phred

Use a BW bullet and seperate IR, don't go IR on the camera. If I was looking for a simple cost effective solution for a door entry cam that's what I'd do. For something better choose one of the other solutions but forget about IR Another thing that makes a difference in cameras is the digital signal processor (DSP) inside. The Sony HQ1 DSP for example has three levels of access to features. The top level is reserved for cameras coming out of Japan the next level down is for Korea and Taiwan and the Lowest level is for china. Now check Rory's list.

Possible solution. Assuming 1 cat5 for each camera. Use one pair for signal and three pairs for power. Voltage drop should be only 2 volts with 600ma current – some cameras will tolerate this drop.

- The Plextor unit does have a hardware compression chip inside and will produce good quality video while putting little strain on your laptop processor. - DivX is an mpeg4 codec and the latest version is very good (though not as good as X.264 ) Your idea will work and give good recordings but I suspect you will encounter a problem when you try to review video if it is recorded as one huge file. Please try playing back an 8 hour video file and see what I mean. Also, for evidence the video usually needs to be timestamped and in a non-editable format. You may find one of the many webcam surveillance programs will work with the Plextor and offer motion detection recording. If you are planing to put a camera and recorder into a vehicle then something like the portable recorders from rapidvisionsystems.co.uk would be worth considering. Cameras and recorders are quite common in police patrol cars nowadays and are kept very simple to use. These systems can often be rented. If your brother is loosing that much money he would be wise to consider spending the money on a proper solution and help prevent further loss.

Same thing here. Not enough time and I don't do cctv stuff for a living, but all too often get dragged in.

Sounds like a fair trade, I am way up near the Arctic circle.

depends on current draw for .5 amps through a 24awg conductor, voltage drop would be around 10volts at half the current the voltage drop is halved, but you would then only get half the power. I think you may need to go to 60 volts then use a step down transformer.

Cheers man btw the Samsung overshooting thing is less of a problem for us limeys – we rarely see the sun

Rory One thing I have become real hacked off with recently is installing XP – takes longer than building the PC. Tried Nlite some months back but every install failed. Got fedup making coasters so gave up. Any general advice on using Nlite for a DVR?

If it is a clone version bought on e-bay then yes 100% CPU usage and crashes are the norm. Try uninstalling the driver and software and install a generic bt878 driver (google it). Then try one of the many webcam recording apps and keep the frame rate down. It may still crash though as it is now only really of interest to archaeologists

Export of a viewer is not always the way it is done. Ask the merchant to look for a cd rom that may have come with the DVR. It may contain viewing software that you install. Also might be worth asking him where he got the DVR - if it is a pc card called WDT – 2016 then it is very possibly a counterfeit board from china.

For the FAQ I meant the info on the cameras rather than the list. BTW what is there to stop cctv_down_under sending you a clip from a Bosch XF ?

try the pano PTZ's the IP range goes very low light Agreed, But the proper PTZ ones, not the little toys like the BL-C10

On 24 volt power - Voltage drop on the longest run is way too high. One answer would be using higher voltage and drop down transformers Double the voltage - would allow half the current and half the voltage drop and you are almost there.

cctv_down_under Good post – like the list. Maybe this should be in a FAQ

Six months ago I would have said the same after poor results from a variety of pci cards I tried. However, now I entirely disagree and I have changed from a standalone zealot to a PC convert. I have built several PC based DVRs 4, 8, & 16 channel in the last six months and not one has had a single issue. My own 4 channel machine has been recording continuously for 5 months 24/7 , 100 fps D1. Only one reboot in that time - to adjust the BIOS clock. Main advantages: Big performance difference - 400fps D1 on a 16 channel Easy upgrades and replaceable parts. All possible backup options. Software flexibility like - 'on an alarm, run this program'. use your imagination. The hardware compression card I use is not well known but there are others around that may prove just as good or even better. Definitely worth considering – the technology has moved on.

The Bosch Dinion XF is considered a top spec camera (in the UK at least) A very good camera often used outdoors in difficult lighting conditions. For good quality cameras that perform well in low light look at the Samsung Techwin range Best low light camera I know of is the VNC 743 from EVS in Russia 0.00003 lux (F0. Beyond that you are looking at thermal imaging!

Sounds rough. Not so bad here but it should be much better than it is. In the North, power is becoming one of our big exports. Wind farms going up everywhere. Have considered getting my own wind turbine and selling the excess back to the grid, it's becoming viable. Shame no one has managed a room temp superconductor, you could just plug in here on a long extension – its a straight run. Would need a big regulated UPS though!

