bpzle

I agree with everything Soundy said but have a couple things to add... A good PTZ and keyboard will cost more than what your budget allows. Save the cash and just buy more cameras. That way you can set the cameras up and forget about them until something happens. PTZs have a cool "neat" factor but they're expensive, break easy with all the moving parts, and you've got better things to do than to sit there zooming around all the time. Save the cash you budgeted for a PTZ and spend it on the DVR... Take a look at the standalone Avermedia EH5216. 16 channel hybrid (analog and IP) recorder. Really a neat unit for the money. Do some creative shopping in the internet, and it won't be much more than what you already budgeted. The unit also has a VGA output so almost any computer LCD with VGA inputs will do. The GUI is pretty good too... remember with DVRs a big portion of what your paying for is the quality of software and the r&d it took to make something that's not a piece of junk. Cheaper units (heck even units around the same price) can't compare to Aver's value and ease of use...

Anything less than 4mm is usually considered a wide angle lens. Anything less than 3mm is considered a super wide angle lens. These are when you start to get that bubbled fish eye effect. Dome style or box style, doesn't matter. Most go with domes in retail as it's more difficult to tell where the camera is aimed. Thus giving the illusion to a theif that they're being watched everywhere. Domes are also more attractive, in my opinion. But box cameras usually have more lens options... We need a whooooooole lot more information before recomending anything... Most importantly, WHAT are you trying to cover? What level of detail do you need? What are the lighting conditions for both day and night? What possible mouting locations are there and how far away will the cameras be mounted from what they need to capture (aka target area)? How high will the cameras be mounted? What is your budget? Don't make the mistake and buy a cheap 16 camera package from an online store or Ebay. You'll be sorry. Let us help you put together something that will be worth while...

Sweet! Nice to hear. Thanks!

Forum rules say don't post prices.. Especially dealer prices. You'll want to edit that info out of the forum, before a mod does it for you. Not to mention do you really want potential customers Google searching your prices and you having to justify your markup?

Can he afford all the additional storage, CPU, and bandwidth requirments??? Seems like there's little benefit there to using cheap NVR software... Not to mention my biggest pet peve with LuxRiot... no pre motion recording. Either you record 24/7 or you'll miss footage!

What NVR software are you using? Are your recording in the native format? Server side recompression?

oh... I was looking at that one a while back... I didn't get it for that very reason. It's cheaper sure but not in the long run when you have to buy the additional storage.

ahhhh... what's the model? no mpeg4 or h264?

Hmmm... You left one thing out: resolution. I'm assuming you mean D1 on all channels? If so, I wouldn't say that's too far off. Obviously calculations are just educated guesses though... Either way, there's lots of online calculators... just search. I havn't seen MPEG compression used in a while... it's pretty ineffecient. The DVR doesn't have MPEG4? Is this something you already have or are you looking at buying it?

I've got plenty of baluns... if only I had some 18/2 laying around....

Your right, but he's a DIYer and don't want to ship him things that may or may not work... I vaguely remembered a thread with someone running multiple analog cams on one coax with something like that... but couldn't find it. That thing is way too expensive for sure! Anything like it but more down to earth? Point to point and a megapixel cam would be cheaper than that!!

Thanks. That's what I thought. I'd like the paper too...but I'm hesitant to burn a couple days of travel time and expenses. Maybe if they come to town...

Anyone taken the Exacq training class to become a "certified installer?" At $250 and a flight accross country, I'm curious if it's worth it to an installer who already understands the basics of IP CCTV... I'm sure the certifcate is pretty... but is it worth it?

why would they leave out such a basic feature? doesn't make sense... That's almost as bad as how LuxRiot doesn't even have pre record. I don't understand how a company who soley makes and develops recording software can't wrap their heads around such baisc feautures that even a $200 DVR has... What good is their software if you have to either record 24/7 or miss valuable footage? I have a big problem with that.

For low budget residential, a lot of guys on here would recomend AVTech... I've used them but just don't really care for them. The software/ user interface is a little quirky to say the least. Support can be can be hard to come by (unless you PM Scorpion hehe). They are 100 percent rebranded and support is entirely dependent on the supplier. It can be hard finding a supplier that really knows the product... I'd spend a little more and get a brand better known, with a much easier user interface and software. Avermedia makes a neat 4 channel unit. EB1304sata I believe. As far as cameras, I don't know any decent dome cameras that could fit the remaining budget... I know lots of great ones, but not in that price range... Maybe other guys on the forum will? However I can recomend the bullet camera ECL-599 from Eclipse CCTV. Excellent for the price... PM me and I can send you demos of the camera and/or DVR.

I've got 2 bids both using Video Insight, all IP cameras. The first bid will have 2x AV3155s. I'd like to sync a single Crown PZM mic to these 2 cameras. The second bid will be 2x ACM3401s. I'd like to sync a single Crown PZM mic to these 2 cameras. Should be pretty easy in theory, what's the best way?

well crap! who else can give a +1 for exacq over VI? man oh man I hate using something for the first time with a client.... that will make me or break me. you guys are sure making it tempting though....

just had an idea.... we're also going to have several other 3401s, regardless of if we get Arecont. I wonder if I could use the audio input on a 3401.... that would get it back to the sever.... but the question is will VI let me strip if from the cam it's coming in with and use it on other feeds?

will do. thanks

tom, pdf is a little clunky on my phone... won't be back to the office for a while. what is that? what are the specs? I really thad my heart set on a sexy 3mp arrecont picture...

+1

The Nuuo mini would have been a neat choice but I need 25 plus channels... Not cost effective to get 2 minis.

The price is right for what I need/ like. I like to build my own servers from Dell and mark that up... Can't do that with Vigil. Or even get a demo for that matter... Havn't had time to play with Exacq... Nuuo is an over priced Aver NVR IMHO... LuxRiot is a joke for $1000 plus cameras... What else is there that's in a reasonable price range?

Maybe VI has some sort of audio capture board??? If so, I wonder how bad the latency is... Is it adjustable? Obviosly the IP cams are going to be delayed quite a bit. I'll have to call them Monday...

What do you mean? As in a true day/ night camera won't work with infared light? This is not true. A TRUE day/ night camera means the camera has an infared filter that automatically pops down over the lens when there are X amount of lummens or less. A day/ night camera is designed to pick up infared light. Cheaper "day/night" cameras will have this filter permently fixed on the lens and will not provide an optimum day time picture.