buellwinkle

License plates are one of the hardest things to capture and there are cameras specifically made for this purpose called LPR cameras. I have never tried one outside a trade show floor, so can't recomend one but the good ones are great at capturing plates and can cost $1,500 on up. Messoa was to supposed to release an IP camera to do this, but I have not seen it yet, the problem with attending trade shows, they show you stuff you can't get for a year, or maybe never. The closest thing that may work is a camera with awesome WDR capabilities as you are working against two issues, at night, you have headlights and taillights that blow out the license plate area that is much dimmer, so you see a black spot where the plate is, the other is license plates are highly reflective, so if you shine a light, like an IR LED at the plate, it will reflect back to the camera and come out white. Speed ironically is not an issue because you have to capture the plates as close to perpindicular to the plate as possible, so no side shots of the car. If you can't see the plate with your eyes from where you want to mount the camera, you will not see it with the camera. The best I've personally used that will do that is the ACTi KCM-5611, about $800 street. Awesome 2MP camera, 18x zoom, autofocus, IR illuminator. Still, cheaper than a decent LPR camera. If you go with ACTi, they provide really good NVR software for recording for free (up to 16 cameras). Most LPR cameras have long telephoto lenses as you don't want to capture much more than the license plate area and they are not intended to be camaera used to monitor an area, you will need a seperate camera for that and the Dahua you mention will do well for that. But if you stick with ACTi camera, the NVR software is free, if you mix brands, you are limited in what will work with Dahua. Ethernet cable is cheap, you can get a 1,000' spool for about $60 for indoor grade, maybe $180 for burial grade. Then get a bag of rj45 connectors and a crimper and cable tester for $20 and you are set. Run the wires where you want, crimp on the connectors as needed. If you have crimp-a-phobia, you can buy pre-made cables from Monoprice.com here in So Cal, they sell up to 100' cables, pretty cheap, like $10-12 last time I looked. The problem is now you have to deal with the rj45 connector as you feed wires through walls, makes it harder and I would end breaking the springy thing on the back of the rj45, so I would end up crimping a new one on anyway.

Not a cost issue, but if I was buying a system for 8 cameras, I would buy a switch capable of 8 PoE ports and not use the 4 PoE ports regardless of which NVR I got and for me, the #1 reason would be not wanting 9 Ethernet cables behind my TV or NVR.

The switch can be any speed, but the cameras are 100mbps, so the network runs at 100mbps, even if the switch and NVR supports Gige, it's irrelavent. When you connect via TCP/IP, there's autonegotiation that's done between the devices to come up with the lowest common denominator. For example, if one device is 100Mbps, MTU 900, the NVR is 1,000Mbps, MTU of 1500, it will autonegotiate to take the lowest common denominator, so the it will take the 100Mbps because that's the fastest that device will go, it will take MTU 1500 because that's the fastest the other device will go. The issue to me is cable placement as #1, the second issue is having a seperate switch for half the cameras, seems untidy, but it will work, but all the cameras will send via a single connection from switch to switch, not perfect but it will work. Even if the internal switch is a router makes no difference, you can still plug the NVR and the cameras into an external switch.

Really, that's funny because their Alibaba price are much lower, like $20, it's all a trick to make you contact them and I hope you did. If you find someone cheaper that is legit, let me know, I hate it when I have to pay more than others I can tell you of a place that is lower priced, but you probably won't like their terms, like 48 unit minimum per camera model (even at the lens, for example say you want 2.8mm and 3.6mm, then you have to buy 48 of each).

