Kiwi

The tagline is from a Aussie tourism ad that ran in some countries, certainly in NZ but not sure about the US. It caused a big fuss because of the ease of taking it out of the context of typical Aussie banter.

Ha! I think not many here will have heard that ad line ("where the bloody hell are you!") Welcome, where in Sydney are you located?

I don't know if Video Server E is different from the "S" but those settings work fine on my home setup with a 3com router. You could try temporarily assigning the DVR to DMZ to eliminate port choice issues. Not that it's likely relevant, but it's interesting that you have used an external DNS address on your DVR. I normally use the gateway (router) so the DVR can reach whatever DNS has been currently obtained off the ISP.

If MS Outlook works with the standard ports on your ISP then the DVR should work also.

There are no electrical engineering reasons to concern yourself with power wires running next to each other.

I've never used this feature but I assume you have the alarm trigger enabled as email? Did you look in the server log to see if the email attempt is failing? You may want to try installing a protocol analyzer (such as the free Wireshark) on a PC on the LAN and see what data appears. I think the handshake is in text so it should be possible to determine what the error is.

What's the DSL modem model? Is it acting as a NAT router? In other words does the Linksys see the actual internet IP on the WAN port or is it seeing a local DHCP-supplied address from the modem? Where are you finding the internet IP that you are using for remote testing? Again, setting the router admin login to allow remote access from any internet IP is a good way to test this stuff without initially involving the DVR. And, again, if you assign the DVR to DMZ you can take out the variable of port forwarding. I think either your modem is also a router (and blocking ports,) or you are using the wrong internet IP when trying to access it remotely. There isn't anything left!

Sure, or buy the matching plug from Radio Shack for a neater job. Or, a twisted pair balun with both matching plugs and then you'll have a real pro effort!

You should see the rest of the system - it's a virtual Rube Goldberg museum of hacked wireless doorbells and plug-in timers! I even have one of the DVR alarm channels hooked up to my backyard sump pump so I can log the start times. Umm, well, that actually was my first attempt at using a glass cutter. Same result unfortunately with the second and the third attempts ...

I would assume because there is still too much light at night. The cam may have an adjustment for this.

I know nothing about the clover DVR but no doubt the instructions will tell you which ports need to be directed from the WAN to the DVR LAN IP, and if those are TCP and/or UDP. The purpose of assigning the DVR's LAN IP to "DMZ" instead is to temporarily (or permanently) avoid the need to figure all that out. If it doesn't work on DMZ it not going to work with port forwarding. Your client, whether it is proprietary or IE should work exactly the same remotely as it did locally, with only the target IP changed.

Might be worth trying to focus some of those at night, assuming they have auto irises and can stop down during the day. The stairwell cam looks correct at night.

We get the same problem here in New Zealand. Any specialized electronic product of decent quality is priced way higher than just the additional shipping, GST, and import duty - usually double the US price. It doesn't help that many US companies are reluctant to ship here, or charge an arm and a leg for shipping. The local CCTV dealer will give me a similar price to the US on "Geo" cards, but they are clearly fakes!

That would be a polarizing filter, no? That would help eliminate the pool reflection and cut down on the light level a bit, but what I see on the umbrella looks like is simply due to the high IR content of the scene. I doubt anything can be done without messing up any night capability. Perhaps the pool cameras could all be zoomed in on specific individual busy areas rather than overviews. With some of the higher-up cameras at entrances I could see you might have trouble ID'ing a stranger. Some shots where people tend to walk a certain path could be tightened up a bit and lowered if camera security allows. Looks like no. 5 needs a sun shade, at least at 17:17 hr. As I look outside my window here in NZ at the cold and rain I can only envy the nice Sunday you are having at the pool! I'll check again at night, maybe I'll feel better. Overall it looks pretty good. Thanks for letting us check out your system!

Agreed, you must actually be using another internet connection for testing. I would leave it on DMZ only until you get it working, then step back. One other test is to enable remote admin in your router and use that to test the DDNS function. Also, you are using the DDNS in your router, not the DVR, correct?

