buellwinkle

Have you tried IPCamViewer, it's free or cheap app that works with every camera I threw at it.

You are correct on the 888888 userid, I tried it remotely just now and you get invalid password and you do get temporary locked out after a few attempts. But I can still use ONVIF with no password and telnet into the camera. Yes, you have to open those ports up but how many people get overwhelmed with configuring their router and open up all ports out of frustration? Then you have internal security issues, a company installs these cameras and all employees on the LAN can view the cameras and use that for theft, spying on co-workers, don't know, it seems like a scary thought that a camera company the size of Dahua takes security so lightly. So you say I should install newer firmware yet Dahua neither supports, services, warranties their products sold in the U.S. So I have no source for official firmware other than what people post here and I tried that once and bricked the camera.

Yes, it does have the issue where the image is soft on the right and combined with the camera going haywire, I would contact Swann in Los Angeles and see if they can send you a working camera as soon as possible. May be better to get it from Swann as then you'll know you are getting a good one rather than maybe another bad one from the same batch Costco has. It would be good to know how decent their support is. If they give you a hard time, let them know all eyes here are watching. If you have to return it to Costco, might as well try flashing it with HikVision firmware, nothing to lose at that point. Swann Communications U.S.A. Inc. 12636 Clark Street, Santa Fe Springs, CA 90670 USA 1800 627-2799

How much is a new Android tablet. Heck, I only paid $199 for my Google Nexus 7 and I think they are cheaper now. You don't want to go too old or too cheap because those may be stuck on an old Android release that newer apps may not run on. Also, they may have batteries that are not interchangeable and have a life that may be near its end.

The Costco.com Swan 1080P two pack seems to be the best dea for $349l. Not saying the Q-See/Dahua two pack for $299 is bad, but it's 720P and 6mm lens which most people don't like.

Yes, that's generally what the substream is for, remote viewing.

I figured it was a bad batch. Good to see a Swann representative on the forum, welcome. There's been some questions floating around but the one that's tops on most people's minds, especially those not interested in using a Swann NVR is how do we get the cameras to give us 3MP resolution? Someone suggested updating the firmware to standard HikVision firmware, will that work or is there a better way, maybe an URL command or hidden menu to do that, or maybe through NVR software that uses RTSP with an parameter to get 3MP.

The study points out wireless cameras but I didn't read one exploit relevant to WiFi. They were all related to allowing network cameras to be port forwarded. If you port forward you cameras, you are exposing them to hacking, so you have to be careful in setting a password and never port forward Dahua cameras, most back doors I've seen in any IP product. First they give you 3 standard userids that you can't delete and I bet most people never change the password on admin userid 888888 with the clever password of 888888, secondly, they don't have password on ONVIF commands, anyone can view your camera, thirdly, they have an easily accessible Linux shell password, just telnet into the camera. I've hacked a bit in my day and I've never seen anything as easy to hack as a Dahua. I don't even think Foscam comes close. I think it's embarrassing for a country that produces some of the best hackers in the world . The camera with the best security I've used is AVTech, uses captcha to prevent password cracking programs from getting to your camera and I wish all cameras have that option. Also Panasonic and Axis cameras make you chose a userid and password at first boot.

I don't like it but I guess people want that clean no wires look and the easiest way is to put the wire in the mount coming out the back. Does look nice when installed, but putting it in is a PITA. Sony, Dahua, ACTi, Avigilon and other's are now doing this on their bullets.

Has anyone used iSpyConnect, it open source NVR software and they have a free LPR plugin - http://www.ispyconnect.com/userguide-alpr.aspx

Tell me about it. I turned it on the Q60 and out of all the traffic and people walking, the camera got fixed on a tree and it was in such a whir going all around that tree that the camera became unresponsive and couldn't move it away from that tree like it was obsessed. So if a $4,000 camera can't do what all of us expect it to do, then I don't hold much hope. For what it's worth, BlueIris had a plugin written by someone else to do tracking called Autotracker for PTZ Cameras that worked with just about any PTZ camera. I don't know much more than that, so happy hunting.

Here it is on an old ACTi ACM-1231, newer cameras do it to;

More expensive than Milestone XProtect? That's about $3K for one camera.

Yes, ACTi does that in all their cameras, it's one of the event actions you can take. I'm not home so I can't show you but if I remember when I get home, I'll show you the screen.

Where can you get the Hikvision firmware? Has anyone tried it?

This camera only zooms, but in theory, you can trigger it to zoom based on a motion event that sends the URL command to zoom to the camera. So if it finds motion, it will zoom in to a preset amount but not sure how you get it zoom back. Maybe Ando would know how to do this better.

