cmf

you might try setting up ftp access through the webcam setup, and send jpgs every 30 seconds to the ftp server of each of the cameras

You will need to forward port 3550 and 3650 to your cctv server if you are using the tcp multiview or ports 4550 5550 and 8080 if you are using IE and want to use it to view the cameras. You might be able to do this in your dsl or cable modem if you are not using a router. From work, you will need to know your ip address, then when you are at work type in http://your.ip.address:8080, but be careful as you are opening up port 8080 for everyone else to sniff around. Assuming you are using winxp, make sure you have the firewall on (but allowing port 8080 access) and all updates applied. I'm a little paranoid when opening direct ports, especially on a modem, so I personally would not take this approach. Someone else may advise otherwise, or have other suggestions. I myself tunnel through my firewall to access the ports. Might be better to use a router, although I'm not sure how much more secure it will be.

On my geo 8.1 system, I have it configured to dump jpgs of each camera every 10 seconds to an ftp site, which in my case is another machine in my network. You might be able to setup ftp on your cctv machine then have it send the jpgs to itself, then grab those pics and email them to yourself every hour or whenever. I upgraded from 7.05 a while ago, and I think I used the ftp option under the webcam setup for that version as well.

try opening up port 4550 and 5550 as well.

for any linux users out there, take a look at http://www.linuxmce.com/ looks interesting, although fairly new.

one other thing, you have the 'create jpeg/gif' files checked on the JPG tab of the webserver, right? Also, what do you have your jpeg quality set at? I currently have mine set to 25

in regards to your ftp question: are you specifying which cameras to send the images? Are you using a user name and pword on the ftp server, or do you have anonymous login? I have this working currently w/ geo 8.1, and I ended up setting my file delay to 30 seconds to allow enough time to send the images. I have a remote file path specifying a folder on the ftp server, and I have a 6 camera setup, sending all 6 cameras. Can you check the logs on the ftp server, maybe something isn't right there. let me know how you make out, and if you have any more questions - I'll try to help out.

Is anyone using the ftp transfer option within the webserver to transfer jpg files to an ftp server? I'm playing around with this, and it works for a while, then on the box running geo, windows generic services crashes, which brings down the entire network interface. I'm transferring the images to my webserver running freebsd and vsftp, with a username and password set. I've played around with the connection retries and send file delay as well. Can't seem to nail down any consistency when it crashes. I'm running the tcp server and CCS - remote view log as well. Not sure if they are conflicting in any way. Just curious if anyone has had any luck with this. The box is running geo v8.1 with a gv1240 card, winxp. I do have windows firewall enabled on the box, but disabling it still causes it to crash, as well as opening port 21. thanks for any help. Carl

were you able to get this working? The other post - http://www.cctvforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=7339&highlight= How do you drag and drop Geo Software? Collin is correct - You can either set the X Y origins, or use the set position to make the cameras display on your 2nd monitor at a fixed position, all under the multicam tab If you still need help, post back under either thread.

Yes, you can. I do it with my Geo 1240 card on my system, having the cameras view on a 17" LCD and run server monitoring stuff on my 20"LCD. Both hooked up to my PC w/ the geo software running. I used the dmpos.exe located in the geo folder to position the cameras to the 17" LCD, and everything else runs on the other monitor in dual monitor mode. I even have the 20" hooked up to a kvm so I can bounce back and forth to other servers, but the 17" still views the cameras. hope this helps.

I'm not sure how much help this will be, because I'm running a system that is slightly lighter than what you are proposing. I have a Dell 8300 w/ an Intel 875P chipset, and a geo 1240 card monitoring 6 cameras 24/7 on my residence (all outside cameras). It has a 3.0 GHz Intel pent 4 processor and 1GB RAM. I have it hooked up w/ dual monitors, with one of the monitors being a 17" LCD and set at 1280X1024 resolution, which has the geo system showing the cameras. The other monitor is a 21" LCD that I use to monitor my network servers, and light internet browsing. I also have the tv out piping to a tv that I can view when away from the pc. The system rarely jumps above 80% processor usage when recording is activated and I am doing something on the machine. If I turn off the recording, it jumps to below 25% usage. I think your proposed dual core 2 processor and 1G of memory and video card should work fine, but again I don' t have the 8-12 cameras that you might. Anyway, I think your Dell should be just fine. I'm a big fan of Dell's machines, to me they are workhorses. Hope this helps.

I'm using a Dimension 8300 and it is has been running for about 9 months straight without a problem. Granted the system was originally purchased for over $1,000 USD in June of 2004, but I have not had any problems. It was my personal pc then I converted it to a system for the cctv monitoring (using a geo card) I did upgrade to a beefier graphics card and more memory. I was actually looking to purchase a poweredge 830, but none of Dell's servers accept a PCI Express (16x) graphics card. I have a pe 800 for my webserver, and love the case (especially the hard drive bays). I have scoured the net trying to find if anyone has successfully hacked a poweredge server to fit a graphics card, and the only thing I could find was some people were able to fit a pci express card in a sc420. But since the sc420 is pretty much a dim 8300 with a different case, I didn't bother. I've chopped the case to add some fans for hard drive cooling, but overall it has worked flawlessly, running 24/7 (knocking on wood as I type) If you go with a lower end dell, be carefull because you can't upgrade the graphics card (at least that was the case 1 year ago).

