jrmymllr

Well anyway, open ports on a camera isn't enough for another entity to spy on you. They have to be able to connect to them.

How about what model camera you are using? SZSINOCAM SN-IPC-4015SW-EU Not familiar with that one, but you're scanning what ports are open on the camera, correct? I personally don't see that as an issue unless the camera has its own Internet address, meaning, if it's behind a NAT router, nobody will be able to connect to it. But, the camera could make outgoing connections from any port it wants. Have you used something like Wireshark to see if it's talking to something else?

How about what model camera you are using?

Just some general Ethernet rules here. You are correct, Cat5/6 can go 100m/328 feet per run. You might be able to get 150m, but don't count on it. It's not a signal quality issue but rather a timing issue. Fiber to copper Ethernet converters would surely take care of it, and they're under $50/each (TP-LINK MC200CM), but if it works out, simply having a network switch "resets" that distance limitation because it retransmits the packets. So, you could have an Ethernet run from the NVR to a switch, fan out to cameras there, then have another run from that switch to another switch 100m further down, fan out from there, etc. There's no reason you can't daisy-chain several switches as you mentioned. About the 150m claim: I was told by a rep from Micrel, who makes Ethernet PHY chips, that theirs will do 150m. So, given a specific switch, it might be worth testing out. You could do some performance tests by starting out with say 200m cable, and shorten it 10m at a time and each time doing performance tests on it. Once you find where it begins working, chop another 20-30m off that length for a safety margin. Again, not ideal, but you might get by with it. PoE is indeed what you want if you don't want a power supply at each camera, no question. I'm not an installer or anything, just a hobbyist, but $15K seems like plenty to do this. I would estimate $100/camera, which leaves you a whole lot to buy the LAN equipment, build a standard computer as an NVR to run Zoneminder/Blue Iris/Xeoma or whatever you want to run.

I am tech savy, but interested in what VMS software you recommend. I plan to rack mount a computer with attached storage. Use a POE switch. That's exactly what I did. See http://wirehead.net76.net/xeoma/xeoma.html

I know Xeoma does plate recognition, and possibly cheaper than Avigilon. I don't know if it does Arabic though. I couldn't find the price for Avigilon so it's probably expensive

There is a point of diminishing returns. The best example is the 'scam' of these formerly called 4k, now called UltraHD TV's which SHOULD be called 2160 (keeping consistent using horizontal resolution). If you sit close enough and/or have a large enough screen, there is a slight difference provided you can have actual 2160 material which is rare. 2160 isn't enough now, so now the 'con artists' are now going for 8k. Of course most of these are still LCD tech which are poor for off axis viewing especially if they are edge lit. Point is, how much resolution do you really need here? is there some contest or is is just ego's? I don't see this as a Ford vs Chevy thread. Analog clearly has limits, despite maybe costing less. If this was an argument about brands, yes. But technology, no. Of course there's diminishing returns. But if a person's face is represented by X pixels vs 2X pixels, it seems to me having twice as many pixels will result in a better chance of identifying that person. But ultimately in my opinion, this is more about SunnyKim's insistence that analog is the best for everything; a clearly ridiculous argument.

FWIW I'm running Xeoma, 3 IP cams at 3MP, 8FPS, 640x480 motion detect substream, on a cheap G1840 CPU and load is about 15%. Xeoma seems to be exceptionally easy on the CPU, although using a substream helps a lot.

If you have any questions along the way, let me know. I've had mine running for about 8 months and it's been great.

I used Hikvision IP turrets and Xeoma running on Linux, although it'll run on Windows too. Xeoma is cheap and seems to work with practically any camera, and is simple to set up. If you're interested, I have a review at http://wirehead.net76.net/xeoma/xeoma.html

In math, more pixels = more image detail, everything else remaining constant. And in my opinion, more image detail = better, everything else remaining constant.

This is probably not what you want to use, but I prefer to piece systems together. Buying separate IP cameras that are well-rated and rolling your own NVR on a standard computer in my opinion is simple, and results in a highly flexible system with low risk.

First, SunnyKim will likely tell you to get an analog camera. Ignore it. 1. Depends on what you want. I prefer to use a standard computer as an NVR for multiple reasons, but if you're not so tech-savvy it might not be for you. 2. I know little about this, but from what I've read you have to be careful here. I believe many NVRs are picky about camera make/model. The VMS I run on my rack computer is very good about just wanting a URL to pull the stream from.

Hi shockwave been a long time. Yes November 2015 they upgraded long term verified accounts hope they keep it that way. Thanks for that info. Now I'm not sure what to think because a couple days after I wrote this posts AND having logged into my account and manually updated my hosts, I got a reminder email to update my host, lol! Goofy for sure. I'm just gonna see what happens in 30 days again. Who knows! I didn't expect to see this discussed here, but I am seeing the same thing. I assumed it was some glitch and I won a mini-lottery. I haven't seen an email to re-verify for months at least. No complaints about that of course, but I don't know if I should be on the lookout for things to return the way they were. Just checked my account. It claims expiration is every 30 days. Hmmmm.

I'm not so sure you're giving sound advice either, with you're analog obsession in full effect as always.

What is it with you and analog cameras? Dial-up Internet is very cheap and reliable too, yet I don't see anyone recommending it for everything. Yes an analog camera is Ok for some jobs, but you recommend it for *everything*, without even knowing specifics.

I have some Hikvision IP cameras and, never being completely satisfied, am still trying to optimize the image settings. It was fine for awhile, but then I tried increasing the WDR because very sunny areas were washed out, and dark areas were too dark. Well then that increased the overall brightness of the image and made things look strange, not to mention the increased noise during the night. In general, how do you set this up? There's so many settings that cause similar effects, for example, the gain, brightness, and WDR all have some effect on overall brightness. Is there a good strategy other than trial and error?

Don't hijack threads.

I'm using Xeoma and it's been great. It's easy on the CPU, available for all common OSs, cheap (8 cameras for $100), simple, and reliable.

I know, but in this case I don't want to add extra hardware. I mainly wanted to know how to juggle all the settings, and now it's fairly good.

Thanks, very helpful.

So the brightness is performed before gain? I'm trying to understand when to turn up the gain, and when to turn up brightness. Good explanation of WDR from a technical standpoint, that makes sense. I don't know if this is how all cameras work, but on mine, WDR seems to brighten the entire image more than I'd expect.

But this doesn't explain the impact of gain, brightness setting, and WDC on overall brightness. And on my camera, I can't use BLC because with WDR enabled, BLC isn't available, and BLC requires to specify a specific region, but since these are outside cameras that doesn't apply.

You recommend non-IP cameras the majority of the time from what I've seen. And the 'cannon' analogy doesn't make sense here: seems what you're saying is that more pixels aren't an advantage, which might be true sometimes but not as much as you lead people to believe.

You seem to have something against IP cameras, which is strange, because they aren't going away. Analog cameras will become less and less common just like most other things analog. And IP cameras are more expensive? I think that depends on a lot of factors. The ability to use a regular computer as a DVR, without needing a special interface or security DVR, along with plugging them right into an existing LAN is a huge advantage, and potential cost savings. You get what you pay for. I could have bought analog cameras and spent a little less, but I love my IP cameras and how they are simply a device on the LAN, and the ability to clearly capture license plates and faces; something that my old analogs could never do.