buellwinkle

Is that doing that in-camera or is that a PC running the software? The reason I want in-camera LPR is I have a "parking lot" use case, meaning I give the camera a list of authorized plate numbers and it triggers the gate to open if there's a match. Yes, I can do that with PC software but then I have to run alarm out to each gate and the gates are about 1/2 mile apart from each other, that's why I want a localized solution with no PC. So far, I've only found one such solution, IPConfigure with the Axis Q1604 but if Messoa can do this, that would be great.

They were focused for your pleasure at their factory in China and not designed to be re-focused. If it's out of focus, return them and get focused ones. To actually focus it yourself, remove the rear cover screws, then remove the circuit board inside, I believe 3 screws and pull out the guts and focus it while it's all in pieces and put it back together. Frankly, treat it like DOA, I would return it, not worth the bother. I rarely got one out of focus, maybe 1 in 10.

Yes, 2-axis, so the camera has to be mounted with the dome level and facing down, can't be surface mounted or mounted on pitched eave. They do sell a wall mount for this camera as well as a tilt mount you can use on like a pitched eave. Would love to see other's people's impression of this mini dome as I had had IR bleed issues.

I would want one that had front and rear cameras hooked up to one recording device and a display so the rear camera can double as a backup camera.

They call it an LPR camera, but does it really have LPR built into the camera where you can enter plate numbers into the camera so you can trigger an event on a match? MSRP is $3,600 which is not really that bad. It comes with the 2MP camera, external 1,000' IR illuminator, lens, housing, heater, blower. We are looking at an Axis Q1604 with a big lens and a big illuminator, so that's probably in the same ballpark, then add LPR software for the camera, and it's up in the mid-4,000 list price range.

Yes, something like MiCasaVerde system. For example, I can tell if my front door is locked/unlocked from my smart phone and it sends a text every time the door locks or unlocks and triggers a lamp to come on when the door is unlocked and turns it off when I lock the door. It has some capabilities to view IP cameras, but doesn't record, just displays. Uses a wireless technology called Z-Wave, so if you can find Z-Wave sensors for your windows, you can do the same with windows as I do with my front door.

I have a 12mm Hikvision mini bullet coming in soon, will let you know how it works out. Sometimes it's better to just find another use for the camera you got or sell it on eBay and get one with a 12mm lens.

Yes, you will be fine in your home network, it's if you try and use a cloud solution like you proposed that you may run into problems, of course non that money can't solve.

Exactly, the over processing Dahua does to get a noise free image makes for a nice picture but lousy for trying to ID someone.

You can get an AVTech push series camera. Comes with smartphone apps that chirp your phone when the PIR motion detector senses a person and you can connect to the camera with 2-way audio, assuming you get a model with mic & speaker.

Like this one?

Here's the Axis tool, click the Start Tool button - http://www.axis.com/products/video/design_tool/

How do you know what the firmware version is on the Hikvision cameras? Mine doesn't have that option where it says Enable Dynamic Analysis for Motion Detection so not same release.

What was interesting on the news last night is they were showing someone's car cam that a thief broke into. Is that they next step, surveillance cams for your car? So I looked in the worlds marketplace, alibaba and there's a company that makes a rear view mirror with a 1080P cam looking out the front that records when you drive with a monitor built into the mirror and a rear camera to capture if someone rear ends you. Wholesale was about $80 and you have DVR and two 1080P cameras. Imagine trying to do that with gopro, heck, the SD cards may cost more than $80.

I got a reply back from Mobotix and it is using 5MP sensors but the image will be limited to 3.1MP, same as the D14 on the color lens for 4x better low light sensitivity. They are not shipping yet but will try and get one for a review.

OK, I'm totally confused then. They say they have a 5MP sensor, but produces 2 3.1MP images, huh? I'll email them and ask. Maybe get one to review. We have several going in on a projects but not for about 3 months until the construction is complete. We have plenty of D14's, and 3.1MP color during the day on one sensor and 1.2MP at night with the other.

I don't have one in front of me at the time, but do an advanced focus where you set the window where you want it to focus on and open the iris (there will be a button to do this) and focus. Do it on a large screen TV if you have and fine tune it. I had to fine tune it to make it perfect. This is not an autofocus camera, it's a camera with motorized focus, personally don't like it, prefer to manually focus but Axis does this the best of any camera I tried but nowhere close to a true autofocus camera like the Axis Q60.

The softness is noise reduction working overtime. But before you pass total judgment, I installed the latest firmware upgrade which is new on all the cameras and we'll see tonight if it makes a difference.

