Amazon has temporarily stopped taking orders for the Blink XT2 smart camera that it launched last month. The XT2, which is Blink’s first new camera since Amazon acquired the company, is listed as “currently unavailable” for purchase. That applies to all configurations, including the single camera and multicamera kits. The Verge has reached out to Amazon for comment. Best Buy, which also carries the new camera, simply lists it as “coming soon” online, but some people have been able to buy it at their local stores.
Early customer reviews for the $89.99 Blink XT2 have been extremely mixed, with some buyers complaining of poor maximum range between the camera and their router, buggy software, and inconsistent movement detection. It seems that Amazon and Blink are aware of the situation, as some customers have updated their reviews to say that they’ve heard from the companies directly in the weeks since launch.
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“I got an email from the founder of Blink letting me know they are working on the unexpected issues and are very willing to work with me to get this figured out,” Gary H. wrote. Another customer praises the numerous software updates that Blink has apparently released to address some — but not all — of the early issues.
The XT2 is advertised as offering two-year battery life on a pair of AA batteries, free cloud storage (with no subscription plan required), 1080p video recording, two-way voice talk support, and Alexa compatibility.
Not all reviews have been bad. Dave Zatz published some positive first impressions of the Blink XT2 over at Zatz Not Funny, which is worth the read if you want to know more about what the XT2 can do and how it compares to similar cameras on the market.
Amazon has plenty of other options for home cameras to sell in the meantime, from the Amazon Cloud Cam to Ring’s smart camera lineup.
This article is from The Verge
