JimB

Most of the knowledgeable people I have talked to tell me that you can't really put together a decent B/W 2-camera digital CCTV system for under a $1000. However, I have seen a number of such systems on the web in the $500 to $1000 range. Could anyone give me some pointers on how to tell the good from the bad?

Thank you, one and all, who have responded to my post. I have a further question about motion detection. Where is the most reliable place to include motion dection, with the cameras or the DVR? Which is cheaper? Also, after researching a bit more, I realized that some video capture cards are "stackable," meaning if you want to add more cameras, you can just add another card to your PC. Are these cards as reliable as the "just one card per PC only" ones? I realize that with the PC's we have available right now (PentiumIII, 800Mhz) doing more than four cameras is unrealistic, but if the PC's were upgraded in the future it would be cheaper to put another card in the same computer instead of another card in a different computer.

The room I want to monitor is about 30x30 ft. B/W cameras are fine, I want the cameras to be visible as a deterrent, so no covert cameras. I would like some form of motion detection, and infrared would also be desirable. I would like a 4-channel multiplexed DVR with as few frills as possible. It would be nice if it were possible to upgrade the system to 16 cameras in the future, but the community college I am researching this for is operating on a shoestring, so that may not be possible. My supervisor sort of has his heart set on a PC-based system, but I am unsure that the servers we have available (Pentium3's, 800Mhz) are good enough to do the job. I am also worried about how difficult it might be to get a video capture card to function properly on our computers if we do decide to go that route; my research suggests that troubleshooting these cards is quite difficult, although it would probably save us money. What do you think? --JimB ps. Most of the places I have looked say you can only have ONE video capture card in your computer, but I see at SuperCircuits they are selling FOUR video capture cards for their 16-channel video card system. What gives?

I am a student doing research on security cameras that the Computer Information Technology department of my college is considering implementing as a pilot project. We wanted to start out with a two cameras covering one room, and if all goes well, possibly expanding to 15-20 cameras for half a dozen rooms. I was wondering if anybody could point me in the right direction on the following questions: What are some websites that have lots of good information on closed-circuit TV surveillance systems? Ideally, we want the cost of the pilot project to be under $1,000. Is that feasible? Is it better to use digital or analog recording? Which is more reliable? Which is cheaper? Why? We have Pentium III servers running at 800MHz. Are these sufficient to do the job of recording digital information from the security cameras? Can you save a significant amount of money by buying individual components and putting them together yourself, or is this just asking for trouble? What are some of the better companies that sell individual surveillance system components? What are some of the better companies that sell complete surveillance systems? Conversely, what are some of the companies that we should avoid? What other important questions should I be asking? Please feel free to answer as many, or as few of these questions as you like. All input is greatly appreciated.