Their IR domes, at least the 3MP I have sitting next to me in my office is bad, same as the 1.3MP I reviewed. It gets a halo from the IR lights, don't know why. If I hold the camera straight out in my hand it doesn't do it, if I mount it seems to reflect back somehow and cause this. I helped one person with this problem and he has light colored eaves like me and he had to mount much lower and away from the eave to solve the problem. Also, doesn't seem to focus as sharp as say my 3MP Dahua bullet, again, same problem other's have mentioned. You can get it better than the way they are shipped from China, but not perfect and I like a real crisp image. BTW, the 2MP minidome has the same issue, sort of sharp in the center, not so sharp towards the edge, at least not like the bullets. They claimed to have fixed this issue with their new 2MP IR Dome and those just became available, just haven't heard from anyone if they are better. I played with it briefly and I didn't see the halo but I didn't have physical access to the camera. The even have a model with motorized focus and varifocal, but I found it tedious, doesn't focus perfectly and you have to tap the + and - buttons to get it close, frankly, I would just get the manual focus. It's not great like the Axis P33, it's more like the frustrations I had focusing the Brickcom with the same feature. I'll review the new 2MP mini-bullet as soon as I can get my hands on one. The NVR is a personal choice, just trying to give you my reason why I don't the NVR and the switch in the same location. I assume that people that want to buy the NVR solution want to plug it into a monitor/TV via HDMI as the web interface is poor and most people don't take to PSS. If I have a TV and there's already a bunch of wires running to it for other reasons, DVD player, cable box, XBox, whatever, not sure I want to run all my ethernet there too. Then what if I change my mind on where the TV goes, do I have to re-run all my Ethernet? So I believe all the Ethernet cables should go to a closet, especially in a business environment and that's where you put the PoE switch, battery backup that I'm sure you'll want, phone systems may go in there as well as any central server and backup disks. Sure, you can put the NVR there, but then it's not easy to use with a TV mounted elswhere as you need the mouse to control it. You will put that NVR where you think it should go, then the owner's wife will tell you she wants it elsewhere a month later and you'll have to re-run all the wires.

I don't have the camera side by side to compare, so can't answer that. Their software is free for up to 16 cameras per PC, so if you have say 24, you can install it on 2 PCs. Uses very little CPU as the cameras handle the motion detection so you can use lower end PCs, like an i3 should be fine. What I like about it is you can scrub the timeline to find the recorded event you want and as you scrub it displays one or a bunch of cameras in real time all at the same time. You can also use the alarm inputs from the camera to trigger recording. Export to AVI is super easy, just mark the start and the end and click to save to AVI. The product was written to work the same from the web browser as the local client software and I don't even install the client software. Very well done. Comes with a free IOS app. Downside is that it only runs on Windows, a pain for me because I travel with my Macbook Air, but I run Windows and IE for other reasons on VMWare, so not a huge inconvenience. I would pay for the software if it supported other brands of cameras.

Try the ACTi cubes, comes in 1, 3 & 5MP, I believe all under $300. D11, E11, E12, E13. All have CS mount lens, just unscrew it and put whatever lens you want. It has a tripod mount but on the back, so you may be able to use it that or use the included mount and rig it to work. Most cube are like this, including the Axis cubes like the M1014 (1MP, maybe $200 ish), another good choice but not an interchangeable lens, so you may have to use your feet to zoom in and out. If you are just continuous recording, just get something like a Hero HD3 and record for a couple of hours to an SD card, maybe more if you lower it to 720P and lower the frame rate. It is so tiny, it's crazy and the new one is WiFi.

That's not true, maybe he can't get it work with his router but any router that supports NATing can do it by forwarding the local port number to a different external one. For example, at my lake house, we have several cameras, all set the factory settings of port 80. I use a Linksys router with DD-WRT software and I configure that port 80 on one camera is port 8081 to the outside world, and the next camera's port 80 is port 8082 to the outside world. I can't tell you which routers do this, I know any router with DD-WRT installed works and my U-Verse router that I got from AT&T, don't even know the brand works. My Netgear router does not and many consumer grade, buy at Best Buy type routers probably don't. You can pickup cheap routers on eBay with DD-WRT already installed.

3G may be too slow, and 4G with a major carrier has become a pain because they don't expose the WAN address that accessible from the internet. I called Verizon and they wanted $400 one time fee to setup a fixed IP address, so it's possible, just someting to consider. It should work fine as you are only doing D1 resolution. You can also limit the frame rate on a alternate stream and use only h.264 compression to minimize your data usage. You'll need to get a broadband router. We use a cradlepoint and the 4G USB stick plops in there and you have a router.

Sweet, love to see the image quality. Competition is good, drives up quality and drives down prices.

The traffic will not be on your router, don't understand why you are worried. The traffic will be contained by the switch. All the cameras, and the NVR will be on a single switch, the NVR plugs into a TV via HDMI. You don't even need to connect anyting to your router. You do realize the hdb3200C are day cameras, can't use IR, you'll have to have pretty decent white lights on at night to capture anything. Even with street lights, may be marginal performance. I would wait until next year, the year of the Snake and get the hfw3200s due out next month. Same sensor, but has IR leds and is a day/night camera. I do like those hdw2100, cool little cameras. The reason for avoiding the NVR with the built in PoE switch is now you have 2 seperate switches, meaning 4 + NVR are on one internal switch, 4 on another so any traffic from one switch will feed into the other, all through a 100Mbps straw. Besides, the price of the 16 port switch vs 8 port may be $50 (when on sale). The other issue is wiring. I like to have my router and switches in one place, the NVR may be totally somewhere else and I want the option to move it and moving it may mean moving 9 ethernet cables, ouch. Just looks cleaner than having an NVR under a TV with 9 ethernet wires coming out behind the TV which already has it's own set of wires to deal with.

