4X Optical Zoom

This review is kind of like one I wrote on a 2nd camera I bought from FOSCAM.The ONLY difference between this camera and the other is the optical zoom.I just started playing with it while standing next to it and noticed a clicking sound while zooming. Not expected, and I will write to their tech support immediately after this review. No big deal, just checking on whether that is normal.Otherwise the camera is great.I tried the **** and 2 other brands of popular cameras. a) Too much lag time and I will NOT upload to the internet. Sorry major brands. Foscam doesn't require that step.I have 2 older FOSCAM cameras. They still work (Model FR4020A2). The dependability was a major choice in my purchasing of 2 new cameras. I have an aged parent that is now living with us, and gets up at all hours of the night. With 2 more cameras I reasoned I could check on their roving around and still leave them some privacy and peace and I would still know they were safe.So I went to the FOSCAM website and asked their tech support (via email) for advice on which cameras to buy based on several criteria. Answers came back the next day, and were spot on.Got the cameras in from Amazon, they installed beautifully. (NOTE: You really want to hook them directly to your router / modem for the initail setup, MUCH easier. You can go wireless after the initial setup)Picture quality has improved greatly in the last few years! This camera is a delight. The motion detection works well, and after about 25 alerts the first night as my parent puttered around in the kitchen I had to put them on a timed schedule. That works better. (More about software later).The cameras work better than I had hoped, and I am going to buy 2 more as soon as the budget will allow.The software is the only thing I have some issues with, and I haven't written to tech support yet. (I will right after this review). Honestly expect to find the problem and fix it with them. Will update later. The program is called Foscam VMS, and every time I start it it pops up a window asking if it can make changes to my computer. A minor step, but mildly irritating.Anyway, I now have 4 FOSCAM cameras, and expect to increase that to six as soon as possible.

I purchased this Foscam Z2 to replace an older Foscam camera. Compared to the older camera this one has a higher (1080) resolution and a 4X rather than a 3X zoom. Foscam cameras are the only ones I've found that have an optical zoom as opposed to digital only. For this application, the 100 degree viewing angle allows me to see a large part of the sky, and the image adjustments let me tailor the image to bring out the most detail in the sky. If I choose to record the video, the 128 GB capacity of the micro SD slot allows me a longer recording time (for a given resolution), although I normally use the IP capabilities of the camera to automatically upload still images to Weather Underground to be posted on their Wundermap. In a surveillance application, the higher resolution would possibly in identifying intruders or license numbers. I am also exploring the possibility of using a Z2 for recording and streaming our church services, since the camera has a streaming output which with additional software can be used as a webcam for video conferencing and live streaming. I've had some unusual questions for Foscam's technical support, but they have always been good at investigating the issues and replying with possible solutions.

Though it is too early to know the overall longevity; it appears to be another good PTZ camera from Foscam (Z2 / ZDEF19926P?). I'm still using my 3 original F19826P's (2016 - 2018). I didn't care much for the Foscam phone or cloud apps, but have managed to figure out the camera's web interface which is quite similar to the prior model (F19826P). Use the Foscam IPCamera utility to help you identify the assigned router address (e.g. 192.168.1.xxx) and its port (88 initial).If using IE 11 (windows 10) you can still manage to use a multi-camera mode (not available in Firefox, Chrome, or MS edge) with both the F19826P and the Z2. At present there doesn't appear to be a Z2 instruction manual on the Foscam or Amazon website though this camera on Amazon may be somewhat of a trial balloon. It is also a bit of a challenge to get the plugin's loaded which must be done for each browser (and camera?) you may be using. Avoid having more than one browser window open when doing this as it needs to shut these down to load the plugins.I also use my Linksys router's web interface to assign unique ports and router IP addresses to each camera.For Foscam: Please see if you can return to the older format for automatically including a unique time stamp address when making / saving an image; snap_date_time.jpg The newer versions of the cameras only have a blank name field when saving the image file. None of the more recent firmware versions I've tried have this feature.