Ring needs to put out a comprehensive video about what the Car Cam can and can't do

I just received my Ring Car Cam yesterday, and I’m learning what it can and can’t do. The explanation videos and web text on the Ring.com website are too simple and vague.

I spent over an hour with tech support yesterday asking questions like “the 2 GB limit on LTE a month, what does that mean? Is that 2 GB of LTE transmission? Or 2 GB of recordings?” The tech support person didn’t know. There was a lot of checking with other people by the tech and being put on hold. I could list all the questions I had, but that is not the point of this thread. Ring should just lay out what it can and CAN’T do. I’m going to continue my testing. Things like: How do you record an incident on the road while you are driving, and when does the recording start? Is that possible? If it is possible, is there a buffer where it saves a few moments before you start the recording? (I have a lot of questions.)

4 Likes

I completely agree with you. I had the same experience and similar questions the last couple of days. The tech support staff don’t seem trained well on the topics that people have concerns about and their website info is definitely vague and unclear.

If the engine has started it should be recording. that’s been my experience. If there is an incidenden you can use the app to download 20s clip from the recorded video.

Hi neighbors, we appreciate your continued feedback on the Car Cam. I’d be happy to step in and offer some clarification to the questions being asked here. I’d also like to mention that we have a lot of information on the Car Cam on our Help Center, which may be useful to check as you get used to your Car Cam.

2GB Data Limit

The LTE data provided by Ring Protect Go is utilized for everything the Car Cam does when it’s not connected to wifi. This includes Live View, notifications, GPS location, and so on. If you have your Car Cam record a traffic stop while it’s not connected to wifi, the LTE data will be utilized for that recording. Activating the Live View when your Car Cam is not connected to wifi will use the LTE data.

We are also evaluating LTE usage for the Car Cam, and there are no charges for going over 2GB at this time. We anticipate there will be reasonable overage charges at a later date for customers who use more than 2GB – to help keep the subscription affordable for everyone. We will communicate in advance of any overage charges being introduced, and you can opt-in to overages for your device before you would be charged.

Videos and Traffic Stop

Drive events automatically begin recording at the beginning of a drive and are always stored locally. Unlike a motion event, no notifications are sent when a drive event has started. Driving video can be accessed directly from your Event History or Timeline in the Ring App. I’d highly recommend referencing this Help Center article to see a breakdown of the different types of events that your Car Cam can record, and how they are categorized within the Ring app.

As for the Traffic Stop feature, you can see a breakdown of that here. The feature is turned off by default. To enable the feature, select the Traffic Stop tile in the Ring app and toggle it on. Once enabled, just say “Alexa, record.” to begin recording a critical event. Traffic Stop will capture the scene for up to 20 minutes, and will automatically stop once you’re back on the road. If you start driving before the event ends, Traffic Stop will seamlessly transition into a Drive recording shortly after the vehicle starts moving again.

How about a simple pdf user manual? I have to look everywhere to try to piece together how to operate this thing.

2 Likes

Absolutely! It is ridiculous that there is no user manual for this and everything has to be discovered by trial and error. Very poor launch.

Caitlyn_Ring notes: “Traffic Stop will capture the scene for up to 20 minutes, and will automatically stop once you’re back on the road. If you start driving before the event ends, Traffic Stop will seamlessly transition into a Drive recording shortly after the vehicle starts moving again.”

This statement is incorrect. The Traffic Stop does not transition into a Drive recording shortly after the vehicle starts moving again.

On my Traffic Stop test, with the car stopped and Traffic Stop activated, I started driving 29 seconds after Traffic Stop was initiated, the cam recorded and tagged “Traffic Stop” Local Storage a full 20 minutes in the Ring app and uploads the first 5 minutes of the Traffic Stop to the Cloud using LTE connection. The Traffic Stop transitions from Traffic Stop to Drive after 20 minutes of driving.

Also note, the Traffic Stop Local Storage will be deleted and overwritten. However, the initial 5 minutes of the Traffic Stop in the Cloud remains and is not deleted until the Cloud storage setting period, i.e., Control Center > Video Management> Video Storage Time.

2 Likes

Amazing!
I have been a Mac user since 1984. Before that, Xerox electronic typers, early 1980s fax machines… Every single device I have ever tested or used had at least a basic guide of some sort. The Ring Car Cam arrived without a single picture, much less a drawing, on how it looks installed. After a few hours of digging around (I used to create web pages for commercial furniture manufacturers), I finally found enough stuff to get started. Got far enough today to plug in the camera and start to run the install.

Don’t know what sort of ‘map’ is supposed to locate me - I live in a well defined area of a city in the Miami, Florida, metro area, well located by Google and Apple maps - and finally got past the location process when it came to the connecting to my Wi-Fi for backup purposes. That’s where everything has been stuck for the last 4 hours - “Connecting to your Car Cam…” Finally unplugged the cam from the power cord.But when I want to stop the extra process of “Connecting to [my] Car Cam…” the warning “Are you sure you want to cancel setup? If you stop now, you won’t be able to use your Car Cam.”

And JUST EXACTLY WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? No way to locate an answer. Anywhere I can find.
Suggestions?
Thank you.

This topic was automatically closed 30 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.