Ring Doorbell 2: This footage is unavailable

Products Video Doorbells
#1

I set up my Ring Doorbell 2 (hardwired) about a week ago and enabled the snapshot timeline feature. Since setting the doorbell up, around 75% of the time between 6:30 am and 5:30 pm shows “this footage is unavailable”. The chunks of time that say that can be anywhere from around 15 minutes to a couple of hours. During the hours of 5:30 pm to 6:30 am (basically when it’s dark), all the snapshots are there (about one every 5 to 15 minutes). So basically I get 9 hours of unreliable snapshot recording and 13 hours of flawless snapshot recording.

Basically the snapshot timeline feature is completely unreliable during the day and works great at night.

I"ve spoken to support. Tier 1 blamed my Wifi, despite the fact that motion and ring video is captured without issue and video requires a lot more bandwidth than a snapshot. A higher level tech mentioned that the feature was still in testing and the app might be incorrectly reporting the footage is unavailable when snapshots were never taken. That too seems suspect because of the 2 hour chunks with no snapshot and then fact that at night there are no unavailable footage chunks.

It seems like this feature simply doesn’t work well during the day, which is when there’s less Wifi being used. Any ideas why?

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#2

My Doorbell 2 doesn’t have this option in the app. Only my two flood light cams have the snapshot capture option, which I have enabled. However, it doesn’t work at all for either floodlight cam. It says “this footage is unavailable” all the time. So I don’t know what the point of this “feature” is…

#3

I have exactly the same issue on floodlight cam. Doorbell pro works fine. Contact customer support got no response so far…

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#4

That’s hilarious. I have the exact OPPOSITE problem. My 2 floodlight cams capture snapshots flawlessly and both of my doorbell pros do not. Odd

#5

I’ve installed the floodlight and have been noticing the same thing. Doorbell works fine, however.

#6

I have been experiencing the same on my Ring spotlight camera is missing snapshots and maybe video. The doorbells work fine

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#7

This started as of today I notice I have the same issue. So is there a ‘FIX’ for this?

#8

Sorry to hear about this concern persisting. Often times, when a video is unable to be seen, it is related to connection interference, processing, or subscription. Of course, subscription is the first thing most check, and as it sounds this is happening intermittently on different devices, it’ll be best to confirm wifi and mobile device connection is optimal.

Removing and reinstalling the Ring app is a great start to ensuring it is up to date and optimally integrated with your mobile device. I recommend also disabling things like bluetooth, VPNs, or any other apps that are running in the backround. This will factor out many variables. Checking a recording or snapshot on wifi only, as well as cellular data only, might also help in finding the best connection.

Wifi signal strength from your router to device is also important for intended operation. The Device Health in your Ring app will indicate signal strength through RSSI. Check out our Community post for tips on achieving a great RSSI. I hope this helps! :slight_smile:

#9

Thank you for the reply, but connection is actually not an issue. The RSSI is 33 which is pretty good, and recording video works okay. Only the snapshot is having the issue.

Last customer support asked me to remove and factory reset the device and re-configure and add back to the account but nothing change.

#10

Surprisingly, the snapshot feature start to work last night at around 8:19pm lol. No change from my end but it is good to see the feature is finally working.

#11

I’ve had the ring video doorbell for a couple of weeks and it regularly says footage for large periods of time are unavailable. I bought the camera because our neighbour keeps letting her dog use our lawn as a toilet. Unfortunately we’ve not captured the evidence because it always happens during the periods when footage is unavailable. I called customer service, waited for 20 minutes to speak to someone and then was told to reset the device. I did this and was then talked through the setup process. The problem still exists. They only explanation Ring could offer was that maybe someone was logging in and deleting the footage!

Ring, always home except for 6 hours of the day when it decides to take a break!

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#12

So initial install, no issues with snapshot. As time as gone on, I’ve had more and more snapshot gaps in the footage captured. For instance, on a given day if I don’t open the app at all, I could have 4-6 hour gaps. Today is a perfect example. 8:26 to 3:03pm until I opened live view, it just showed this footage unavailable.

RSSI-35

So it’s not a wifi issue. What’s going on with this? I’ve had multiple days that are 6+ hours of no snapshot footage.

I’ve had this doorbell since mid December.

#13

Are you hard wired ? You can buy a plug in adaptor for about $20.

since I have had it installed and the battery charged (took a day as hardwire slow charges) the issue has not happened again.

i got the adaptor from amazon, for the ring 2 and just wired it with out the supplied diode. Works great. The light around the button stays on as well now. Handy at night.

#14

I should’ve stated that. Yes mine is hardwired.

#15

Question, I may have missed this, when you login and view the footage from different devices do you see the same result ?

#16

Primarily just access it via my iphone app. I’ll have to check my ipad later tonight to see.

#17

my suggestion next reboot router/access point. It will choose the best channel. Sadly WiFi world channel traffic is an issue, just spotted it on my network, I’m not having ring issues but my download speeds on a general test sucked.

#18

Just as a precaution, I did reboot my WiFi router. But I have it set for smart connect. So it uses the best signal on the device using either 2.4ghz or 5ghz band.

#19

So question,

is it roughly the similar times daily ?
can you run a ookala speed test on a device from your home location ?
as I said I’ve been noticing some weirdo stuff on my network and blamed ring servers, but now I’m suspecting a wacko connection to wifi intermittently.

do you have WiFi extenders or repeaters ?
they have caused me no end of issues, I have removed them all.

sadly seems to have fixed a lot of glitches.