Nimrod

The standard btwincap drivers only work with a small range of bt878 cards, for others you have to make custom drivers. There are instructions on how to do this on the web site but i never tried.

Go to that mfg site and see if you can match up your card to verify we talking about same thing. Also let me know what your other card is, maybe you have possibilities there.

This wireless system is complete garbage. There is not one component in it that is not cheap junk. It is a low resolution 380TVL system with lousy wireless capability and bare bones almost non functional recording software. If at all possible return it and get your money back. If you can not then put all the cameras in the same room as the receiver and just play with it as a toy with the kids.

The NV9200 chip is a very poor chip, look at this spec. Recording resolution CIF: PAL: 352*288(CIF) NTSC: 320*240 (CIF) Your only possibility is go to the manufactures site and see if they have updated software. http://www.macro-video.com/en/download.asp But even if you get it to run that resolution is terrible. The NV9200 is also a bastard chip. No other software will work with it.

“Blue Iris demo worked fine with my Axis P1344 at full res.” In your camera setup set FPS to 15 or 20 FPS, then go to blue iris and try to capture those frames. What i find and others on there forum is that blue iris will use a lot of cpu and only capture about 4 FPS. To check what fps blue iris is capturing at right click on the camera video and select stats. Also verify in blue iris in the video setup menu that you are at 1MP and not at the default 640x480.

“Try here http://btwincap.sourceforge.net/ John” The Btwincap drivers have only partial functionality in Win 7. None of the color, hue, and contrast controls work.

I did get the manual now, and it says the power to the camera should be 220 volts. You said all the cameras were run back to the same power panel, what about the DVR, does it go back to the same panel. And i still think the camera case should be electrically isolated from what ever it is mounted on.

“We are using the Ranger - Outdoor 300' Night Vision High Speed PTZ Camera, and the manual can be found here: http://www.mediafire.com/?t9052o1sa6u2pj2“ The download has errors and i cannot open the PDF.

As i grow older i find my mind reading skills grow weaker. It might be simpler if you actually told us what card you had then make us guess. Also a good picture of it would help, an overall view and a close up of the larger chips, so we can read the numbers.

“The only "cheapest" solution i can come up with is to get the PCI card for my analog cameras and install BlueIris ($50) based on Buellwinkle's suggestion.” I fought with Blue Iris for a month or so and gave up. If you put an IP camera on it higher than 640x480 it can not handle the input. It works good with analog cameras if you buy the expensive Bluecherry BTTV cards. The 4 channel card works good and the 8 channel card i think works but have not been able to confirm that you can run all channels at full speed. Also you can only use one card in the system even if it is Bluecherry. If i remember correctly i also got it to work with the cheap “pico” 4 input BTTV card, that card will give you about 4fps if you use all inputs. And you must use XP for any of these cards to work properly. Blue Iris is $50 and unfortunately you get a $50 program.

If you are setting up a surveillance system in a subdivision were do you put the DVR and how do you get all the cameras connected to it, and what about power? In my subdivision we do not even have street lamps.

Does anyone know what gives this systems video its dull washed out look.

If your run is 100 feet or less you will probably not see any improvement.

First, if the PTZ is connected to anything conductive, disconnect it and screw it to a plastic isolator. Also make sure that there is no ground wire connected to the camera and what it is mounted to. Next, try an experiment isolating the power. The ideal way to do this is at the PTZ location disconnect your remote power lines and power the camera with a large battery. For the last experiment hopefully you have an easy way to try a quick run of RG59U to the camera to see if that clears up the problem even if you just have to lay it on the ground. RG59 has a much greater noise immunity than cat5.

“We are using 220v power with passive video baluns to CAT5 unshielded twisted pair to all cameras, but have also tried re-running a camera using 18/2 shielded cable as well, both of which suffer from the same interference.” Do you mean you ran 18/2 shielded cable for power with your cat5 for video. Or do you mean you tried Siamese RG59U coax for video with 18/2 for power.

As for cat5 or rg6 which one you use will probably come down to what you already have or what you feel comfortable using. Any ham handed dummy can pull cat5, but rg6 must not be kinked and should have a minimum radius bend of about 4“. Cat5 with baluns requires less specialty tools and rg6 requires compression tools and fittings. You also have to look at what kind of run you have to make. Are you just coming thru walls in to your camera or are you going underground to a remote location, this will affect the cable jacket rating. When you factor in the above the actual cost of the cable does not mean much.

I sent you a PM.

This post will probably start a riot. I just found this paper on the study of CCA shielding in CCTV RG59 cable. It shows that as long as the center conductor is solid copper the CCA shielding is as good as solid copper braid (CCA = copper coated aluminum). http://ecadigitallibrary.com/pdf/IWCS06/3_3hsw.pdf

CNB DBM-24VF cameras are INDOOR cameras. Try one of these. CNB VCM-24VF 1/3" 600TVL Outdoor Vandal true day/night DC Iris M13 2.8-10.5mm .005 lux CNB VCM-24VD 1/3" 600TVL Outdoor Vandal fixed IR cut filter DC Iris M13 2.8-10.5mm .05 lux CNB VFL-20S 1/3" 600TVL Outdoor Vandal fixed IR cut filter M12 3.8mm Fixed .05 lux “Where can I find pre made siamese cables? Cheaper than cat5?” Ebay, search for “cctv rg59u siamese cable” or the dealer you buy cameras from probably sells it also. Edit, if you want really cheap stuff as in quality and price search for this on Ebay “cctv video camera cable”

This document answers every question that has come up with baluns. 1 How it compares to RG59. 2 How long can you run CAT5E. 3 What causes ground loops. 4 How to splice CAT5E and what happens if you do. 5 Top secret ways to extend the distance for passive baluns. 6 What is better for noise immunity CAT5E or RG59. 7 How should CAT5E be run to avoid noise pickup. 8 Does running 24vac or multiple video feeds in one CAT5E cable introduce noise. 9 Why do different people get different results for same length of CAT5E run. http://www.muxlab.com/assets/files/application_guides/VE_CCTV_Balun.pdf The document is 23 pages long and it is worth reading.

“What about this guy? Vivotek IP8332“ Well that camera alone blows your budget. But even if it did not it is clearly a poor performer in low light and it has a fixed wide angle lens not suited for looking down the driveway. Also unless it comes with free DVR software you have no way to record anything.

Cheap wireless rarely works. I can only think of one solution for you that might work because you only want one camera. Get a decent camera like this one. CNB VCM-24VF 1/3" 600TVL Outdoor Vandal true day/night DC Iris M13 2.8-10.5mm .005 lux To record the video use a crummy USB DVR that can be bought from $10 to $30 on Ebay (go for the better one). With you only using one channel it may record a decent picture and frame rate. And BTW, putting the camera as high as possible and only recording the tops of peoples heads may not be the best way to do this. Edit: Make sure the USB DVR will record at 640x480 or D1, and check its compatability with win xp or 7.

This site has a lot of info on test charts. http://www.bealecorner.com/trv900/respat/ And here is about the cheapest test chart you can get. http://www.edmundoptics.com/onlinecatalog/displayproduct.cfm?productid=1665

“I see no noticeable difference at up to 700 feet” Could be the baluns used. What type do you like.

"I have done numerous tests. As long as the cable runs are less than about 300ft, there is no noticeable difference using passive baluns. Going above 300 feet, we noticed that the color burst started to drop, causing the colors to begin to fade although the image was still very sharp." Good post, thank you.