ACTi had a promotion on their new 1MP indoor dome last week, the D51, really cheap, retail they are going for under $200. B&H had them for $177, but if you are buying from a distributor, they are obviously less but I don't want to quote wholesale prices here. The equivalent Axis would be the M32 and M32 series, comes in 1MP but a little pricier than the ACTi, about $400ish. The E84 for $600 will be a bargain. That sensor is one of the best I've tested. They will also have the bullet version, the E44, my guess about the same price. As for the TCM-1111, I have not received an EOL notice for that camera and I get all the notices. Nice small camera, priced well, under $300 retail at many places. I believe it's replacement sort of is the E31, about the same price. You lose a little resoluton (1.3 to 1) but you gain WDR and faster frame rate. The E41 is more like the TCM-1231 replacement with a varifocal lens and more features, my guess in that same $500 street price range.

First understand that regardless of how many 2MP cameras you have, you are limited to 120FPS on that NVR, so 8 cameras can only run at a max of 15 fps and you have obviously have to get the NVR that supports 8 cameras. I would not get the model with 4 PoE ports, or models with a P suffix. Just get their standard 8 port NVR and buy a nice 16 port PoE switch, I like the Zyxel ES1100-16P, catch it on sale and last week it was $99 (not today). To record 8 2MP cameras, say at 15 fps each continously will be exciting. It supports two hard drives, I would recomend as huge a drive as you can afford, at least 3TB hard drives. That should give you a week or two of recording time. Now you want to connect this to his house so he can view remotely. Does he have complete line of site? If so, I would recomend Ubquiti Nanostation 5 or Engenius Tech, both lower end solution, not WiFi that are under $100 per side. These are outdoor bridges, not routers, don't know of any WiFi routers that will go 400yds, I have trouble getting mine to work 14 yds in my house. You plug in one of these into your switch (non-PoE) and then plug the other one into his home network. If you don't have complete line of site (and I mean a tree branch in the way can make it non-line of site), then you can try 900Mhz, more expensive, slower, interferance issues, but has better penetration.

So you want a 2MP outdoor dome with IR and day/night capabiltiies for the price of a Vivotek 1MP indoor mini-dome without IR or even day/night capabilities? Tall order there, not sure we are even in the same ballpark. At the moment, Axis does not have an outdoor dome with IR illuminators, maybe soon, but not yet. Also, they don't do 2MP domes, don't know why, but you can get 1,3 & 5MP. They do have outstanding low light performance in their 1MP dome. When they do, it will be the P3364-LVE with 1MP (720P) and my wild guess is it will be about $800 street. ACTi is in the same boat, they have a really good 2MP IR vandal dome due to come out this month called the E84. Don't know pricing but I'm assuming it displaces their aging TCM-7811 dome with low light performance which was priced at about $700 street. Currently, they don't have a 2MP dome, they have 1.3 and 4. Personally, not a huge fan of IR domes as they tend to have IR light bleed issues. Sometimes it's torrelable when the camera is new, but as the donut that seperates the lens from the LEDs ages, the situation may get worse.

Absolutely, I know Axis and ACTi have excellent service and support. Also, many of the newer cameras are coming in at a pretty good price point. For example. Axis has a 5MP 360 degree camera for about $500 and ACTi has megapixel indoor domes they recently introduced for well under $200. Also, both Axis and ACTi provide free software that is better than Vivoteks. Axis AAC does not require a PC to record, it can go straight to NAS so you can factor in the costs savings of NVR software and dedicated server. ACTi NVR 3.0 is one of the best NVR software products I've used. I don't know anything about Bosch.

ACTi told me they test the cameras in freezers to test for operating range, so if it's rated for 14F, and temps go to 10F, you are on your own. But I see this all the time on webcams in our local mountains in So Cal (was -2F last week in Big Bear, yes in So Cal) and they freeze, stop working, then come back to life during the day as they thaw out.

I had a camera company ship my camera to another customer, so maybe I'm more paranoid than most but if they don't accept walk ins then it is what it is. At least you know that ground UPS only takes a day anyway.

Nice, heck you could have driven over, aren't they in the O.C.?

