Razer_SE

Replied to your PM a few days ago, hope it helps! I have been getting prebuilt servers from Exacq as I needed a hybrid solution at most of my installations, but I will also be trying to build my own in a few cases reusing older PC based DVRs that I only need a few cameras on. If I cannot get enough equipment to do that at all locations I may also use some atom based mini PCs. Client software seems to run pretty well even on a lower end system so far, I have one system just setup for viewing on a video wall and it's running fine and it's a five year old pentium d processor with only 1gb of ram and it's working great. Waiting to see if once I get a ton of separate servers if it still does the job, but so far so good.

I tested video insight pretty extensively for my company in the last few months and in the end we went with exacq. I tested many others too, but video insight was one that we bought equipment and tested in house for a month before sending it back and deciding on exacq. So far we are completely satisfied with the product and we have had zero issues with it. We will continue rolling it out over two years before we are done, so it will be a while but it will also really test it out I guess!

Yes we did, we are able to get upgraded for longer than we expect the equipment to last for the price difference. Plus with some of our small sites that we currently have nothing we will be able to get a camera or two up for almost nothing using just the software and not getting the hybrids we are rolling everywhere else. That's down the road yet though. Still, we should be at roughly 70 sites when done with even the little sites.

I'm installing a lot of these cameras right now actually with great results. Using them as plate capture cameras and they are working out very well for me. Using IR at night, in a pretty well lit area to begin with though but still results have been above my expatiation. Still tweaking to get the best results, but I like this camera.

If you have a power over ethernet switch they also make adapters that will take the power from there and power the camera with no power needed anywhere but the switch. The cost of the units I use is pretty high though at say $400 or so. It would be cheaper to run new wire unless the run is a really long one. Veracity makes the ones I use, VHW-HWPS-B and VHW-HWPS-C. I only use the adapters where CAT5 would be too long of a run, at 600' of cable and having to run it, that makes $400 look pretty nice when coax is already there lol.

We selected Exacq for our needs - it had every feature we needed and the price was unbeatable from the pricing I got. Web view and mobile apps were important and they were free - and when you are doing a big multi server install those things add up.

I should have been more specific I suppose lol, but yes the differences I was talking about were huge. So is one too good to be true or is the other guy ripping me off? I need an MSRP to at least base my shopping on then I can shop around to find the best service and price that I'm looking for. Some may be full MSRP, some may sell below, maybe the service at full MSRP makes it worth it or maybe I just need the flat lowest price. Either way I feel better about my decision. With others that I looked at I was at least close or in the neighborhood of each other in pricing, with Avigilon I was getting big swings that I felt were unnerving for me. The better prices I felt must be missing something due to how big the swings were! It's ok, our decision is working out very well for us, but for others maybe Avigilon would have been better. I'm just saying this to help them in the future, or maybe even me on down the road who knows?

Pricing is not difficult to get, it's just not posted all over the web. To get pricing just contact a dealer and we can quote you a price. I tried that, and that is where I ran into issues. I could not get consistent pricing from those that I contacted. I had odd pricing from dealers where the same items were priced differently and that was a turn off. I want a set price so I know what I'm getting into in a large project you know? I also greatly prefer pricing to be transparent, if the prices are set then why the secrecy? Just odd for our situation, but I guess it helps the installer as the client is more dependent on them? For us, we are the installer, purchaser, user, you name it we are doing it and all we needed was just equipment. We also made all decisions on the equipment, did all of our own testing and evaluation too. Some makers/vendors seem to not be set up for us but for the integrator only. That just makes it hard for them to capture business like ours where we just need a product sold to us for a price. I want at least a nice msrp price list with all the products they sell on there so I can then just contact sellers with specific price quotes for the equipment I need. Then the sellers can sell at less than that if they want, that I'm fine with.

I know my company would have considered Avigilon much more had it been easier to get pricing and the info we needed to compare them against other competitors. I personally researched them a few times but it was a hassle trying to get pricing form them and I got conflicting information a few times around the costs involved. All the pricing information I was able to get made them out to much more costly than the direction we did end up going I do know that, but I would have liked an easier way to compare head to head on pricing. I know that almost every time pricing is "secret" I personally just assume it means it is too much lol. In the end we went another direction and it is working out very well for us. I'll continue to watch them though to see how they continue to grow with all the changes they are going though. I liked what I was able to see from them so I hope they continue to do well!

