kensplace

Decided to stick a electronic lock on a door, mainly to learn more about access control, as it seems a easy (apart from the fitting side) but financially rewarding industry. Course the stuff Im using isnt pro stuff, but thought I would post my findings, so other people who are thinking of buying a access control kit from ebay are aware of the pitfalls. Picked up a cheap lock electromagnet lock release, and bought a rfid door controller from ebay (were talking about 20 quid for the lot here). The lock release is standard, just a small electromagnet that pulls a small catch that allows the pivot to move, hence allowing the door to open. The rfid reader is cool to play with, it can store 500 users and allows either keyfob or card (both rfid) or keyfob / card + passcode, or passcode alone. For the price the RFID part works great, the problem is the unit is made out of cheap plastic, and you could just rip it off the wall and apply a battery to the lock wires which are clearly marked..... Even worse, you could just cut the power, and re-apply it, as the stupid thing automatically unlocks the door when power is first applied, then locks it again a second or so later... Bad design.. No wonder they are on ebay so cheap... But it suits my purpose, keeps the kids out of the room, and allows me in even when I forgot where I put the keys. I would not put it on a external door though, no way, far to insecure, neither would I rely on it to protect anything valuable.

Whilst powering many cams off one 12vdc supply is a cheap way to do it, it has a big drawback, if one wire shorts out, or one cam shorts out, all your cams go down at once. As long as all cams are connected properly, and the wire runs are not too long (for voltage drop) and you dont exceed the current rating of the psu, then there should be no problem powering multiple cams.

I have a low end (very low end) honeywell dvr, when I emailed honeywell to ask about any updates for it to make it a dvr that was of merchantable quality. I clearly told them it was not a dvr suitable for its purpose in its current state without updating - they did not even reply. I know its only a low end DVR but if a company is not even bothered that they are selling merchandise unfit for purpose, and cant even be bothered to reply then that puts me off ANY honeywell system.

How did someone change your password? Who else knows your password? Why did they change it?

With those temps I think you would probably need to put your camera in a outdoor heated housing, search for cctv housings/camera cases and look for ones with good heaters in them..

If you get hold of any I would recommend checking with a lawyer in your area before showing the footage. Just so you dont break any privacy laws, or interfere with any ongoing trials etc.

There is a standard called rotakin ( I think its called) where silly cutouts of people are used to see what the camera can see, although it doesnt look very scientific to me...

I would send a email to the manufacturers, ask them how to backfocus a lens. Would be interesting to see what they reply. They advertise it as having a c/cs mount, and if it cant be back focused I would say that they are selling goods not fit for purpose, so you would have a right to complain - loudly...

No lens mount adjustment? How do they expect people to backfocus lenses? Its a pretty basic requirement. Have you checked the manual, maybe its software controlled or something, find it hard a camera wont allow lens adjustment. But then again its a megapixel cam, so maybe they have not heard of it..

If your talking about pointing a camera at the screen to record it (instead of just recording the video directly) then the flicker that can occur due to the screen refresh can be avoided by altering the cameras shutter speed. Many (decent) cctv cams have settings to enable different shutter speeds, try a few till you get a good pic.

Pelco are pretty open with their protocol, dont know about bosch, you could ask them I guess.. Also try these people http://www.opencores.org/projects.cgi/web/man2uart/overview no idea if they will be able to help, but obviously they have been working in that area. The bi-phase will probably need extra hardware, I dont think its a simple rs232 jobby.... But you can get pelco to bosch bi-phase converters.

Sounds like you need to backfocus, do a search on back focusing on the forum and or google and you should find some guides on how to do it. Once you have backfocused the lens, the problem should go away, unless the lens is dodgy...

And they reckon women are safer drivers....

Unless you can find a digital slr that can automatically upload its images as they are taken, to a remote pc then the burgler would be able to walk up to the window, smash it and walk away with a nice second hand digital slr, your proof of who did it would remain with the burgler..

Be more specific, post your full specs of the machine, software, settings in the software etc, and example images.

While your fixing things, fix the caps lock key on your keyboard I think its stuck....

Did you ask the seller?

Also not sure what analytical video is... But whatever it is, if its really for security purposes (ie your researching for security, not just researching about security) then I would recommend getting a pro to handle it, as cctv is a great fun to learn, but not something I would ever recommend someone learns the hard way. If your not bothered about the security, learn, if you need security, get someone that has learnt the hard way to save you making the same mistakes they made ages ago. As for securing perimeters etc, cctv is useful but only part of a solution, there is a alarm industry that should also be considered in that aspect.

Often the mounts can be removed and replaced on the bottom, but if its a cam that just has the hole, ie not a screwed on mount, then you *may* be able to turn the insides of the cam upside down, depends on the camera, sometimes its easy peasy, sometimes it just impossible.... Im sure you can get something to flip the video, cant remember of hand though where I saw it, but if you just need to mount it then how about gluing a mount to the base of the camera?

Ahh get what you mean, I think, I normally just do it at home ( thank god, used to hate doing computer installs, running cable etc, but the views under the secretaries desks where interesting lol)) plus I just buy 100m rolls so tend just to pull off what I need and do one at a time......... Guess if I had a HUGE drum I would pull off cable, if the drum was to heavy to have on a roll that enabled easy pulling.

Curious, does it make much difference having a megapixel lens? Are the standard lenses that crap they cant work with a higher res ccd? They must be bad if thats the case, I would have thought a decent lens would be fine? Or is it something else, like focal lenght?

4/ Uncoil the length of cable 5mins You uncoil the reel before pulling?

If I paid for a install, and someone came out with premade cables I would send them packing...... As said earlier, you cant pull a premade. Plus premade is usually not that good quality, made in bulk, not hand done with loving care.... And its hard to get premade to the exact lengths needed. As for being cheaper, I doubt it...

So the user has reset passwords, then on purpose disabled the recovery option? Its there fault I would say.... Either that, or they did it a sneaky way.... Its the customers problem at the end of the day, so I would fix it, then charge em for it... But I would be wary, if they are doing things like this, they may be trying to find out how to get geo passwords reset for a reason... So maybe follow geos official advice and reformat, and then I would charge them for it. At least that way, they wont ever get to find out how to reset passwords, and will learn a valuable lesson, DONT MESS AROUND.... If they screwed up, its there wallet that needs to pay for it... Be wary..... Dont trust situations like this.

They can afford to go for what does the job, cost secondary..... It will cost them a LOT more to lose out to thieves than it would to buy a decent system.