1.5 amp power supply for two OGs, when each cam comes with a 1 amp power supply. From my observations the cams rarely if ever use the full rated output of the power supply (in the case of the OG, more like 1/4 to 1/3 of the rated power). The Pan cams may be closer to the limit but I’m guessing they probably rarely hit over 1 AMP and likely max out at like 1.5.
Im assuming this is better than just the regular brick it comes with.
Would this now give it thw power needed to power both? And if so, what splitter would i need for the pan v3 and cam v4
Essentially id like to climb up on the side of the house and detach the usb micro connector, mount the second cam facing the other way close by, attach both to a splitter, then splitter to the outdoor wyze adapter cable thats already set up and have them both running.
2A is the rating of the Pan cam alone. It probably won’t be enough for both. They’ll work, but you’ll probably have intermittent oddities and probably an eventual failure.
You’ll want at least a 2.4A, but ideally a 3A adapter. The outdoor adapter isn’t required as long as you protect the adapter from rain, so putting any decent adapter a sealed box or using an “in use” outlet cover will do that.
But the cable you’ve run, what gauge is it and how long is it? That factors in a lot as well.
As far as the splitter you need a Micro USB Female to 2x Micro USB Male, readily available on amazon. However if you’ve used a long (over 15 feet or so) and/or thin cable, your best bet would probably be to just run a second one alongside it.
I didn’t even think about that before. I really like this idea, especially when Cam OGs are on sale. The Outdoor Power Adapter can be left in place to power both Cam OGs, and the Cam Pan v3 could be repurposed elsewhere. Good thought!
I was actually just mentioning it because the OGs come with 1A adapters but the stack kit for two comes with a 1.5 - so obviously the OGs don’t need a full amp each, and I suspect most of their cams do not draw the full rated power of the adapter. So the full 3 amps of the Pan and v4 probably isn’t needed, but likely more than 2 is.
The stack kit probably isn’t all that useful for this situation since the Y splitter cable is only 6 feet (and is not an extension) and the adapter is only 1.5A.
Funny thing is I bought the stack kit, and I do use the bracket for two of my OGs, but the cable is not flat (which I need since it runs through a window), and the “Y” section is really long and hard to conceal. I ended up just running two of the flat stock cables to the two cams. If I were to do it again, I’d just mount each cam separately.
Good call. I didn’t realize that it’s that long. I was thinking of something shorter that would split closer to the cameras themselves (i.e., a single cable for most of the length and then split to significantly shorter legs for each of the Micro-B male connectors) and essentially be similar to how you could daisy chain older Wyze Cams. With that cable and a Micro-B-female-to-USB-A-female adapter, it should still be possible to drive two Cam OGs with the Outdoor Power Adapter, I’d think. Whether or not that’s useful for this application depends on the location @12345678910 is trying to cover, but I could imagine something like this working well at the corner of a garage.
You are correct. When I first got my V3s I measured the current and they only draw something in the neighbourhood of 0.7 Amps give or take. I imagine the OGs draw similar amount.
It is actually something in between. The overall length is 6 feet, with a bit over 4 feet as a single round cable, then 2x 20 inch round cables after the split. The round is not terribly thick, but not something I’d want to close in a window. And I had assumed the Y would be much shorter, since the cams are going to be a few inches apart. The 20" of split sort of defeats the purpose of wanting to have a single cable and be less conspicuous. I ended up routing the two flat cables stacked on top of each other, which basically looks like 1 cable. The Y cable is in a drawer for possible future use for some other purpose.