@techbill - don't worry, we have a team working w/@rlithgow1 on doorbell tech and he's agreed that mounting the doorbell in his office won't be the most useful location. 
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It’s there to keep an eye on his beer (duh).
I will allow it.
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100!!! That's why the team wants it in the mini-fridge, to monitor a lot of beer.
I've been playing with it, I just haven't had time to mount it.... Stupid kids...
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How has this gone and how are you liking it. My Arlo Video doorbell just died and the Reolink is on a short list to replace it.
He got it installed and at his last very recent posting he loves it. 
Not sure what he did w/his kids...a little afraid to ask.
Here's that recent post from Rick on the Reolink:
I've just got a wifi one waiting to go on the front door.
What I like is that they supply a 24V DC plug pack (or wall wart for you northern hemisphere guys 
) so no need to buy a new power supply. Video quality is great and you
get RTSP/RTMP/Onvif compatibility. Good compatibility with home assistant too and it's very much cheaper than the competition when it's on special (which is quite often).
What I don't like is its motion algorithm isn't particularly good and it gets triggered by sudden light changes (like your porch light going on). Best to use some other external software instead. As mine is streaming constantly it does get quite warm. But not hot fortunately.
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We installed a REOLINK Video Doorbell PoE last summer - in summary:
- Overall we're happy with it, and while there are minor gripes it's a "would buy again/recommend" thing. But...
- For button presses I attempted to use my Synology NAS as an intermediary (as per the thread @marktheknife referenced), but never got that working. Doing so at all was very much a "let's set it up because I can" thing, rather than to meet an actual need, so in our case that wasn't a deal breaker.
- As @rocketwiz says, the doorbell's motion detection algorithm wasn't terribly useful. Before installation I'd had high hopes of using it for visitor presence detection, but after lots of fiddling with settings I never got the false positive rate down to a workable level (night time rain, in particular, seemed to more or less permanently trigger it).
I spun up a copy of scrypted in an LXC container and button presses work fine. However when you do this you also are subscribing to the video stream which I don't want. I'll try the home assistant integration as it looks like you can just access the buttons but I'm not entire sure of that atm.
I was originally going to have video from the doorbell sent to my nest hub when the button is pressed but due to the delay in getting the video going it's actually better to start streaming the video once upon a specific object is seen (ie people).
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I minimize stuff like that in the reolink app. I let camect handle the AI
2 questions, if anyone knows...
-
Blue Iris was mentioned. Does anyone know if there's a way for BI to recognize the button press directly?
-
Has anyone jerry-rigged anything to get these to trigger a mechanical chime?
The Reolink Video Doorbell comes with a chime which is plugged into an outlet
I don't know about BI but Camect is able to use the button as a trigger
No jerry rigging needed. Simply connect the existing doorbell wires to the terminals while also using a resistor. So you can put the electronic chime anywhere in the house while still using your analog chime.
Can doorbell presses be set up and linked in Rule Machine?
Thank you
Do you know what size resistor I need to add to the circuit?
Doesn't matter which way it's installed.
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Not directly. You need something to relay them. Blue Iris can do it, and Camect
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There are 2 different approaches that can be used to "trap" a bell press on the Reolink.
(Maybe more, just 2 that come to mind quickly).
- I have a Zigbee motion sensor, positioned under the eaves trough, pointed at the front door. It fires a motion activate in Rule Machine.
- In a "ring doorbell" installation that I did, I have an Alexa routine flip a switch that is shared with Alexa (via the Hubitat Alexa skill app). That is used in a Rule Machine rule.
Does this actually work? I've been looking to replace my AWFUL POS Foscam DBW5 but the lack of mechanical chime support on the Reolink is a non-starter for me. I've done a fair bit of Googling and by all accounts the the Reolink doesn't appear to have an internal relay required to trigger a mechanical chime.