We are moving to Exacq right now actually, and so far we have had zero issues. We are also using ACTi and Vivotek cameras and we have had zero issues with connections so far anyway. If there are issues I'll be sure to find them as I'm installing a total of 50-60 separate servers with 12-24 cameras each though many of the cameras will be analog for now on existing sites. So far we've had great luck with them and the search works great for us anyway. Did not like the search before 4.8 though, they really improved it and we did not start with them until 4.8 on our roll out. Web view was really, really important for us and it works so much better with no active x and such I agree. 90% of our use is the web view and they do that really well for our needs anyway.

Hi guys, thought I'd ask before scouring the internet more than I have already. I'm looking for a 19" 4:3 monitor that will be better for viewing outdoors. We have screens mounted running in rotation and while they are inside a small building three sides of the building are glass, and the monitor is mounted on the wall facing the glass. This causes some difficulty in getting a good view, the monitors are just not bright enough. I've found some before but then they became unavailable and now I'm looking again. Looking for something that is like 500 nits or so without breaking the bank. I've seen daylight screens around, but they are like $1000 so that is out, we'll survive for that cost. Surely there are still some high brightness screens around though? Appreciate any help, thanks all!

Get the ACTi KCM-5211 and not the KCM-5211e if you do not want the IR portion. Then you get the zoom and the higher MP of that camera. Though you may not use the zoom feature you can use it to set it where you want and leave it there to record I guess. Just a thought. I just ordered the 5211e and while I need a little zoom I did sure not need 18x, but for the 4mp and at least having the zoom option I went that route. I plan on zooming a little and then just leaving it there, I'll be disabling any PTZ options for my users anyway. Using it for a LP cam, won't have it up for a few weeks but we'll see how it works out, hoping for the best!

I'm looking for some reliable, higher amperage 16 camera power supplies and was not sure what would be recommended. We have several out there now and they are suffering a high failure rate right now, and I'm also getting lines in the views that are not there when connected to a separate power supply so it must be giving dirty power and I'd like to get rid of that of course. A lot of my cameras are in higher range of power requirements also and I'm finding that I have to jumper the power supplies to the next one to give higher output and make the cameras work correctly. This sucks for me anyway and also makes a 16 camera supply suddenly an 8 or even a 4 in a couple of cases - are there supplies that will auto balance the load and not make me make 30 jumpers every time? Or I guess supplies that give me at least 1 to 1.5 amp to all 16 slots would work as I have no cameras that need more than that. Suggestions or thoughts? Appreciate it guys!

Quick question, is Aventura's software just a generic front end that others use also? Just looking at a DVR that appears to be running the exact same software under another name and I was wondering. There are subtle differences, but literally 95% is the exact same and might even just be version differences. Anyway, I'm pretty set on Exacq at this point but we are committed to at least checking this out so we will be here soon. Just wondering is the base software is something that can just be skinned and sold under other names or what exactly is going on here. Maybe it's just a partner or private label of Aventura? Now I have to read up on Aventura as it may save me a ton of testing. Already appears to not work in Firefox so that's a major roadblock right off the bat.

I've not checked as we are getting entire systems no matter who we go with. Our current stuff is old, time for replacement, or with some we will reuse as standalone DVRs for locations with no internet. We have another 30 locations in that situation currently.

Evaluating Luxriot and Exacq right now, and both appear to do what we want them to. I cannot test Exacq fully right now as I cannot find an analog card that will work to test, but I assume so far it will do what I need. Looking pretty hard at Luxriot right now, it has been perfectly stable in testing over the last couple of weeks, and the features will do almost everything we want it too. I wish for better views in the time line in playback, and a couple of other niggle type of complaints, but overall it seems very solid in my testing. Any major problems or troubles with this software that I sould know about? Will be getting 50 seperate units, each running 12-24 cameras, all off site with no one manning them. The cost of the units are only a few hundred less each than the Exacq units, but there are no ongoing costs with the software which is sure attractive with the number of units we are getting. Currently have all analog, so hybrid is a must due to costs at first. Exacq would be 12-15K a year it appears to stay current after a few years so that would add up fast, otherwise it looks nice also. Any feedback from you guys would be appreciated.

Thanks for the replies, after testing for a couple of weeks I've found that the software would meet our needs and it many areas I really liked it. But the playback is weak for sure, I can make it work and it's better than a couple of systems we are using now but it is not good enough. Maybe after a few more versions they will be everything I want, but not currently. No saved views in web views is another miss right now as most users on a daily basis will use the web view. Overall though the software worked very well and I was impressed with it, especially considering the cost. Just not quite there yet imo. Exacq is where I'm leaning very hard right now, the cost is not that much more and it meets all our needs and we can even grow into it later on as far as some features are concerned. There are a couple of small issues, but overall it is our winner after testing so far. I'll have at least 40 servers, and 600+ cameras when the new setup is done and Exacq seems to have responsive support and good third party camera support so far. Now I'm researching cameras and such, thanks again guys!

