Fair night capability using a Foscam FI9821W V2
589484
Ok, it does help a bit at night.  The resolution works better if I set the color adjustment of my Foscam FI9821W V2 to the following:
  Hue: 52
  Brightness: 100
  Contrast: 24
  Saturation: 40
  Sharpness: 100
Since I don't pay attention to the details, it came without a power plug, so be aware that you need to order a 12V adapter for it also.
I am thinking about buying a second one to see if it will boost my video quality at night, but I am not sure if that will help.  I have a separate question for that issue.
3149289
This is a nice camera.  I have it configured to cover my driveway and a portion of my front yard.  We live across from a school and have issues with frequent traffic pulling into our front yard when turning around.  I've used the camera to capture evidence to convince city officials to make some traffic engineering changes to out street.

The camera provides a nice, high-quality image in daylight hours.  At night, the image is still quite good, though some features are washed out.  I think this may be because we have a motion-sensor light mounted and this lighting affects the infrared night vision of the camera.  Even so, the video quality at night is good.

I have the camera configured to send images and videos to a FTP server over my home network.  I like that the camera also has a 16GB card for local storage in case of network failure.  I may get another one or two of these.
3329525
I have a couple indoor FOSCAM cameras and I wanted one so I could monitor the front of my house.  Setup is easy; plugged into my router, saw what IP address was assigned and then I went in and changed the user name and password, what port it is on, static IP address etc. Took all of 10 minutes.  Then installed it outside.

Yes, it does need a power supply (why people rate it poorly for this I don't know) and the image at night is black and white (again, what good is color at night?).  It works.

I use FoscamPro on IOS to monitor the cameras from my phone (remember to do port forwarding on your router if you want to view away from home - I was surprised to see that FOSCAM has instructions for most popular routers on their website when I got my first camera) and it works great.

These are nothing fancy but they work at night, the picture is clear and I will be buying two more of these.
1938976
Pros: reasonable price, works like a Foscam with excellent night vision.
Cons: weak signal, "Alarm Service Setting" seems not working properly, and no technical support.
I resorted to buying a Foscam which is a little bit more expensive but customer service is excellent.
Tips for those who have problem with "Remote View" of the IP camera: If you're with Comcast, you might have problem with Internet view though your local view is OK, which means as long as you are in the same network with your IP camera.  Call Comcast and request for a switch to "Bridge mode" then it will work beautifully.  If you could talk Comcast into doing this without having to sign up for their "Signature Support", you're a genius! Good luck and enjoy your IP cam.
4412731
I don't see how you can go wrong for the price.  I've actually been using this camera outdoors, under a covered patio without any problems.  There are a number of cheap generic power cable extensions you can use to put this camera up in a location a bit further from a power outlet.
One great feature of this ipcam is the basically scan and play qr code.  Scanning this code immediately added the camera to my foscam app.  I use both the older and newer versions of the app.  Scanning the code also allowed me to view the camera via my smartphone from outside my home network without any issue.  This is a big improvement over my older foscam ipcams.  Those typically required plugging into an ethernet cord to initially access the cam and setup wifi and passwords.  This qr code makes it much easier if I need to do  a hard reset I can simply go out and rescan the barcode.
I was able to update the firmware without issue as soon as I had setup the camera.  Finding foscam firmware can sometimes be tricky, I suggest saving the link as a bookmark in your browser.
The web interface is also a must use piece of software.  This requires installing a small file and seems to work best with mozilla's firefox browser. Using the web interface gives you a lot more functionality than just using the foscam apps.  You can easily update the firmware, take in the live view, access the sd card for recordings.
I really like using the live view while I'm at home over my wifi.  Makes it easy to see what's going on from my couch without having to go outside or move to another room.  Picture quality from this camera is great for a 720p 1.0 megapixel feed.
I recently purchased an amcrest 4 channel NVR, the NV1104.  This camera records to the NVR without any issue.
4692584
This is a great camera, if it worked as advertised. The specs are excellent. I got the V1 camera and it has had a lot of problems. Read about them on the internet. However, Foscam has come out with a V2 of this camera and early reports is that they have fixed the problems. The camera is very easy to set up. It has great features for a wireless camera and I would recommend the V2 model. I have 4 Foscam cameras and this is the only one I had any problems with. The other 3 (different models) I would give a 5 star to them. This camera is going in now to be replaced. Their support was also very good. Sorry you had a problem, send it in and we will replace it. Very responsive. I will continue to buy Foscam cameras. Them will probably be this camera model if the replacement works. They also just came out with a higher end camera that I am very interested in.
813552
Great camera - works great at night - has a grid showing that I am getting close to an object.
4097242
The PTZ on this camera is very good.  Clarity is excellent.  I am only giving this 4 Stars due to a night time views issue.  I placed this inside a window facing the yard.  Video was good during daylight hours.  Once it got dark I could not get good video.  The leds around the lens reflected back and bled out the picture.  Even with the yard lights on there was a back reflection of the Leds.  I still need to verify what it looks like if it was placed outside of the window in the dark.  I have not checked to see if there are parameters to modify the effects I witnessed.  I have this setup to record to a Qnap NAS,  Surveillance Station app for 24/7 recording.
2932963
Hi, Julia of the Foscam amazon support.

