buellwinkle

If it's just one camera, BlueIris can't be that bad. Milestone will give you a single camera license of their pro-level product for free, so if it's just one camera, you can try that. Not sure Milestone will be anymore efficient than BlueIris though.

Are they both in color? Does the Bosch switch to B&W with an IR cut filter? Is the M12 switching to it's B&W night lens?

The way the warranty works, if you have any trouble at all with your Dahua camera, any, you just throw it in the garbage and buy a new one, no questions asked.

How big is that file? I tried but after about 200MB the download died. Do you just have a JPEG image from each to see?

Axis makes a popular low cost encoder, the M7001 which has a BNC connector on one end for composite video in and Ethernet on the other side. There probably are those that have DVI, Component, HDMI out there but not aware of them. I know with the Axis name, it will work with just about any NVR software out there. http://www.axis.com/products/cam_m7001/index.htm

Haha, that's funny. Don't forget, you get 1TB drive for each NVR, so having two means 2TB of storage. Just have to have them connected to 2 different TVs, assuming you have them at 2 locations or just view them via a PC with PSS running on it.

I mount my cameras to my soffit but mine are solid 1" wood. I know in some homes, it's just a decorative vinyl product and of course, you can't suspend a camera from that, hence what Sawbones did and added support. Don't worry about the angle of the soffit, for example if you are putting it on a pitched roof soffit as I have, the camera has adjustment to compensate for that. The problem I had with the p33 was it's size, too short compared to other vandal domes, so I had to add a 1" thick piece of wood behind to lower the camera so wasn't blocked by my facia board. You could also mount it flush with the wall under the soffit and they also make mounts where the mount attaches to the wall and the camera mounts under that facing down. I had to used that at some locations to avoid using the max angle on the lens. In domes, when you push the limits and use the edge of the dome, sometimes that part of the dome is not as clear & sharp as the middle of the dome. Sure, you can be in denial and say Axis makes pefect domes, but nobody does. Here's an Axis outdoor Q60 dome (cost thousands more than your P33) on this website - http://www.sundiegolive.com/ Take a look when he zooms in on the city, the tops of the buildings are a little blury, that's what you want to avoid

You can do as you describe with Axis P33 cameras using the free Axis Camera Companion (ACC). The others, not so much and you'll need a full blow NVR or NVR software that supports all your cameras brands. Some software like ExacqVision will allow the cameras to do motion detection, but record at the NVR or software. Most NVR's or NVR software does the motion detection and recording at the NVR.

Exacq works great if they support your specific camera and firmware level. Updating the camera firmware alone can make it stop working. I tried a variety of cameras and even though they supported most Axis camera, I could not get all to work. They didn't officially support my Panasonic BL-C230 pan/tilt camera but it worked. So testing before buying as you have done is the smartest thing to do. Also, found they absolutely refused to help me unless the specific camera was on their list. For example, they had a few Dahua models listed, but I had a different model, they would not help me at all.

I don't know any authorized Dahua resellers in Canada. I was referring to Dahua resellers in China and don't know what trade agreements exist between China and Canada. Between China and the U.S. we have free trade, there's no tarrifs, taxes, VAT or anything we have to pay outside what the seller in China is charging. I can send you contact info for a reseller in China if you want.

Does it seem off? I can get a comperable Dahua system with an 8 channel NVR and 4 1080P cameras for about $850 shipped. What advantages make this system worth $2,000? That's been the problem with SDI cameras, the DVRs are way overpriced and can't compete with networked cameras and NVRs. If they get the price of the DVR's down to $200-300, then they may have a product.

I never had issues with Axis support. I think the policy is more in place to punish the reseller by removing their partner status which worsens their discount levels. Ironically, the best IOS/Android apps come from the lesser known brands like AVTech and Dahua that allow you to not only live view cameras, but also view recordings. IPCamViewer is my favorite, but as most, you can only view the camera live.

I agree it's not perfectly smooth, but honestly, have not found a camera that's perfect in this area. It could just be the way they convert from their proprietory format to a common format. When you watch the cameras live, it's perfect.

ACTi said late January for the 1080P IR dome. Axis did say last year but didn't release it yet. When I ask, it's any day now, so your guess is as good as mine. IR domes are the hardest of cameras to get right and this is their first. If you use the Synology as a NAS, then like Groucho says, you don't pay the fee.

You don't need a dedicated PC with Axis Camera Companion as the P33 cameras write directly to a NAS or SD card. You only need to run the software when you want to setup a new camera or view the cameras or recordings, but you can do what I do on a Mac, run VMWare Fusion or Parallels with Windows. i leave Windows running all the time and rarely reboot my Macbook Air. When I have to do something on Windows, it's just a quick click on the program icon and with Fusion Unity, only a single window opens, not the entire Windows desktop. ACC is free vs. $50/camera for Synology camera licenses.