The Hikvision mini bullet is awesome, using one soon to replace a Dahua which honestly, after having them for a while, they are not all that good, not side by side with other cameras like the Hikvision. The mini domes are not ready yet but their engineering is working on it, so hold off on those. Also, they are 2 axis, but they sell wall mounts and tilt mounts to help. Honestly, by the time I put a wall mount or tilt mount, the aesthetics of the dome vs. bullet go out the window. The bullets are so tiny. I will leave you with this thought. This is a Dahua hfw-2100 image during the day looking out the window of my lake house (soon to be replaced with Hikvision, so if you want to buy it, let me know) This is the same shot, different window with an indoor AVTech AVN812. You can see the greater detail, the much better color accuracy, the detail in the texture of the water and trees. I would say the Hikvision mini bullet or ACTi E32 is comparable to the AVTech in this regard but at 3MP.

Maxicon, just the software prices alone blow this out of most home users and most home users do not need LPR but the low budget approach would be to get a box camera with decent low light capability, say an ACTi E21, 1MP, WDR, fairly cheap with the fixed 4.2mm lens that you toss and replace with a nice dc iris Fujinon 12mm-50mm CS mount lens and put it in an outdoor enclosure. May cost about $350. Since the plate is your priority, setting the AE reference value pretty low (an ACTi adjustment), you can capture the hotspots like the plate better. The Axton illuminator should do well, get one with a narrow angle lens, maybe 20-30 degrees. Set the max auto exposure to 1/60th and I think you'll do well. There's some open source and cheaper LPR software out there, just not the high accuracy rates commercial software promises.

Tome, something probably got lost in translation because I saw that too and said WTF. The one you would want is the D15 DNight SEC and whatever lenses you choose. This includes 1 color sensor, 5MP for day use and one b&w sensor, 3.1MP for night use. The advantage is you have a good color sensor for the day that's lousy at night and a dedicated b&w sensor that's 3.1mp but excellent for night use. I have yet to work with a camera that gives me a b&w image that's as crisp and detailed as the Mobotix b&w sensors. I have some that I use that have 2 B&W sensors, older models that were 1.2MP, but with the new one, you could get two 3.1MP b&w lenses, point them separately and have 6.2MP of recording and you can chose to record them as one video like we do or as two separate cameras. So I can see why they say that but that's not common, but I do it on two separate properties because they work well day or night, just lose color but then we have other color cameras to capture that detail like license plates at faster shutter speeds and dedicate one sensor of each of 2 lanes. As for adding an additional PIR, yes, you can use the internal PIR motion detection as well as audio detection to trigger events and external alarm inputs for detection like an external PIR. Also, Mobotix has some basic analytics built-in for intelligent object in motion detection that reduces false alarms and they also have reference images you can use to reduce false alarms and you can setup basically unlimited rectangles for video motion detection. Also, separate rectangles for each lens and each rectangle you can set sensitivity settings for. With all this flexibility comes a price, it's not easy to setup but once you figure it out you can appreciate the complexity. What makes it easier for some is to use their MXEasy and MXControlCenter software, but I just setup everything form the camera's browser interface.

Depends on how fast an uplink you have to support a couple of cameras with cloud recording. I'm going to assume you want at least 1MP, maybe more. First go to the Axis bandwidth calculator website and enter all the cameras you want at the frame rate and resolution you want. This will give you the required upload bandwidth you need from your ISP. Even a single 1MP camera may overwhelm most home internet accounts. The best way to check is go to an internet speed test site like speakeasy.net or speedtest.net and see what your upload speeds are. Cloud surveillance may be the future, but not sure the future is here yet. You may want to consider an NVR software product like BlueIris where you can have it record to the NVR and then transfer those recordings via FTP to the cloud giving the advantage of fast local access to video and the security of having the recordings offsite. Offsite can mean a cloud provider, maybe AWS or to an inexpensive NAS device at someone else's home.

Last time I looked at Mobotix specs on this, it was 30'.

I haven't seen the Swann/Lorex bullets anymore on Costco.com. I would avoid the Lorex/Hikvision mini dome for now, it's got issues and Hikvision is working on them.

PIR is as close to full proof as possible as it triggers off the heat signature of an object in motion and you can set physical zones by blocking out parts of the lens and set a sensitivity so you don't get critters setting it off. It can not be triggered by lights, shadows, trees/shrubs swaying in the wind. Decent outdoor PIR motion detectors cost about $100ish. The problem with Axis is that it doesn't have 12V out on the alarm I/O like say ACTi, so you could either get a battery operated PIR (batteries on them last a year or more) or get a 12V power supply to power it. A Mobotix D15 may have cost a little more but would have had PIR motion detector built in and mic and speaker built in. Also 5MP and total access to recordings from the camera, no PC software needed, just saying.