You have been a very busy googler. From the choices you provided, Red5 is a known product that will restream RTSP from most IP cameras and restream it as flash. It's open source, meaning free. I tried it once and couldn't get anywhere with it. It requires you do develop code to do what you want in their language. I tried for a few hours and got nowhere, but that doesn't mean you can't do it. It would be cool if you got it working and provided us a primer on how to do it. The Vivotek solution requires you a) have a Vivotek camera, b) all your viewers have Windows and IE. Click2Stream, heck yeah, any re-streaming service is best like ustream.tv and many others. Seems too cheap at $30/mo, but why not. You can try the free version, not sure if they let you embed for that price as it says that only for the $30/mo plan or the $5/mo plan (single user). FMS - Flash Live Video Encoder, the encoder is free, FMS to run it on is $995 for the standard edition, $5K for the pro version, get the pro, you can't go wrong unless well, you want to view the website from an IOS or Android tablet that does not support Flash, just saying. I think everyone will soon throw out their IOS and Android tablets and buy the Microsoft Surface just so they can run Flash, I know it. Too bad Microsoft was the only tablet company that couldn't afford a booth at the CES this year, I guess they didn't think their new products needed explaining. Have you seen the Canon cameras, the Cannon VB-C50i specifically, does all you want, built into the camera. You can embed the video as a java player. Allows people to control the zoom for one minute, pretty nice camera and affordable, well kidding on that last part, but it does what you want. Here's a sample website - http://www.geddys.com/geddycams/videocam/

The lens on that camera has about 1/8" clearance from the dome to the edge of the lens. If it's a little close, say 1/16th of an inch, it will probably still work, if it's 1/16th of an inch too short, the rubber donut on top of the lens will not seal properly. If it's more than an 1/8" longer the dome will not close. I think it's risky proposition. Search ebay for a 2.8-12mm varifocal auto iris mega and you'll find a small amount, 2 at the moment and see how both lenses are completely different sizes and shapes, how will you know which fits? Do you buy all of them? What if none fit? what if you find the right height but the diameter is off, then the rubber donut doesn't fit? Your best bet may be to sell the camera on eBay and get something else that suits you. The Axis P33 series comes in what they call 6mm, meaning it has a 2.5mm-6mm lens and is available in various resolutions like 1M, 3MP and 5MP. I know it costs more, but it's a much better camera.

Wow, I've been asking for a long time how to get a single snapshot and even Dahua could not tell me. My second Wow is there's no security at all. You just enter the URL, hit enter, and you see a snapshot, no password, no userid, just a picture. As for FTP, very few cameras can effectively manage this from the camera and the only two I know of is Mobotix and Axis cameras that support Edge recording. You can a with Dahua, but not easy. Try their PSS software to view the recordings.

Varifocal lenses are considerable fatter than fixed lenses, so technically it will fit, but realistically you would just have a huge mess because the IR illuminators would reflect back in that gap and you would get a mess. But during the day it should be fine. BTW, for some reason, on Dahua cameras, you can't turn the IR leds off. You could in theory create a foam ring to seperate the two but it may be futile.

That is good service, good to know.

True, only the 1MP camera has Lightfinder at the moment. So the choice would be to include illuminators, of course, that may look worse than a bullet cam with built in illuminators. Although you may be able to hide illuminators, for example, I have one in a pot with roses growing out of it. Also, external illuminators can carry further, be brighter, more light = less noise and more detail. Also, domes with illuminators are never perfect with light bleed, some are close, none are 100% immune to some reflections on the curved surface. WDR implementations vary not only by manufacturer, but even different models within the same manufacturer as new technologies come out. I had one of ACTi's first WDR cameras, the TCM-1231 and it had lousy WDR, more the equivalent of turning contrast down. The KCM-5611 has their latest WDR and it works great, don't even know it's on except you get good detail in the shadows and can read plates at night with headlights on. Don't know if their new 1080P bullet and dome that will use the same sensor will also have the same WDR capabilities.

First, what are your goals? Do you just want to see that there's a car in the driveway or a car drove by, that there's 4 people standing in front of you home or do you want to be able recognize someone you already know or be able to ID them? Looking at the lens calculator, with the camera in the front, say it has a 2.8mm focal length, 720P, you should be able to recognize someone about 10' away, ID them in 5'. To me, that front camera is an overall event camera to see things happening but not to ID someone. The rear makes more sense as you have 2 cameras covering the same area as one single front camera. Maybe a pair of 3MP will get you to the point you can ID someone at 20' with say a 3.6mm, or recognize someone at 30-35'. To me the rear is more important to protect as that's where I believe most theives would enter from.