Go Live Hit Or Miss
Recently put up two cell trail cameras on some out of state hunting property. One is a Spartan Go Live. The other is a Reconyx. Both cameras are in sight of a Verizon cell tower. Verizon signal strength at home is good to excellent. Really pleased with the Spartan camera, particularly the Go Live function ….. when it works. When Go Live does not work, I also am not able to request that the camera take a picture. When I attempt to activate the Go Live feature, I get a pop up that says Go Live is not available. The take a pic option disappears from the list of options. The Go Live function will magically start working later in the day. While the Reconyx does not take video, it has never failed to take a pic when requested.
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Is the problem that the Live button isn’t green or that you request to go live and you get an error message? If the button isn’t green, try closing/reopening the app and/or logging out and back in.
If the problem is that the button is green but you get an error message, are you trying again?
What SD card are you using in the camera? (Picture if you have one, maybe from a web site?) -
Live button is grayed out. When Live button is green, everything works fine. I have tried repeatedly to close and reopen app. Doesn’t seem to do anything. I just come back to the Spartan app later in the day and it is green. The SD card is one that came with the camera from trailcampro.
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The SD card may or may not be to spec. The ones I got with a couple of Reconyx cameras are not to spec for Spartans but that was over a year ago. I don’t know what SD card they are including.
Did you try logging out and back in? For me, closing and reopening the app usually works but I’ve seen people say they needed to log out and back in. I don’t know whether it will make any difference but it’s worth trying.
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I have the Reconyx and Spartan apps on an iPhone and an iPad. The camera is 900 miles away so I don’t have access to the SD card. However I think it is a Sandisk 32GB. It is the same SD card that I am currently running in 10 other cameras. I have tried deleting and reinstalling the app. Works sometimes, but not always.
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Spartan doesn’t ship SD cards with the cameras. That’s a “perk” from TrailCamPro. The ones I was sent were SanDisk class 10, but 48 MB/s. That’s fine for the cameras they were sent for but I quit using that speed in my Spartans. I use 80 MB/s or a little faster.
It may not be the SD card, but SD cards do cause a lot of problems. It’s worth trying to format the SD card from the app. -
I think it was black and red. I am almost certain that the cards in all of my other cameras is black and red. The ones sold on trailcampro are black and red. I reformatted the sd card this morning. The Live View was working this morning before I reformatted the card and is still working. I am planning on replacing several of my non cell cameras with cellular. I really like the Spartan Go live camera but simply can’t live with 6-8 cameras that only work sometimes. I currently have the Spartan set up to actively monitor a two acre food plot… basically as a manually activated plot watcher. I need to be able to activate GoLive at peak activity times. When Go Live doesn’t work, I also can’t use the take a pic function. So, for that period, the camera is useless.
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Tom, are you always in the same location when trying it? When the live button isn't green then for some reason the signal is poor between your phone, server and/or the camera. One thing you can do until we figure out why it's acting up is use start/stop times and time lapse to monitor those plots. Basically tell the camera to send you pics at a certain time interval during specific times. Be sure that your start/stop times incorporate all 24hrs of the day. Any time outside of those start/stop windows and the camera is basically off.
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I second Johnny's suggestion to use start-stop times with time lapse. That's actually better than relying on manual take photo. You won't have to remember or think to take a photo, you'll get them at whatever interval you specify. This is especially helpful if you are running several cameras. You'll get those photos automatically.
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Not always in the same place. Same thing occurred shortly after I set up the camera, while I was still on the out of state property. I assumed I had set something up improperly so I went to the camera and went through the entire process of checking settings and rearming camera. Starting working so I declared success. Stopped working a day or two later while I was still on property. I was tied up on other work so did not immediately go to the camera. Magically, it starting working again without me doing anything ….. other than maybe turning Go Live off and on. Left the property a day or two later, and the camera has been pretty much the same thing. Will work long enough for me to think the problem has gone away …. only to come back and stay down for several hours. Interesting that it is down on both my phone and iPad at the same time. I will check out using start stop times with time lapse. I will Lao look into the faster speed SD cards.
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Tom,
It's likely the camera, not the apps, but sometimes getting out and back into the apps resets the connection with the server.
I don't use the live feature on mine much and almost every time if the Live button isn't green, closing and opening the app gets the Live button back so I don't have much experience with the live feature not being available, other than it was dicey during Ida. The cameras were taking and sending photos, but my phone and iPad and the cameras didn't have good enough signal to live stream.
You may want to talk to support. 770-582-0004 9 AM - 6 PM Eastern M-F
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Too early to declare success but camera has been working great for the lat 24 hours …… basically since I remotely reformatted the SD card. I am almost certain that I formatted the card when I installed the camera but I have had brain farts in the past. Will provide another update tomorrow. Thanks for everyone’s assistance.
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Overdue update. Still have issues from time to time with Go Live button grayed out …. Go Live not available. Problem seems to occur less frequently than when I first put up the camera but may be that I have just accepted that the issue is going to occur and quickly move on to deleting and reinstalling the app …. which almost always corrects the problem. I purchased an additional camera to see if the problem was the first camera as some had suggested. I was very meticulous with the set up on this camera and also used a higher speed SD card. Problem occurs with both cameras and on an iPhone and an iPad. Have decided to use the Spartan cameras where I can benefit from the live streaming capability and use Reconyx cameras where I have used traditional trail cameras. The one Reconyx cell camera I have out has worked flawlessly. It just does not have video capability and, based on reviews, I have concerns about battery life.
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im having the exact same issue . go live would not connect. i drove all the way back to where i put camera like 70 miles from home. i got to wendys to grab a burger, while i was waiting i clicked golive and it then decided to connect!!!!!!!!! i continued to camera location added external battery and solar panel . checked golive agin several times and it was working. i drive back home few hrs later. i try when im home and here we go back to not working again!!!!!!!!! i request a photo its stuck on stupid and has not sent it. if this worked as it was designed to it would be fabulous but is is very quirky! my cellular quality is 21
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Richard, is it working today? I did hear of some random issues yesterday so maybe there was something going on. If not has it ever worked from your house? I'm wondered if there's something up with the signal there. Maybe try it with your phone wifi turned on and off and see if that makes a difference.
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My problem has not been resolved. Last contact with Spartan support suggested that they were aware of the problem and that it seemed to occur most frequently with the apple iPhone. I have the same problem with my iPhone and iPad. I have three cameras and have the problem with all three cameras. Frequency of the problem is the same whether I am at home …. 900 miles from the cameras or at the hunting property where the cameras and my iPhone/IPad are both within sight of a Verizon cell tower. Spartan support gave me no indication if/when the problem would be resolved. My workaround is to delete and reload the app.
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I failed to mention that Spartan support felt the problem was with the app. Makes sense given the problem occurs with different cameras and different smart phones. For me, it occurs with the same frequency with a near perfect signal and a marginal signal. The common factor is the app. Just curious, you have Verizon or ATT?
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