DVR Suggestions for Office Building

[lmxru 0]

I'm planning to implement surveillance within the next month and am looking for equipment suggestions.

 

The main purpose of the surveillance is to thwart intruders at night. We have a yard that often has company vehicles (with various tools and construction material) parked at night (gated). We've had about one robbery per year where our vehicles that were left out were broken into. The yard is about 100 feet long and the lighting is next to nothing. I don't know much but from what I've researched, I think this means we'll need pretty decent outdoor cameras. We have two parking lots that I believe will need 100+ feet IR cameras.

 

As for the interior, we want cameras that watch a main hall and two roll-up doors in our warehouse. I believe these cameras will not need to be very sophisticated, possibly with the warehouse camera needing to be a a little more capable (50+ feet in darkness).

 

We're planning on starting with 4 cameras (2 interior, 2 exterior) and want to have the option for expansion. So I'm leaning towards an 8 channel DVR. I've seen a lot of talk about the Dahua brand - it seems cost effective and reliable per what I read on these forums. I want the capability to access remotely via iOS/Android/IE (hopefully chrome). From what I've seen, this seems to be a fairly common standard.

 

Does anyone have suggestions for a DVR that will fit our needs? Let me know if I need to be more specific. Since I don't know anything about surveillance installation/equipment, I don't know if what I've provided is a good starting point to point me in the right direction.

[dmoore 0]

The yard is about 100 feet long and the lighting is next to nothing. I don't know much but from what I've researched, I think this means we'll need pretty decent outdoor cameras. We have two parking lots that I believe will need 100+ feet IR cameras.

 

Are you able to install lighting outside?

[lmxru 0]

The yard is about 100 feet long and the lighting is next to nothing. I don't know much but from what I've researched, I think this means we'll need pretty decent outdoor cameras. We have two parking lots that I believe will need 100+ feet IR cameras.

 

Are you able to install lighting outside?

 

Probably, would this reduce the cost of the cameras by a good amount?

[yakky 0]

You are on the right track with the Dahua, a great value and lots of features for the $.

 

Cameras are a bit more tough. Since you want to prevent, you're probably better off with some pretty obnoxious looking box cameras in large housings. A tracking PTZ is great too. While you can get away with a cheap DVR, cameras are where you want to spend the money. A few dummy cameras might be good as well. Night stuff gets really tricky and without a good illumination scheme, you'll get very little detail, just enough to let you see the action, not enough to ID someone. Your best bet is to cover your entrances and hope for a license plate at night.