The M1114-e is a good camera, but no IR cut filter. The P33 will be a good camera, solidly built, day/night IR cut filter, motorized varifocal and focus, WDR, audio in/out, alarm i/o. They are coming out soon with a version with built in illuminators. At about the same time, ACTi will have their low-light dome with similar features but will be 1080P, double the Axis dome and probably priced in the M1114-e range. Hopefully I can get both at the same time for a bake-off.

I no longer have the NVR, but I would think that you can use the NVR to view the cameras via the network using PSS. PSS is their CMS software for viewing the cameras and recordings from a PC. The problem I have with 4 PoE ports on the NVR is I don't want the rats nest of wires by my TV. I put the NVR under the TV where it's connected via the HDMI cable and it was connected to my network via single cable. Just a personal preference. I can move the NVR to any TV and only need a single network connection, with the P version, I would have to move 5 Ethernet connections along with the NVR.

The P33 can look straight out/down. You can use any NAS with this camera if you use the free Axis Camera Companion but it requires Windows to run. You can wait for the p3364-lve coming out soon that has an IR illuminator built in. If you want to save some money, ACTi is coming out with a 1080P low light dome with illuminators, probably cost 2/3rd the Axis but double the resolution. Samsung i would not get. Mixing brands only matters if you want to use the company's software, for example, if you think you may end up using Axis Camera Companion, then stick with that brand. Also makes it a pain finding an NVR as you have to find one that supports all your brands. I'm at that point where I can't find good software that supports all my brands. I can find one that supports 2 out of 4, and one that supports the other 2, but not all 4.

Should we also have a rule that you must post the camera you used to create the image?

Haha, I bought the camera for personal use, full advertised price, what would I have to gain by making the image look better. You are just jealous that Dahua image quality blows Avigilon away. If I can get Avigilon to send me a camera, I would love to put their 3MP side by side.

Exactly. I believe when you click the snapshot button it presents it in bmp format but is actually made from the compressed h.264 stream so you'll see compression artifacts in both images as faint as they may seem. There's a quality setting for snapshots, it's set to 5 by default but 6 is the highest. I personally find Dahua's images a little over processed, like the difference between a consumer point and shoot digital camera vs. a dslr camera. For example, on Mobotix, I get the choice to enhance sharpness and it looks great for a demo, but in real life, the over-processed image tends to lose detail.

I personally buy from K&D in China but the prices at the place you find aren't bad. The reason I buy in China besides price is choice as Dahua makes dozens of camera models, but sometimes U.S. resellers limit choices to just a few models. As for the the 1.3MP bullets, they are OK, not great. They use an Aptina sensor vs. their 1080P cameras use the Sony Exmor and are way better, not just the extra pixels, but the way it works, better colors, better white balance. Dahua is coming out with a mini bullet that looks and has the limited features of the 1.3MP bullet but has the 1080P Sony sensor. Should be out early next year.

If you haven't selected cameras yet, consider ACTi. They have new cameras coming out soon that will be awesome. They have great service and support. Their free NVR 3.0 software uses the camera motion detect so you can run the 10 cameras on an Atom processor if you wanted to as I was doing but switched to i3, not because I needed it, because I found one cheap and repurposed my Atom based NVR to a PVR (like a Tivo) for my TV. Look at my review on the KCM-5611 and their new 1080P dome and bullet will use that sensor. The only downside to using an Atom based Nettop is they are typically not expandable, for example, with 10 MP cameras, you may need a second NIC, you may need a drive larger than what's available in the 2 1/2" form factor, you may need more than one drive. Their NVR 3.0 software is the best I've used, going to miss it as I'm switching to a mixed brand security system.

NVR apps generally are very CPU intensive. H.264 compression is very CPU intensive. Imagine that the computer has to decompress every frame and analyze it with previous frames to determine if video motion was detected, 30 times per second for each camera, millions of pixels at a time. There are a few software NVR's that use the camera's motion detection but they are typically limited to certain brands of cameras. For example. ExacqVision does this on all the cameras they support but their support list is limited and something like a firmware update may throw it off. Some like Milestone that have a very comprehensive camera support list does it on some cameras, not others, even with Axis when I tested it, it did it's own motion detection or maybe I was using it wrong. The other choice is some cameras like Axis, Mobotix, Dahua can write to a NAS and they have their own CMS software to view multiple cameras and view recorded video. Then you don't need a PC to record as the cameras will write to a NAS or SD card on their own. The PC would only be on for viewing so it doesn't have to be a powerful PC.

An uncompressed snapshot converted to JPEG may be more representative of the compressed recorded video. Still, way more accurate than someone, won't mention his name, who posts a picture from his cell phone of a camera image on a TV As for Axis, could be different firmware levels. When I reviewed the Q6035-E, it spit out png files, but that camera has long since died.