rory

they 'were' legit I am mainly talking about the OS's that came preinstalled like with HP, Dell, etc. The clean version (it was a legit xp cd from ms) I had that never needed activating is going back a couple years now, Ofcourse it needs the normal windows upates..

question though, this I imagine is in certain versions of XP only, as I dont know anyone over here that has had to activate anything for windows XP?

gee, ive never ever had to nor would call microsoft none of the Xp systems i have or have used or know people to have ever have had to 'activate' it. That includes XP Pro and Home, but they are not the newest CDs, maybe a year old.

sounds alot like the difference in using a cheap camera and an expensive one, or a cheap dvr and an expensive one; so much in technology and electronics these days is you get what you pay for.

Purpose of IR Filter in Color Cameras An IR filter – or IR cut filter - is a color filter blocking the infrared light. There are several good reasons for using an IR-cut filter. Using a color camera to achieve realistic colors in white light requires an IR-cut filter. The color spectrum seen by the human eye is quite limited compared to the spectrum seen by a CCD camera. Especially, in the near infrared region of the spectrum the difference in sensitivity is significant. This is important to know since many light sources, including the sun, emit infrared light. A CCD color camera in daylight without an IR-cut filter will therefore see a significant amount of infrared light resulting in strange colors. Another reason for using an IR-cut filter is the limited color correction for many lenses. It is difficult to design imaging optics covering both the visible spectrum and the near infrared spectrum at the same time. Therefore, many lenses have different depth of focus for the visible and the infrared spectrum. Anyway, the IR-cut filter cuts away a significant amount of the overall collected light and thereby affects the sensitivity in a negative way. In general, color cameras are one factor less sensitive compared to monochrome (depending on the CCD chip). This is primarily due to the IR-cut filter. Info courtesy of Jai Camera Solutions www.jai.com

i add the price per camera also. The system price is for install of the system components, which is obviously higher than it would be if by the hour but thats how I work it out, instead of the way alot do it here in the Bahamas which is by percentage which comes out to more normally.

okay, when i first powered it up, it stayed up, a minute or so, then died. Brought it home, some many hours later, powered it up and it did the same thing again. When you repower it up right afterwards there is nothing, it seems like it is shorting out or something? I cut back the piggy back cable far back just a couple feet from the camera, and powered it up like that and it worked but died once again. This was after maybe 5 minutes from before. Seems like a short in the camera's power board itself? Should I try to open it up, it is very hard, tight. It is a mini bullet camera. I can get the front opened where the lens is, but the back is a different story. I cant afford to send this back as I have to finish this job this week and shipping time would be next week sometime for a new one, or I will have to replace it with one of my own, but I made nothing on parts client bought his own. Rory

hi, i am getting 12 volts, well 13 from the multi power supply. Yes tried diferent power supplies. It goes down so quick no time for that. Yep I cant get the part open that has the power in it, its too darn small! As a new camera, I can only imagine it is shorting on the camera board, which I cant get to. Rory

I have a cheapo Color Dome (yes a cheap one!) that is giving me issues. I have 3 of them all doing the same thing in the same location: They will switch from bright to dim automatically over and over. It actually looks like it is switching between white balance modes like found in box type cameras. As far as I can tell there are no settings to change on these? Any idea what may be causing this problem? The shop has regular ceiling flourescent lighting, and white tile. There is one main door (no windows as they are still boarded up from the hurricane) so some exterior light enters the shop, but none are pointed at the door area, and one is even in a hall way far from exterior lighting. They are connected to a 16 channel Altronix Power Supply 12VDC 6amp with the remainder of cameras being CVC-130R B/W Bullets. The same problem exists when I put the cameras on its provided power plug, and when I plug them direct into the CCTV Monitor and not from the DVR. The monitor is a Vernex 450TVL Color Monitor. I could try another monitor but since the B/W bullets are okay in this respect I doubt it is the monitor. Any ideas? tanks Rory

Hi Thomas, okay actually it is an HP not a Dell, my bad: HP Pavilion ZT1000 Series Rory

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=96300&CatId=1204 If I have a laptop (new withing last year) and its CD Drive is shot, I need something to reload windows so I need a drive that is recognisable in DOS. Will a drive like this with a IDE CDROM installed, be recognised as a CD drive in DOS on a modern laptop using the USB connector, its a Dell Laptop, not mine cant remember the model off hand. Thanks Rory

want the IP just for the heck of it

anyone else getting a handful of these emails lately? If you click on them they ask for info like pin numbers etc, are these crooks getting bold or what!

yeah but ive gotten one a day now for the past few days, from different banks, and I dont even have an account with any of them! Easy to get their IP though, dont they realise that? I know something about spoofing but if digged deep enough can get the origin... thing is the same user@ has been on all of them: supprefnum@ and then the banks name. But for example, the email was actually received from: c5ba7.c.pppool.de with an exact IP address, which I imagine is not from the origin though, but still.

looks like it never made it our way )

thanks, will look into it. I am still waiting to find out what laptop model is it

HI, Thanks for the replies, i got a reply from them: "It sounds like you have a 12 volt DC camera under florescent lighting and what you are seeing is called "color drift". It is a normal condition if you are looking at a slow change in color that repeats itself about every 7 - 10 seconds. The only solutions would be to use a 24 volt AC line locked camera or to change the lighting to incandescent. I'll bet that this condition would not happen if you shut off the florescent lights and only used daylight coming in through the windows." IN OTHER WORDS - DONT USE THESE INDOOR CAMERAS , INDOORS!

Id think it would be easier just to copy windows over the network then boot to dos with a floppy, but can you install windows XP from the hard drive? Ive never done it like that, only me & 98. thanks

yeah yah learn something new every day huh

it doesnt matter, I have no problems viewing java Applets from anywhere else.

Yes he can, but we want to reformat it also. Rory

ok, just checking thanks. If you have a firewall and arent browsing the web it probably doesnt need the updates right?

So dont leave on the automatic updates for the regular XP hot fixes?

http://www.specotech.com/cart/products/productDetails.asp?prodid=709 This waterproof, color bullet camera offers a 170 degree angle view which is ideal for complete coverage of elevators, vestibules and other small areas. http://www.starkelectronic.com/55.htm#638

what about all the annoying windows XP frequent hot fixes with automatic updates?