SEANHAWG

I sent you a PM of some video.

show screen shot of router config

You can always surgically remove the IR filter if you want, although it will make for an off color day shot, especially if its a cheap camera. Removing the IR filter from board cameras can sometimes be tough too as I have found that they are sometimes glued on.

I once also purchased a Pelco DVR and was not impressed at all with the recorded video quality. Actually, it sucked. I was expecting alot more from a Pelco unit. It probably has something to do with how the video is compressed. You probably wont find many DVR's that will look as clear as the live video but there are some very close that is hardly noticeable at all. 7.5 FPS per channel at D1 is what you will find on most 8 and 16 channel DVR's, and usually most 4 channel DVR's, but having a 4 channel do D1 @ 15 FPS per channel is pretty typical too. If you want to get a DVR that can do full strem 30 FPS D1 on every channel then the price usually more than doubles for that, but for most surveillance scenarios, you dont need anything of that nature.

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One more question. Whenever you send your test emails, does the test email get sent to your inbox?

Dont give up yet. Setting up email can sometimes be a doozy but its usually just one little configuration thats causing the problem. The reason I instructed you to use Gmail was because that is what I always try first and if that works, then I use re-configure and use my regular mail. The only other thing that I think that may be your problem is your ISP. Your ISP could be blocking your outgoing email ports or they require you to use their outgoing mail server. Before calling your ISP: One other thing you can try is using various different ports. When I first tried it, I was using port 587 and it did not work which is odd because I had port 587 on my other DVR using Gmail and that worked, but for some reason on this DVR it didnt work. But it may work for you. Try using port 587 and port 25 and keep sending emails till one comes through. If you really get desperate you can send the DVR to me to see if I can make it work on my network, if I can make it work on mine, then we can rule out that it may have something to do with your ISP.

If your DVR allows it, you can also set your PTZ to zoom in on certain areas once your PIR's detect motion.

Here is some we did for a lens comparison. Although we did it on a real cloudy and gloomy day so the color doesnt pop that good and everything looks dim These cameras are only 330 TV Lines too: http://www.nellyssurplusguide.com/lenscomparison.html

Dahua specs and manual documentations are so flawed in several different areas. It is surprising that since the company is so large, that they just dont hire someone to write all their documentation and make it correct and understandable.

Also, make sure that if you do go with a Dahua DVR, make sure its a real "dahua". Sadly, I have seen many companies on Alibaba claiming they are Dahua's when they really arent. It appears that these DVR's are now being counterfeited just like the Geovision cards are.

Dahua DVR's are good DVR's but please note that you wont get the resolution anywhere near what the "Wireguys" posted with that type of system. Megapixel IP cameras and High Resolution Analog Cameras are 2 different animals. Even the high rez Effio-E cameras cannot compare to Megapixel cameras. Nothing wrong with Analog, but if you are expecting Megapixel quality, then you had better plan on Megapixel cameras. Why not contact the "Wireguys" directly and ask him some questions to determine what can fit in your budget to help you plan better.

I know some of you said you use XP so this wont be a problem but if you use Vista, try turning off UAC as sometimes that will hang it up.

I dont know a whole lot about Hikvision DVR's but you may try using Internet Explorer as most DVR's remote viewing software works best in that browser. What you need to do is go into your DVR and find the DHCP selection. Select DHCP and click "save". Exit it out of your menu and go back into the network settings, you should have a newly assigned IP. If not then you need to re-start your DVR and go back into the Network settings and check for the new IP. Like I said, I dont know too much about Hikvision to give you the exact method but you get the gist, most DVR's are the same just different methods of doing it. When I first set up my first DVR, I too assigned my own IP and I was wondering why the heck I could not get it to work, it was because I was not using an IP within my routers DHCP pool. The DVR pretty much configures all of this for you when you select DHCP so it doesnt take much work on your part. But make sure to re-configure all of your port forwarding configurations within your router with the new IP.

You could completely remove your email from the DVR if you no longer use the email feature anymore.

Not sure if I understood you correctly. Did you have the router assign your DVR an IP through DHCP or did you just assign the IP yourself? If havent done DHCP yet, try that.

Changing the rez on your TV really isnt going to improve the picture quality of the cameras much as the most the cameras are putting out are probably only 480p anyways. Like you, I seriously doubt that all 13 cameras are bad. I agree with Soundy that the nighttime picture looks pretty typical, for such a low light shot such as that, you are going to get noise. We really need a larger daytime shot to compare with.

Seeing the DVR over the local network does not require port forwarding so thats why you are not having any problems in that aspect. On the other hand, seeing it over the internet does require proper port forwarding. I know you said you did port forward in your router but since the ports are being blocked, you will not be able to see your DVR over the internet. Here are a couple of tips that may help you get the ports unblocked. 1) Have you DVR obtain an IP from your router through DHCP, and once you get that IP, re-configure your router to forward the ports to that new IP 2) If that still doesnt work, it could be that your ISP is blocking those ports, in which case you would need to contact them to tell them to unblock them or ask them which ports are available to use.

I can get a whole day out of an 80 gb hard drive off of my 16 channel recording D1 @768 bit rate on all channels, Just checked. I havent tried a 1tb yet on our new DVR but if its anything like our old DVR, I should be able to get 8-10 days for a 16 channel which is usually enough for residential applications as you will usually know if something is tampered with the very next day it happens. 500 GB on a 4 channel should get you atleast 10-15 days recording D1, depending on the DVR. Here in the states, the price difference between a 500gb and a 1TB is minimal considering the extra storage you get from a 1tb. For a 500gb, you can get a nice SV Seagate for $50 with free shipping, a 1TB will cost you about $75 with free shipping. You can even get a 1.5TB Seagate Barracude for under $100 easily and is sometimes cheaper than the 1TB Seagate SV, but is probably not as sturdy as the SV series. Check Buy.Com, Amazon.Com and NewEgg.Com for great deals on hard-drives.

I should have used different terminology, what I meant by false alarm is false recording triggers meaning you will have several recordings of nothing with pixel based motion from the DVR, night time Noise, Wind Blowing the Housing (if you have a housing). IMO, the best solution would be to have a large enough hard-drive to record 24/7 to eliminate the problem of too many false triggers, or the possibility that the motion detection will accidentally fail.

PIR motion detection for outdoors is great and highly recommended. About the only time we use the DVR's motion detection is for indoor use. Otherwise, we just recommend to record 24/7 for outdoor use because if not, you will be plagued with false alarms.

go to a computer that is in the same local network as your router and go to www.canyouseeme.org and check all 3 of those ports to see if they are open.

All cameras that you will find will be 30 fps for NTSC or 25 fps for pal. Adjustable shutter speeds can be found, but I havent seen too many board cameras that have good adjustable shutter speed settings though. I am sure there probably are some though. If there are adjustable settings on board cameras, they are usually through a few dip switches to adjust the basic settings such as BLC, AWB, etc. Fully customizing the shutter speed gets a little tougher to find. You may try looking for board cameras that have OSD menu's which again is pretty rare for board cameras to have OSD menu's because its pretty hard to toggle the menu on such a small camera unless there is a keypad button hanging from a cable off of the camera. But check for the ones that have OSD menu's as those usually have the most adjustable settings. From there you can search to see if they have the adjustable shutter speed that you need. If that fails, check for box cameras or some good quality domes as it will probably be alot easier for you to find the specs you need through a more robust camera as such.