So far I like the R2 camera and how it operates. Initially, I need assistance setting it up. I am using it to keep an eye on my dogs when I am out of the house. The picture is very clear. It has been quite an experience and surprise to see what the dogs, who are locked in the kitchen do when we are not at home. I am still trying to discover it there is an off button for the camera. It would have been nice to have a printed user manual included with the camera. I did print the one off that was on-line. I am not very computer literate, so I am still discovering how the camera operates. I have recorded while we were out, but have not been sure how long it will record for. I am enjoying using the security camera as a pet-cam.
2064997
I have this setup about 80 feet from the house inside an open shed.  The wireless connection has worked well.  I use it for close up, within 20 feet viewing and it's perfect for me.  I'm viewing animals that walk through the shed, so I don't need it for security and don't need to ID a criminal.

The camera has been in use for about 7 months with no problems.  I'm writing this review because last week a bear stepped on it and it's still working.

The night vision works beautifully!

Buy from Foscam only, not a second party.
2928585
The product was received on time and the cameras were as described.  The cameras, even though inexpensive, work well.  Sixteen feet is about their maximum distance.  They auto change between day and night works well.  The night lighting is good enough to identify individuals.  The wireless software works well, I can connect to the cameras (2) via our computers (W7 & W8.1), ipad & iphone.  I'm impressed, will buy more if needed.
1333795
Works great. Crisp clear imagery. Software is not as configurable as shown in manual. Works as promised, clear night imagery. Motion alarm works well day or night
3213180
The camera has exceptional quality both day and night.  I have it for the front of the house and there are street lights in the neighborhood.  I was concerned I would need an IR camera but the B&W night picture is excellent.  I can easily make out people walking by.  The ability to set a motion detection windows is excellent.  You can define the areas you want for the motion detection which can be any section of the viewing area.  I am very happy with this camera, and I am still learning new features.
4561686
This isn't a re-purposed webcam for your desktop; it is optimized for high-quality, multi-stream, compressed video output under even relatively low light conditions. It will provide adequate image quality under nearly-dark conditions (low "night" interior lighting, street light) and the illuminator can be used for then the PIR sensor picks up motion, even in "total" darkness.

Good quality video is streamed even at 200 kbps, with the camera able to support multiple, H.263 streams at once. No compression host is needed. All day-to-day viewing and management tasks can be performed through a browser -- Mac and FreeBSD (and, I assume Linux) work just fine. I expect that Maemo on my soon-to-be-shipped Nokia n900 will be fine as well.

No drivers are needed and there is a well-documented API that allows for development of image and video control and capture utilities on any platform that can handle HTTP(S) and RTSP for streams.

My only complaint so far, for the price, is that the password mechanism is somewhat bizarre. As with the other user that mentioned this, it took several reboots to get one that works. It may be that uppercase characters on setting the password are silently changed to lowercase. This needs to be worked out before I consider providing access to the camera on a public Internet address.
2574933
Using the camera with Zoneminder, works well, although some issues with Zoneminder as only getting 1 fps of the high def camera, but this is a Zoneminder issue as the camera does do 30 FPS using VLC.

Camera seems to be excellent after 2 months of use.  Had what I thought was my first issue after second month, but turned out to be a router/switch issue.

Update:
Camera still works well after 1 year of use.  Zoneminder now configured to get 5-10 fps based on light levels.  I can configure it faster but Zoneminder seems to have issues with that.  Works at 30fps with VLC and RTSP.  Camera is a great value, I wouldn't hesitate to buy again if I needed another one.
3412105
Video quality is very good during daytime, furing nighttime you need to adjust the settings via the software. Support is not that great on the software.
2010410
I bought this to monitor our chicken coupe at night. It takes good quality night pictures in black and white and very good color pictures during the day. I have only used the movie mode and am very pleased with the results. I learned possum, ratcoons and bobcat frequent our chicken coupe by night and the neighbors dog by day. Also my granddaughter checks for  eggs each morning. Clearly the night no glow LEDs do not effect the wildlife at night because they go about there business. I can't speak of the battery life since I have only had it a few days. I purchased a 32GB scan disc which is plenty sufficient.