edwardh

I'm not sure that I even want remote viewing to be possible, as I plan on having the cameras on a separate network not connected to the internet. I want the camera to be able to be switched off because I don't want the indoor camera to record me all day long unnecessarily... Plus, I think it's morally questionable to record guests. So whenever I get home, I plan on having some sort of mechanism to switch it off.

Hi, I'm very new to CCTV - only had one foscam a while ago and didn't do much with it. But I was quite happy with the basics of how quickly it turned IR on/off automatically and how well recording based on motion detection worked in iSpy. Now I would like to expand on this. For one thing, I want to be able to turn it on/off remotely not via schedule but on command. Ideally with some home automated power outlet. Or PoE, I suppose. I don't really expect advice on that since this isn't a home automation forum. But you guys do know whether turning the power on/off interferes with some cameras, maybe because they're dynamic IP only and so I can't rely on their IP staying the same after powering off and on again. Also, I'm wondering about motion detection and recording. It seems to me that a lot of cameras offer proprietary software to make that possible, usually just for PC/Mac, no Linux. And there doesn't seem to be any kind of standardized protocol that cameras use for signalling even open source software to record. Such software (like iSpy) will only get image information via e.g. RTSP streams and will have to do motion detection by itself, right? So... is it even possible to have a mini server with Linux running somewhere that switches my cameras on and off on demand and also records when necessary? Or would it have to be a beafy Windows machine (motion detection for multiple cameras at once) using e.g. iSpy? (as I don't want to use proprietary software) I guess a separate DVR device altogether would be an option but I would prefer to not have yet another device consume additional power when I'll already have some server running for multimedia purposes.