APC used here too, very reliable (where's my Oak plank). Never had to poke about inside one but they must be built within certain limits. One of the disadvantages of all the different power sources we have here now is all the switching from one to the other. Often notice on night recordings how the light levels vary as voltages go up and down. Where do you get your electrons from in the Bahamas? Any wave or wind power?

a UPS is just a battery backup, the voltage Regulator is actually what saves your hardware .. Good point. I should have said a 'Line interactive UPS' not a cheapo without a regulator.

Just to add to the above suggestions. One other thing that can cause this is your mains electricity supply. The grid supply is often switched from one source to another and it does not always happen smoothly. There can be a short blip in the power that is sometimes enough to trigger a shutdown. If the BIOS is set to reboot after a power failure, this can cause apparently random reboot behavior. If you run the PC off a UPS and it is functioning correctly then the problem is elsewhere. If you don't use a UPS then I strongly suggest you do – if my suggestion is correct then you are heading for early hard drive failure without one.

Looks very similar to one I played around with a couple of years ago. Got it working with something eventually but very disappointing results. In the end, the only use I could find for it was a fancy dress party. The 8 into 1 connectors make a fine Rastafarian style wig. It is a very dated piece of technology – don't waste your time on it. PC type cards really need proper hardware compression chips. Bt878/9 based stuff relies on your CPU for video compression and no CPU can compete with several ASIC or DSP chips dedicated to the job.

It all depends on what you hope to achieve. If all you want is a camera that will capture a motion triggered event of someone entering your lounge or appearing in your drive, then the least expensive way of achieving this would be an IP camera, because you can achieve this without a recorder. Some IP cams, like Panasonics, can be configured to send snapshots and video clips of motion triggered events to your e-mail inbox or use ftp - just make sure your inbox or ftp site has a generous capacity as false triggering is generally unavoidable. If you must have continuous recording then analogue will currently give you better results for the same cost. Good IP recording solutions are still rare and expensive. If you must have low light performance then analogue wins again, few IP cams I have seen are any use in low light.

You may be able to find a proper Lexan polish – for motorcycle windshields etc Have used one called Novus that came from the US. Comes in 3 grades. Novus1 is the finest - only use Novus 3 if you want to make the dome cover into a lens! Harley dealers often stock it.

Mirroring is like RAID mirroring. Same data is written to two drives at the same time so it could be useful for your needs. Just make sure the DVR writes to disk in a PC readable format and comes with viewing software that can be installed on a PC to allow you to view the files directly on the removable drive. I have found another DVR that can do what you want - but only available to professional installers in the UK. So there will be others. DVRs are now a bit like PCs – loads of different models from different manufacturers but mostly built from the same limited range of parts and often similar software. May be worth speaking to the manufacturers in your country – there are a few. regards

If the vgz files are from a DVR then they are almost certainly Chateau Technical's proprietry H.264 codec video files. If not then disregard the rest of this. Several manufacturers use these capture boards in their DVRs. The software includes a player called Vg player or something similar. Check and see if you have it already. If not try a search for Vg player – any re badged player will do, they all use the same codec. The player should have a menu item 'Tools' - 'VG to AVI' that allows conversion to any avi format – just install the codec you want. You can also save it out uncompressed but be careful as compression ratio is very high - 1Mb .vgz may be 400Mb plus uncompressed. Conversion to most avi codecs is slow – fastest by far is the Xvid codec. For slightly larger file size you will get near perfect copies - so turn the quality/ data rate down in Xvid for smaller file size. That said, from your post it sounds like you are backing up a whole days continuous recordings at a high frame rate from 4 or 8 cameras. Conversion to any other video format for all of it would take days, as it uses your CPU . By comparison the hardware compression chips on the dvr board that created the .vgz file are many times faster at handling video. Converting vgz files to avi is rather pointless if you are hoping to collect video as evidence. The time code on the original video is security protected and will deliberately not appear on converted video. Otherwise converted avi could be opened in a video editor where all sorts of tricks could be performed. You need the original vgz file for evidence. The vgz player app allows you to do motion searches of the video file for the interesting bits and editing tools that allow you to cut out and save those sections. Also the DVR software usually includes a setting to allow you to record extra video clips on motion alarms so you may only need to backup these. Motion detection is not a perfect science but nothing can guarantee 100% that you will get that all important face shot. If you are using the type of DVR I think you are, then it can record continuously at highest quality for several weeks on a big drive. If you combine that with motion alarm recordings backed up on DVD then you are achieving more than most in ensuring your chances of detection. regards phred PS The digiview link that Rory suggests is the correct player