cab938

Hi, I'm planning out a simple home system for myself after a couple of neighborhood annoyances. I've got a couple of gaps in my knowledge I'm hoping people can fill in for me. First, my background is that I understand video compression/image recognition/etc. and have developed some non-security solutions for video capture from things like BT787 chipsets which are pretty common in security cctv solutions, as well as a working knowledge of things like mjpeg, h264 compression factors, etc. I also have a little bit of a (hobbiest) background in optics; fov, hdr, etc. What I don't have is practical experience with the security products (this forum has been great, props btw). My requirements are pretty simple and probably similar to others, except I've come to love quality and want to make my buck stretch as far as I can. Understanding the tradeoffs is important to me, I'm not really expecting a "just go buy this" (though I'll take it if you have it!). Problems: - I want to monitor my front yard fairly inconspicuously with relatively decent quality. Don't think I need license plates, but I would like to be able to ID the person at the door. - I want to be able to expand later into monitoring my backyard, but that's not part of phase 1. This mostly comes into play when considering if I need a DVR/etc. - I don't want to write any custom software; I have no idea if I should just buy a dvr or a card and run some software. Windows or linux solutions would be fine, but I'd like something that can do motion detection (image comparison based is fine, I don't need real motion detectors) and start recording then. I don't need 24x7 monitoring. I'd love to have remote access, or be able to fire scripts off of detected events. I just want it to be easy; the geek in me wants to hack away but the soon-to-be dad in me wants to keep it real. - I would be willing to spend up to $400 or so on the camera if an IP camera is needed. Am I deluding myself into wanting to purchasing something more than I "need"? - I need something that works in the cold. PTZ isn't important. I'd like to be able to set focus and fov on the camera once its in place if possible. The cold weather thread was useful in suggesting to me that maybe this isn't a big issue to worry about. My biggest question is to choose between IP or non IP cams. If I end up doing the backyard in 3 years, m I going to be annoyed that I sunk money into an ntsc-based solution when IP cams have fallen in price? Or, when I get the solution installed with an IP cam, will I be kicking myself that I went the the extra expense when I could have done multiple angles for less with an ntsc solution? What does one usually record with when using an IP solution? Software? Are there open source things out there, or am I stuck buying something proprietary (in which case I would probably convince myself to hack scripts off mjpeg feeds, but I hope I don't have too...) Is the h264 encoding on-camera usually a really low bitrate? Is this something that is usually configurable? (I'd prefer a fat feed and compressed on my machine as cpu cycles are cheap and bandwidth is plentiful in this environment; for that reason most of my day to day work has been with ntsc cameras because we can get tiny h264 files with a real machine behind the encoding. But in this environment maybe my desires are not aligned with products?) I prefer the look of dome cameras, but they seem to be a bit more expensive; is it a waste of money (or maybe I've just seen a bunch of cheap bullet cams?). I don't really want to buy a QSEE from a big box unless everything else is wasting money. But being able to get four cams and a dvr for $400 seems...affordable. Should I resist this urge (I don't need four cams now, and my overall budget is probably closer to $600 after shipping costs. But maybe I'm being unrealistic again in what I can afford.). Or is there a good reason to buy a dvr+cam pack - should I just spend for this now and try and get back and front done at once? I was eyeballing: $310 ACTi ACM-3401 - 1.3 Megapixel IP dome camera, Two-way Audio, 0.5 LUX - MPEG / MJPEG 1280x1024 @ 8FPS $410 AirLive OD-600HD - Wired H.264 / MJPEG IP Outdoor Pan / Tilt / (Digital) Zoom camera - 1280x1024 @ 15FPS, two way audio, 4.3mm fixed lens (digital zoom) On the composite side I looked at: $210 KT&C KPC-VNE101NUV18 - *700TVL* Armored Dome Camera, IR LEDs, Color, Varifocal Lens (2.8~12.0mm), Vandal-Proof & Weather-Proof (IP66) I welcome suggestions! Chris