Quick question, I was wondering if Aver has a live demo up that can be accessed to test out? I'm specifically interested in accessing my live camera views over the web, easily. I have the need for many people to be accessing a lot of offsite DVRs easily with no logon or at least a way to automate this so they can choose a site or link and be seeing live views fast. Possible? If so is it possible to see in action? Just wondering and I've not been able to contact Aver personally yet to ask.

Thanks for all the information I've received so far, it really is appreciated. I think after all the reading on here I can better make camera decisions at least. Now for the software, any experience with AverMedia. Looking at something like the SA6416 RACK looks like a cost effective hybrid system but I don't know the software side yet. This would let me use all the existing cameras and upgrade to IP with no costs for third party cameras and such it appears. Again super, super easy access to live feeds from remote sites via a web browser link is needed, no downloads and logins and such at each link, just working video with a click is ideal.

Hello first of all, and I'll try to make this quick. New to this forum and I will read more around here as I'm sure a lot of this could be answered if I read for a couple of weeks but I'm looking for a starting place to at least start looking. We have existing analog camera systems are remote locations that are working now. These are remote locations with no people on site so reliability is a must. Several hundred cameras in use now. While I understand you should not go cheap, on the other hand cost is a big factor when you are looking at the number of cameras and systems we are looking at. I'd love for cameras to be at $500 or less (way less unless they have a crazy warranty as we replace them too often currently!), we use bullet cams almost exclusively. Some dome cameras in some locations, but mostly bullet cams. Lit locations, but we do need night capability of course. Megapixel at the least if we are spending the money on an upgrade. What software should I be evaluating? Exacqvision is something we have been shown as an example. Meeting with vendors already of some things but I want to be aware of what's out there before making a decision this size. This is a new job for me so I'm new to all of this and learning as I go. It appears this will be a major part of my job now so if I'm supporting it I want to know all about it! Thanks for any pointers, and sorry for what I'm sure is another noob post that you are all tired of seeing!

I have seen Avigilon mentioned a lot one here and they are the only major one I think that we have not looked into at all yet. What is pricing on Avigilon? I understand that this might have to be PMed but I'm just looking ballpark for software right now. Recurring fees, ip license requirements for third party cams and such. We would love to use something like Pivot3 or whatever to store all the recordings offsite, maybe just have 30 days stored locally and the rest uploaded to the central system overnight but bandwidth could quickly become an issue I'm aware. We have currently around 40 locations with 12-23 cameras at each one all recording locally, and all analog. Something that could use our existing analog and be slowly upgraded to IP would be great from a cost standpoint. We want to be consistent across all of our locations as far as software goes, right now it is mixed between three systems and this makes it hard on the end user for sure. Our main use daily is just live remote views as needed in a browser by many people through the day. If break-ins occur then we will look at footage later to see exactly what happened but no real time emergency or response. Regardless where we go I'm sure it will be fun! What about Aver? Looks reasonable at first glance for the stand alone hybrid DVRs with the ability to upload the video offsite it appears.

Thanks for the reply, I appreciate it. As far as the $500 number I'm talking about just the camera itself, I understand the costs of the cabling and software and such being extra. We have looked at several camera vendors, I'm talking today with someone about Mobotix today and will see what kind of cost to expect there but I expect about $1000 a camera there I think. If I could find something about half of that we'd be in a much better position to get a faster roll out. We have been looking at a hybrid system also, but by the time we spend $200+ on IP adapters we are part of the way towards a new camera too you know? We may end up doing this anyway as some camera shots do not require megapixel resolution, but maybe I can get sub megapixel IP native cameras at reasonable costs for these shots? I don't yet know as I'm having to learn fast! I personally would like to avoid hybrid if possible but we might have to go that route. From a software standpoint we are using a mix of two systems now, each site has a computer working as a DVR and we have remote access to them, remote viewing and playback is needed for sure. As far as outages and such we are aware of cameras going out and such pretty quickly after it happens already as we access each site pretty often. From a cost standpoint we can pull our cable and do the install ourselves, we are just looking at the costs of the actual equipment and software/licenses to make it all work.