I saw this last week, cute demo but no meat to it. I want to see an end to end demo, how do you enter plates to match on, how do trigger events on a match, can it trigger the camera to respond on a match and issue an alarm i/o event? Can you trigger events based on a good list and bad list separately? For example, say the police provide a list of Amber Alert plates and they wanted to be texted if that plate is captured, can it do that? Can you keep other information in the database, given the same example, can I put the name of the officer associated with this and his phone number and text him for this specific case but text a different officer working on a burglary case using a different set of plate numbers? Then can i give it a set of friendly plate numbers, maybe 2,000 of them and trigger an event off that at the camera, not at the PC?

It's their standard 4MP outdoor fisheye, KCM-7911 or you can use any ACTi camera with a wide lens, depending on your reach. What you do is setup a motion detect window and create an event that sends an URL to another camera to move it where you want. They demoed this at ISC a year ago and it was working surprisingly well inside the expo hall with thousands of people. I'm sure other brands, like Axis also do this too. Their PTZ, KCM-8211, 1080P is brand new, so not sure many people have experience with it. The specs say -30C or -22F, your choice, up to 45C, 113F. At half the price of the Axis, it's something worth looking at. I wanted to get one, put it in our park and set a patrol of some hot spots where kids congregate to do a review and see if it's suitable for our security needs, but I don't even know it's available yet. Sometimes cameras on their website are available for ordering, doesn't mean you can really get one. The cheaper choice is their KCM-5611, 18X zoom, 1080P, excellent low light sensitivity. Then find a cool PT external housing with illuminators and laser. There were a couple of booth at ISC last week that were selling such a device and the KCM-5611 has support for external PT.

The Axis Q6035E I reviewed has the ability to track but frankly, didn't work all that well, at least to my expectations were it would follow someone automatically. ACTi had an interesting method of accomplishing this with a 360 degree fisheye camera that would send commands to their PTZ camera to pan over to a location triggered by motion detection on the fisheye camera. What I want is not a PTZ camera, but a zoom camera mounted in a PT housing with a laser beam on it and then run tracking software. The red dot would follow the suspect around. If that doesn't scare a trespasser into submission, nothing will.

What I'm saying is, if I there is camera embedded LPR software, or even PC based LPR software that can scan license plate numbers but has poor or no database of plate numbers, names, addresses to match and they provide an API in their SDK to provide a list, then yes, I can develop a Windows program in a few days to maintain the database of plate numbers and associated information and use the API to feed the information to the LPR software. As to developing my own, sure, why not? There's LPR and OCR controls that I can call in my code. The issue is licensing. If I can get past royalty or licensing issues, maybe find open source code, I can develop something initially in a week or two and tweak it over time. I can offer it free or very low costs (depending on royalty fees I have to pay, for example, one I looked at had a $90 runtime fee).

Bollocks. You said that about Brivo and they have their own equipment, but they recommend using readers from HID Global in their installs. Yes, familiar with the Edge 400 model with the built in reader but not sure it's available from Brivo as it's HID, not Brivo and they have the their own controllers. Never used it because it clunky and you get a cleaner install with the Edge 400 mounted elsewhere and the reader at the door and if I remember correctly, this combined unit is indoor only. Either way, technically, even though the physically packaged the two products into one box, the Edge controller is what's IP based and the reader is just a reader.

Ssmith, what software do you use for LPR on your projects?

We had Brivo and yanked them. Their interface is geared towards office buildings with things like employee ID and we wanted to use it at two communities and we don't have employees, we have residents and they didn't want to accommodate us and allow for searching by address or name, only employee ID. So they agreed to take back their system and we replaced it with a more open (they call OPIN) product from HID Global using their Edge and VertX controllers. Then you are free to pick from dozens of solutions from software based to cloud based. We went with a cloud based provider in Arizona, ControlMyDoors.com which I would recommend, both in price and service. We had them now since 2009. We use key fobs we had custom made in China, with our logo silk screen on back then for 90 cents each, probably cheaper now with rarely a report of a failed tag. BTW, HID Global, as large as they are was very accommodating to us and wrote special firmware to trigger a buzzer if someone holds the door open for over 30 seconds, a problem we had at the pool where kids would prop the gate open. Also, for thewireguys, the Brivo readers are not IP based, the controllers are, the readers are then wired to the controllers.

Maybe the view is so tight that the subject has already left the field of view? Is there an option to capture pre-trigger frames? I use built in PIR motion detectors on Mobotix, AVTech and Axis and they all work very well as one would expect.

Haha, you do know Dahua looks at these forums and then shuts down anyone trying to sell their cameras in the U.S. so be careful what you post on here, that's how K&D got caught.