buellwinkle

I actually have VMWare Server on my desktop, use it mostly to test Linux stuff. I know I can setup a VM with Windows but that would take longer. I was able to go into control panel, programs and features, sort the installed software by install date and click on each on to uninstall so it's gone. It's not like viruses, it's just they have different components to their software, not all gets uninstalled when you run their uninstaller. So far, the best bargain is BlueIris. Not free, but at $50 it's close enough and how can you beat $50 per server for the level of support you get. You need a decent computer to run it, but nowhere near Axxon's requirements.

It would do awesome with a decent IR emmiter, but it may cost him more than what the camera costs. I think the reason people like built in illuminators is the simplicity of not having to run seperate 12V wiring, the look of the additional box, and most importantly is the cost. Ninja, you can't run a camera at 1/4/sec unless your goal is landscape photography. Seriously, every moving object is going to be a blurr. I strive for 1/30th outdoors and frankly, cars moving across your field of view at 10mph will be a blur but at least people walking will look good. Get the Brickcom bullet I reviewed, it will look good for that shot with it's illuminators.

Haha, looks remarkedly similar in looks and specs to the Dahuae on the left. $108 is an amazing price for the specs.

If it's true that the injector is 2.1mm and you want to plug into 2.5mm, then adapter plugs are available on ebay from US suppliers for a few bucks. Here's one example of 2.1mm female to 2.5mm male. http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-pcs-DC-Power-Plug-Adapter-Input-2-1mm-Male-to-Output-2-5mm-Female-/300708221094?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item46039b50a6

Sorry to hear that, their bullet cam I tested had very nice illuminators that had a nice even spread. They do have conflicting info on their website. On the list of vandal dome cameras, it shows that camera as not having IR LEDs, but their spec sheet for that model shows ▪ Built-in IR Illuminators, effective up to 15 Meters. I would email Neobits the PDF spec sheet found here - http://www.brickcom.com//resource/Documents/Datasheet/VD/ds_VD-130N_v3_English_official.pdf and return it for a full refund because they misrepresented the camera, it either has IR illuminators or it doesn't and clearly the picture you present does not match the picture in their spec sheet. Their return policy only gives you 15 days - They do claim the VD-130Ap does have IR LEDs in both places, but who knows.

Wow, that is very restrictive. I don't mind paying for software and I don't expect upgrades forever but I do expect that for the version I paid for, they keep the camera list updated for free and that I can re-install on any hardware at anytime without their intervention.

I'm saying don't do a software upgrade, install the latest version, re-apply your licenses. Do you know the maintenance costs for Start? I know the prices vary from $42-50/camera depending on the number of cameras for the initial license but I can't find maintenance prices anywhere.

Built in IR varies from manufacture to manufacturer. Don't let a bad Vivotek experience sour your experience. For example, my ACTi TCM-7811 has recessed illuminators that are angled in a way to provide even coverage, not the flashlight effect you get with Vivotek. Also the Brickcom bullet I tested had very nice wide even coverage, no spotlight effect. The reason they do this is because if they focus the light in the middle, they can claim a longer effective range for the IR lighting, in the same way when you look at Raytec illuminators, depending on the angle of the light beam, it will have different distances it covers. What I do with cameras I don't like that I bought is sell them on eBay then I get what I want, like when I bought a 3MP Arecont and hated it. It will likely be better than trying to get adequate lighting for that Vivotek.

In theory, you can download the latest eval version, apply your old license key to it by using VMWare to create a new image with the OS and new software.

My confusion is that the press release and their spec sheets are not the same and the spec sheet did not say this so I couldn't confirm, but the press release I read said it did. Sorry for the confusion. I'll get one soon and review it. I have a conference to attend next week but try to get to it the week after.

Purely in the interest of science I tested a few scenarios. As someone, I think Hardwire previoulsy stated, changing the MAC address in Windows does not change the MAC address the software is looking at, so you can't move the software to another PC without getting a new license key. I believe they charge $125 to issue a new license key. I then tried it on Win7 on VMWare (on my Mac, not to be confused with MAC), assigned the MAC address to be the same as the licensed used for another PC. That works perfectly. So if it was me, not trying to cheat, but wanting to preserve my investment, I would try and run the Linux version of the server software on a virtual machine using VMWare server or the open source Virtual Box would do the same thing using a derived MAC address. This way you can uninstall/install all day long and apply the old license key. Whether or not this works from version to version, I don't know, but don't see why not.

