gencom

thanks again for the help. the cameras in the front of the house don't look so out of place and ugly now.

thanks for the info guys. I repositioned my cameras to how the neighbors has it. the new positions seems to be able to see people better as it is more to the side. Now I have visual coverage of my windows and most of the porch. now anyone that try to get to the windows or cameras can be captured on video btw: I can't put it any lower as it will be hitting windows.

ok I just install my first 4 camera outdoor system. (first time) I got two camera in the front of my house and after installing it I notice my neighbors that have two camera in front are angled differently than mine. (our houses layout/design are pretty much the same and I've seen this angle/placement before also) How the cameras angle/placements are on several neightbors and other residence I've seen: http://geniv.com/download/clist/Camera%20Angle%20Normal.gif How my is placed/angled: (I mainly want to get a good view of whos going into my house and driveway) http://geniv.com/download/clist/Camera%20Angle%20GIF%20KIN.gif for reference this is my two camera image. http://geniv.com/download/clist/Camera%20Angle%20Live%20Pic.gif Is there a reason/method why I should re arrange my cameras to be like the neigbors? or my placement is ok?

mod please delete i posted in wrong section

ok I'm planning on running 4 PoE IP cams outside my house. I'm not really concern about vandals as the wires and cams will be placed high. the house side takes turns and have other obstruction so putting straight conduit is a PITA. is there anything like "outdoor" rated cat5e cables or some kind of cheaper (and flexible) outer sheath that I can put my cables through that protects it from the environment? something like outdoor rated carflex (if theres such a thing)

I've never mount an outdoor cam before. When I got my swann cam from costco I noticed there is a 2ft pig tail hanging off the camera with connector for power and POE cat5e. These are to be mounted on the side of my house (brick wall) and wood. How do I go about running the wire across the side of my house? In particular protecting the CATe5 and power connector pig tail of the camera. Is there something that I can buy to wrap it up and protect it from the element/rain?. I mean the cables I can just put some kind of hook on the wall and run the wires along the wall. but I'm just worry about the connetions to the camera being wet

unless you need more than 4 POE ports. The Trendnet one from newegg $55 is works. I got my 4x swan and that POE switch and tested all 4 cameras at once and it has enough juice to power all 4 swanns. I have it on for about 2 days and no problem. I have to take the switch/cameras apart and box it up till I"m ready for the outdoor installation. but the switch works fine with the cameras.

And so begins the spending. I wish I was warned about this 1 year ago when I bought my first foscam it took me a year and a stolen gps from my yard to get around to setting it up. now it's like a hobby in itself constantly wanting better resolution and image quality. not to mention the want for more cams into the NVR. (it's like potatoe chips you can't just have one hahha)

I'm not in the a/v integrator business but IP cameras are borderline IT stuff now. stuff like setting up switches, configuring routers and smartphone falls in the zone of computer tech. the stuff I do. I'm at $80-$100 an hour. if that helps

ok I got around to configuring the swann cams to my network subnet and it's associated setting. now to - configure a spare PC to run BI (of all days this thing just died on me) - find out how to connect BI to the cams What are the settings for BI to connect to the cam? (hate to read through 23 pages of this thread to find it again) thanks in advance UPDATE: I got BI to talk to the camera and can "record direct to disc" what is the optimal setting u guys suggest on the swann imge/video setting? my current setting is: -media stream -video stream -1920x1080 -constant bitrate -max bitrate -6 fps (on BI recording fps is also 6fps) - I Frame interval: 6 (though not sure what it does)

Where is the latest firmware file for this camera located? the one I got is FIRMWARE VERSION: V4.0.9 130106 ENCODING VERSION: V4.0 build 121228 WOW with this cam you really have to be tech savy to get working. (at least without their standalone NVR )

That was quick! thanks. I was half way find out the solution via googling. ran the HIKvision IVM400 and it see all my cameras. (so apprantely all the cameras have default static IP of 192.0.0.64 with DHCP disabled. so thats why my router can't see it) Now to configure it.. DARN!! though the system I have Blue Iris just shutdown and now it won't start up.. seems like it blew a mobo. I had another identical unit (Fujitsu Esprimo Q910) like that blow a mobo or psu (it's on a single board). Now I have to reinstall on another system..

OK, my 4x Swann came and I hooked it up to my new POE switch the switch is working fine ads I hae a laptop hooked up to it also. I can see the camera started up and getting POE (from switch indicator lights) HOW THE HECK DO I CONNECT TO THE CAMERA!?! the skimmpy "user guide" it came with don't say anything about IP it kinda assume u are hooking it up to their NVR. No CD or anything else is included. Is there a utility that can help me find the MAC/IP of the camera? for some reason my Router don't seem to see it (or not refresh yet)

That I understand but HOW MUCH of the 100mb pipe does it uses when transmitting at say full quality. Let say the switch is only 100mbps, the uplink to the router maxes out at 100mbs. The uplink is a single port on the switch that will be carrying the video stream from ALL the cameras at the same time. If say one swan cam uses max of 25mbps and the foscam uses 10mbps (4x 25mbps) + (2x 10mbps) = 120mbps combine. bandwidth of all the cameras at 120m it will overload the uplink speed going back to the router. and you will have either frame drops or camera not showing up. or some garrbled video. So now I would need 1000gb switch to handle the uplink going to the router. Due to the nature/location of where the cameras are wired to and the placement of switch I don't want to use anything expensive if I don't have to. *** SOMEONE correct me if I'm wrong on how it works, as I currently run 6 foscam off a full gigabit network.

thanks for the upload. the size/location of the time/date overlay from the Swann camera is pretty annoying. I hope the "Hik" portion can be disabled Hopefully future firmware revisions will have the option of size and location. But as now of it is serviceable and potentially a 20-30% less CPU utilization I'll deal with it.