Not sure if you found the answer to this yet, but I came across this thread and did not see any relevant replies so here goes: The ip address that it is asking for is the computer you have the geo software installed on. Easiest way to find this is from that pc, open a command prompt and type "ipconfig". This will give you your ip address. As for your dsl router, assuming it is acting as a firewall/router, you will have to forward a couple of ports to the ip you just found. Forward port 4550 and 5550 if you are using geo's web server, accessed through IE. Forward port 3550 if you are using the multicam remote viewing system. If you have a software firewall running on the geo pc, you will have to allow those ports as well. If you have a static ip address (from which the dsl provider assigns to you, different from the ip address you just found through ipconfig) you will need to use that ip from the other pc you have connected through the internet away from the geo pc. The easiest way to find your 'true' ip address is go to www.whatsmyip.org and that will reveal your ip. Use this ip from the second pc that you are running the remote view and type that ip along with the port number - say 123.456.789.09:3550 for mulitview. The username it is asking for is the user name you use to access the geo software on the geo pc. hope this helps, someone else chime in if I have something wrong.

I have 6 W27IR19N cameras, and last I checked are just under $150 without cables. They are on my house, and I am very happy with the quality. During the day they can see quite far, but night is maybe 50 ft w/ IR and total darkness. I think there are a couple of models of this camera with more IR leds that may give you the distance your looking for. I have a couple of pics at www.carlmfischer.com/cctv which hopefully will give you an idea on distance.

I can't speak on a dvr (I have a pc based system), but I have 6 W27IR19N cameras, which are just under $150 without cables. They are on my house, and I am very happy with the quality. They just survived a storm (rain, wind) we had in the southeast US this weekend, and are still working great. I have a couple of pics (2 daylight, 1 night) at www.carlmfischer.com/cctv. Let me know if you want a couple of other night shots, and I'll post to the said site. Carl

great utility, thanks for posting it!

not a problem - pm sent.

I went with a similar nuvico camera - the W27IR19N - for my home install and the cameras are great. I have 6 of them monitoring the perimeter of a house - all outside. I originally looked at the GV-800 card, but after researching, I purchased a geo 1240-8 card. From what I have learned, the 800 card might work well, although I liked the video out feature of the 1240 and the higher frame rate. Here is my post to the forum when I was going through my buying decision - http://www.cctvforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=3369. There is also a link in that post to some of my camera shots, so you can look at the resolution on them. Hope this helps...

From the research I did prior to the purchase of the system, I think rory is correct about the memory on the video card. I think it only affects the local monitor. I think the GV card affects the recorded quality, as well as the memory on the machine itself - but I am not totally sure. When I upgraded the machine's ram to 1gb, it seemed to smooth out a bit. that being said, for my system, I went with a ATI radeon x700 pro graphics card with 256mb ram on the card, and it works well when I'm at the pc looking at all 6 cameras. I have a regular tv that I hooked to the rca connector on the GV card, and it displays all 6 cameras in real time. As for the recording quality, currently I am using next to the highest setting for each camera, and it records well. there is a little frame delay, but not enough to bother me. I found the highest recording setting eats up a lot of hd space, and it wasn't worth the setting to gain a little more smoothness in the video. With your potential 600gb hd, the highest setting may serve you well.

I recently purchased that same card and installed it to a 1 1/2 year old pent4 pc. I have a 250gb hard drive, with 6 cameras monitoring/recording. I've only had this up and running for a few weeks, so I can't speak for the size of the hard drive, but I think 600gb will be plenty. I'm still tinkering with the recording sensitivity, but it appears I use about 8gb a day in video storage. Granted this is for a home setup, so there is not a tremendous amount of activity that invokes the video record. I upgraded the pc's video card and memory (to 1gb ram). I originally had 512mb ram, which ran fine, but I found upgrading to 1gb ram improved the recording performance, albeit slightly. The geo system is the only thing running on this machine. Although I have a static ip, I punch a hole through my firewall for remote view/web view, I think you can do something similar with a dynamic ip - using a service such as dyndns.org or no-ip.com. Hope this helps...

Do you know if it is possible to add a custom capture for a camera hooked into the Geo software? I would like to add an outside temperature reading so when I use the web/remote view I can tell what the temp is outside (displayed next to the camera id/name). I was thinking it could do something with the I/O setting (hooking a thermostat or something into the pc's com/usb port), but it looks like that is for motion detection/alarm triggering. Curious if anyone has had any success with doing something like this. I am hoping this is the correct forum for a topic such as this, not sure if this falls into 'Installation Help and Accessories' or another forum. I've tried searching for this via the web, and did not find anything relevant. Carl

I like that idea rory, and I'll echo Jasper, any suggestions on a third party device? This is quickly becoming a hazardous-to-the-wallet hobby.

I wanted to see what the temp was when I was out of town. I could do the weatherbug/weather channel thing, but this would be much more of a challenge. I guess the question boils down to if you can hook an external device to the geo software, then display/overlay that device on the camera caption. The caption already displays time/date/camera id and camera name. I was hoping to add to that caption, and display the temp. I'll have to look into what scottj mentioned, and overlay it to the video.

I was hoping to do something without adding another camera. Something like putting a temp module on the outside of the house, and have that transmit the temp (wirelessly) to something hooked to the pc, then display that temp in a camera caption. I have a wireless weather station that sits in my kitchen that displays the outside temp - there is a separate module that is attached to the outside of the house that transmits the temp/humidity back to the weather station. That got me thinking of this scenario.

I think your option of imposing the temp, pos style, sounds interesting. I haven't looked into the pos option. Maybe I could hook a device to transmit the temp outside to a device connected to the geo pc. I don't necessarily want to be alerted, just curious to see what the temp is when I peak into the system/cameras. Carl