My bad, it looked like the newer models had this but it was just indentations around the rim of the lens. They claim very good low light performance with their LightFinder feature but only 720P.

Push notification works on Android (I use it with my Moto Razr), IOS (I use it with my iPhone) and Blackberry (don't have one of those). The AVTech cameras have very good low light capability and that LED is insanely bright, brighter than the one on the Axis M1031/M1054 cameras. For what it's worth, you can get a CFL light that only uses 10-15W that will provide plenty of light and to save electricity you can run that only at night. May cost you 25-50 cents a month and provide better security for your vacation home as lights are a deterrent. The problem with motion detect lights is that a) pre-event frames will not be lit, b) it takes just about any camera a second to re-adjust exposure, so your first few frames will be over-exposed and the lost info may be the most important.

Someone said the license is tied to a MAC address and date and you can have a portable NIC, they even sell it. I don't understand that if you have a portable NIC, and you move that NIC to another PC that has a different version of the software, why would it not work?

You can tie it to a USB NIC and Exacq sells a USB key for this purpose so you can trasnfer it from PC to PC. Part number is ev-usb-nic. They do charge a fee to transfer a license to another server. What if you run ExacqVision on Linux or Windows inside a VMWare virtual machine? Then you can set the MAC address of the virtual ethernet connection.

What happens if you download the latest version as a trial and apply your license keys from a previous version?

Can't comment on the Vivotek as I would never buy one, but the AVN812 does not have an SD card slot (only on the AVN80X), but can notify you immediately of motion and show you the last video event from your iPhone or Android device within seconds (email notification with pictures can take several minutes to make it to your phone. The Brickcom camera is nice, but not sure why you need 5MP resolution indoors and that camera comes in other resolutions. It can notify you via email, not not instantaneously like the AVTech. Also, both the AVTech and Brickcom can ftp your recorder video to where you want, assuming you have the bandwidth. Also, consider the Axis M10 series. I use an M1031-W in a vacation home, sends me a few pictures via email on motion detect but no SD card slot, ftp only of images, no video. Also, don' stress over varifocal indoors unless you live in a castle like Napoleons' vacation home in Versailles. A decent 3-4mm fixed lens will provide good coverage. Outdoors, go with a real outdoor camera, like a dome. The housings are typically made of aluminum and the insides are plastic. A nice dome camera like an ACTi or Brickcom in that price range will hold up for many years. Putting an indoor camera facing out will not allow you to use in-camera illuminators or give you the field of view you probably want.

Raytec makes a good well made illuminators in all sorts of sizes, even PoE illuminators if that helps with wiring. Just consider that a decent illuminator may cost nearly as much as your cameras.

I started a new series of reviews on software as this gets asked by people starting out second to what camera should I buy. I know there's many pro's on this forum that already went through the pain of selecting their favorite software, this is not for you. I chose Exacq because it's one of the leading commercial NVR's out there and this is their "Start" version which is 1/3rd the price of their commercial products. Also because I get asked what about Macs. This has a Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, Android and IOS client. The server only runs on Linux or Windows. It's also very resource friendly as it uses the camera's motion detect zones and settings. Ideal for an Atom processor server running on Ubuntu Linux. http://ipcamnetwork.wordpress.com/

That's the Pro version, Start which I reviewed on my blog is $50 per camera. You can also start with Start and then upgrade for $100 per camera.

A 2MP camera should keep a fast home/small business internet connection busy. If you expect full speed, meaning 1080P at 30FPS, say with 30% compression, and h.264, according to the Axis bandwidth calculator you, would need about 2.3Mb/s upload per camera. I have AT&T U-verse, and I get 1.5Mb/s upload and that's just under $50/mo. So if you go half the speed, 15fps, you would use half the 2.3. Also consider that bandwidth is half the equation, latency is the other half, so just because you have enough bandwidth to run 15fps, you may not really get that speed, depends on number drops, lag at each drop on your internet connection. So having that on a consumer grade line would not be as effective as having a dedicated T1 (1.5 Mb/s) with a top tier ISP. Just saying because you need a reasonable expection. I don't know the specific camera you have, but many newer cameras have multiple streams, meaning you can set one stream configuration, say 1080P 30 fps to record, but have a viewing stream that may be 720P and 10 fps for online viewing.