I've built numerous outdoor housings for home use over the last several years that are fully exposed to direct weather and have learned the basics of what works and what doesn't. Commercial housings are hard to source cheaply in this part of the world and in any case are usually not configured exactly the way I want. I generally use PVC pipe and related fittings as it's easy to work with, cheap, and will survive for years once painted. I don't use heaters and fans, instead have gone in the direction of sealing the enclosure air tight with desiccant installed. This has worked great across seasons although for anything but the smallest housings you need to allow for thermal expansion of the internal air, but there are a couple of sneaky ways to deal with this. If you want to make your own, post a sketch of the basic shape and perhaps I can provide some tips. This one points just a few degrees below the sun's daily arc so the sun shade is shaped to keep sunlight off the window. This one sits under the eaves. Sunshade added later. This .1 lux monochrome board cam gives acceptable images in daytime and at night under halogen lighting. The green filter in the front is in addition to an IR-cut filter glued to the rear of the lens. The sun shade is a drawer pull and the box is sealed with rubber grease.

MAC update client at DynDNS.com http://www.dyndns.com/support/clients/mac.html As mentioned, getting a router with a built-in client is the easiest solution if there are no "always-on" computers on the LAN.

Thanks for the link. More cool stuff - web-based I/O modules. http://www.controlbyweb.com/products.html

Either wiring between camera and iris is faulty, or the iris has oil on it or some other obstruction to operation.

perhaps to about 60 or 80 mm, with automatic iris. I think you can get longer wavelength units (940 nM) that are not humanly visible. That's going to take a bit more thought and experimentation. You need to really tighten up the shot to get a readable plate, the car should fill at least half the frame. Plus there's glare from the headlights at night to deal with. The camera being high in a tree will help. Here's a thought - if the "visitors" are not walking I'm wondering if you will get much value from an IR illuminator. I doubt they would be recognizable inside the car. Instead, if you place something reflective at the side of the road like a white sign you will provide enough bounced light off the headlights to illuminate the license plate. The camera changing to night mode and back again will likely trigger it.

That is correct. Umm, no, ground on the power supply output is connected to the ground at the input, hopefully then connected eventually to mother earth. The 24 VAC lines however are floating. Just because the ground terminal is next to the 24 VAC output does not imply some relationship. Unlike house wiring there is no reason to go to the trouble of having a center tap (tied to earth or otherwise) as there is no need to derive 12 VAC, nor is there a safety issue with leaving the 24 VAC lines floating.

It's not clear to me why you should expect the 24 VAC lines from a low-power transformer to have any relationship at all with a physical ground? I would expect the transformer secondary to be completely floating. There is no safety or electrical reason that I am aware of to ground either side, nor provide a grounded center tap to place each line at the same potential over ground. In fact leaving it floating is likely to be preferred by the camera electronics. When you measured the potential of each wire to ground, did you load each line one at a time to ground with a suitable resistor? My guess is you didn't and are not getting a useful reading from the voltmeter. Sounds like it's just fine as it is.

Enter the DynDNS account name and password inside the DSL-604T modem/router, under "Dynamic DNS" in the main menu. If your router doesn't have this option, you need later firmware. Do not use any DDNS (dynamic dns) feature present inside the DVR. Set the DVR for a static IP, in my case I used 10.1.2.3 as it's outside the router's DHCP range. The net mask is 255.0.0.0 and the gateway is 10.1.1.1 In the modem/router, under Advanced, Virtual Server select the same DVR IP you set (above) in the scroll list and under Servers "add" Web Server. (This assumes your DVR is accessed over port 80, if not "add" a new application and enter the required ports, both the same.) Reboot router as directed. Now you can reach your DVR from the internet by entering your DynDNS hostname.

I'm doing the same thing and have found it's a lot more convenient to have a separate monitor for the CCTV, if you have the space near your TV. Perhaps a TV-out video card for your computer and a cheap color TV. Might also be less expensive than the video splitter and modulator path. Cheapest solution of all, just tap off the camera video and run it to the aux on your VCR if avail, and accept the darker image

Well it is just a short length of cable after all, and cable has an impedance I asked a top notch EE about this decades ago and was assured that using the "wrong" impedance over such a short length is not an issue in lower frequency applications, certainly video easily falls in this category.