'ZDNET Recommends': What exactly does it mean?
ZDNET's recommendations are based on many hours of testing, research, and comparison shopping. We gather data from the best available sources, including vendor and retailer listings as well as other relevant and independent reviews sites. And we pore over customer reviews to find out what matters to real people who already own and use the products and services we’re assessing.
When you click through from our site to a retailer and buy a product or service, we may earn affiliate commissions. This helps support our work, but does not affect what we cover or how, and it does not affect the price you pay. Neither ZDNET nor the author are compensated for these independent reviews. Indeed, we follow strict guidelines that ensure our editorial content is never influenced by advertisers.
ZDNET's editorial team writes on behalf of you, our reader. Our goal is to deliver the most accurate information and the most knowledgeable advice possible in order to help you make smarter buying decisions on tech gear and a wide array of products and services. Our editors thoroughly review and fact-check every article to ensure that our content meets the highest standards. If we have made an error or published misleading information, we will correct or clarify the article. If you see inaccuracies in our content, please report the mistake via this form.
Soliom S600 security camera review: pan and tilt with a spotlight to light your way home
Solion S600 security camera
pros and cons
- 320 degree pan
- Solar panel and 9000mAh battery
- Integrated spotlight
- No zoning for blocking off areas
- No time schedule settings
The Soliom S600 outdoor security camera has a lot of features for its sub-$160 price and is on a par with far more expensive cameras.
The S600 has a pan and tilt that will ensure that all of the space you want to monitor is covered. it will pan through 320 degrees horizontally and tilt 90 degrees vertically with a field of view of 160 degrees, and zoom into images up to 3x using its digital zoom
Inside the box there is the camera, solar panel, USB cable, fixing screws to attach the camera and a template for the screw holes. There is also a user manual.
It is a large camera – dimensions are 28.6 cm x 19.8 cm x 16.8 cm and it has a solar panel included which not only captures the rays of the sun, but also acts to keep the rain off the camera when it is pouring down.
The solar panel means that you do not need to connect the cameras to any wires. First, charge the camera's 9000mAh battery using the USB cable – in case it is not sunny when you install the camera.
Connect to yoiur 2.4GHz Wi-Fi network, and pair it to your mobile device using the QR code. The S600 set up process, like other security cameras I have tried, was really easy – have no complaints there.
The S600 is flexible in its storage too. You can choose to save all videos onto the micro SD card in the camera (not supplied)– up to 64GB in size, or for 30 days at $1.99, or for $16.99 per year you can take advantage of Soliom's cloud storage option.
Top ZDNET Reviews
Video is 1080p HD resolution at 15fps. The camera has a built in microphone and speaker so you can talk to visitors.
The camera has a PIR detector with a range of up to 18 feet to trigger the camera. This gives minimal false positives and activates the night vision camera which gives a good image of up to 32ft via its two infrared LEDs for night time vision.
The camera also has four white light LEDs which act as a super bright spotlight when it senses an object approaching..
My only niggles with the camera was that where I positioned it – the top corner included a view of the road – and every time a car went past, I got an alert. It would be lovely if I could block off one part of the image so the camera would not pick up movement in one specific area.
Cameras such as the Netvue Vigil do this and I found it a really useful feature. It would only take a software update to create this feature for the S600 – which would be really useful for those of us living in towns, or near busy roads.
You can not set a time schedule for motion detection either so I am alerted to anyone approaching the house – even when I am in it.
Apart from these small gripes, the Soliom S600 is a nice feature–rich camera with a superb spotlight to light up my drive – with the added bonus of a flexible pan and tilt option.
At under $160 the S600 can function as an intruder alert system, a monitoring camera and a two-way talk door alert system. I like this camera a lot.