If you get a commercial grade server, some of the newer ones support 16 drives like an HP DL380. So say 600GB SAS 10K drives split into two smart array controllers and setup with raid as one large virtual volume, you can get the throughput to easily support 128 cams. You don't need much memory. Maybe $10K new. They are dead on realiable, had several hundred in my group at one time and I can go for years without having one fail. They typically come with 4 GIGE ports, dual power supplies. Then if you need more storage, you can add their external storage arrays. I know it sounds expensive to some, but if you can afford 128 megapixel cameras, $10K is the least of your worries and you can't afford to have your single point of failure fail. Besides, Meg Whitman is getting desperate running HP and laying people off like crazy, she needs the money.

I sort of have that $400-600 price range in mind when I get cameras and the good news is the cameras in that price range are pretty good. I have the M1054's little brother, the M1031-W and it stands guard at our vacation home, not so much for video, but to alert me if someone enters the home. I used to have it at home but have replaced it with ACTi for one reason, the built in IR illuminators as in homes, you can't really have ligths on all over the place for cameras and you can't have a bright white LED on in the middle of the night. Indoors I use ACTi 3511, 1.3MP, varifocal lens, day/night filter and IR LEDs that will light up from one end of the house to the other in total darkness. I like domes because they can't be knocked over while dusting or bumping into furniture and they are so ubiquitous that people don't notice them. Also, it's hard to tell where they are pointed at quick glance which throws the intruder off. The cheaper model, the ACM-3511 runs $400ish, the TCM-3511 runs $500ish but I find them on eBay cheap now and then (just got a brand new one for $202). So imagine that you love Axis, and who doesn't, but the P33 equivalent dome may be a grand, not saying it's not worth it, but it's easier to justify the lower amount. Another good brand in this price range is Brickcom. They make a M1054 like camera, but still, I would go with a dome with IR leds. Is it worth what I'm protecting, heck yes, me and the wife. I can check the perimeter and inside my house in total darkness from my bedroom on a 50" TV while my wife chambers a round in the 12 gauge. It's like having night vision googles, you see everything, very cool. Video is easy enough to erase if you don't like what was recorded Alarm company called me today to sell me an alarm, I said why would I want to alert police so soon, where's the sport in that?

If you stick with one brand, most (not Axis) provide the software for free. For example, I use ACTi software which is very efficient, it's free and you can run it all on an Atom Nettop, I did for a while. I switched to an i3, overkill for 6 1.3 megapixel cameras but I got it cheap when an NVR company went out of business. I did some NVR software reviews on my blog, but the most efficient NVR software I used is ExacqVision. If you ran something like Milestone XProtect, it may need an i5. Not sure about Axis software. The M1054 is an OK camera, not something I would get because of the poor low light performance, white LED for light. Indoors I use cameras with built in non-visible IR light. I started off as you did but when the lights go out at night indoors, the M1054 will show black until the LED light goes on and adjusts, so pre-event frames will be useless. For example, say you hear a noise and want to check your cameras, what do you do, turn on the LED manually and blind the person? Can you even do that from the NVR? Even with the LED on, it's still not the best image. The problem is the small cheap glued on lens. The M1114, same sensor but good lens makes a huge difference, again, not what I would recomend for indoor home use because the M1054 or M1114 will not work with IR light. Axis recently started making indoor/outdoor domes with built in IR light. I'm going to try and do a review on one soon. But what's you budget for each indoor and outdoor cameras?

i7 is a consumer grade PC, not really a server also it's old technology as the 10 core romley chips roll out. The state of the art example is a Cisco UCS C460 with 4 sockets, 10 cores each with hyperthreading and you may want external storage and at least 4 ethernet ports for handling the network traffic. Also an IBM X3850/3950, HP DL380/DL580. So 40 cores in one box vs. i7 which is max of 4 cores per box. So there's 3 aspects to sizing 1. network bandwidth, you can only handle so many megapixel cameras per subnet. This should be available from the vendor you are getting the cameras from. 2. how much I/O will you be doing. Each drive has a rated throughput and you have redundancy like RAID so assume you write each bit twice. Only you can figure that out as you need to know how much recording you'll be doing and what level of concurrency is required, all 128 cameras at once? That dertmines how many drives, if you get SAS or SATA, if they fit in the computer or not. Also you have read access, how often will people be viewing recorded video. 3. CPU depends on what the software you are using is doing? Analytics, video motion detection, resolution. Some software use the camera's motion detection like ACTi NVR Entrprise or Exacqvision and they use fraction of other software like Milestone that uses software motion detection. If an NVR is telling you it handle 128 cameras, with 1-2 hard drives and an i7, I would be asking question because I bet it's not 128 1080P cameras.