foreverjne

The color camera that I recently bought from Toshiba, IK-65WDA, displays a purple spot in very low light condition. In day light, the spot is brighter than the surrounding area but not too obvious. Their tech support insists that it's a pixel burnout and is not covered under the warranty. It's only when there are "excessive" burn outs that Toshiba would replace, and it's only at their discretion. Toshiba does not indicate anywhere in the printed information that comes with the camera what the number of burn outs are defined to be "excessive." The tech support mentioned 30 burn outs, but also said that Toshiba would not defined a specific number. Further, the tech support says that the CCD is not warrantied. Is it the norm with the CCTV camera manufacturers that pixel burn outs are not warrantied, and in only if a large number of burn outs occur that the manufacturer would replace the camera?

I'm planning to put a camera near the front door of my house and would like to get a good picture of people standing at the door and the view of the front yard. What lens should I use to get objects in good focus at 5 feet and decent focus to 25 feet? From reading about lenses, I understand that the lower the f-stop, the better the low light performance. However, lower f-stop decreases range of in-focus distance. I've learned a lot through reading this forum, but I haven't been able to find much information regarding this matter. Your help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks again for all the great suggestions. I understand that for my application, I probably don't need the latest and greatest components and spend a fortune. However, without any experience with CCTV, it's riskier to try to save some money by using components that require the experience to adjust them to work properly. The other option then is to hire a good installer. Since I haven't had good experience with anyone I contracted to do work on my house, I've decided to do this myself. To avoid having to buy just the right components and not able to adjust them correctly, I'd be willing to spend a little more to get more flexible components that's more automatic. Right now I'm leaning toward the toshiba because it's their second generation wide dynamic day/night camera and they have a 3 year warranty.

Thanks for the tips. OK, f-6 would give me good focus from 5 feet and beyond. I do intend to get a DC auto iris lens, so the f-number of the AI lens is really when it's fully open? Let's say the AI lens I use is f-1.0 and I set the AI lens to focus at 5 feet, When it's fully opened at night, would objects 25 feet way be extremely out-of-focus? The WDR camera I'm trying to get some information and pricing is the Toshiba IK-65WDA. It's supposed to be both WD and DN. Is there a particular brand of lens that I should use or avoid?