Soundy

No. Wattage rating on a speaker is the most it can handle (usually RMS, with higher, short-term peak ratings). Wattage on an amp is the most it can deliver into a specified load (usually 8 ohms for PA horns). It's a "good idea" to make sure the two are close, but unless you're planning to push the system to its limits, it's not generally critical that they match exactly. Honestly, 10W is probably MORE than enough for your needs. Keep in mind that the actual output volume will vary greatly depending on the shape of the horn and the efficiency of the driver - a good, efficient driver and horn design will be louder with 10W driving it, than a poor design with 30W driving it.

Something like this? http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2102855#tabsetBasic Edit: I would expect this to be able to drive a small-ish PA horn... for something louder, try a powered horn, or add a little "kit" amplifier. Re-edit: Kit amp example: http://www.rpelectronics.com/ck193-20w-bridged-power-amplifier.html

Similar to this? If you look up the current ratings on each of your cameras and sensors, then add them up, that will tell you the maximum current requirement... I'd guess it comes in well under 3A, which means you should be fine running everything off the one power can. Just make sure each device has its own fused output.

Kinda hard to answer without one very basic piece of information: what IS your current PSU? Make/model? Voltage? Current? Style?

You can't FORCE current into a load. Ohm's Law: I=V/R, or current = voltage divided by resistance. The camera presents a fixed load (well, two - one with and one without IR). At a given supply voltage, it will only draw whatever current the resistance allows. If the camera presents a 40-ohm load, then at 12V, it will draw 300mA, PERIOD. Current rating on a power supply only specifies the maximum the supply is capable of providing, PERIOD. If the camera draws 300mA, it will only draw 300mA regardless of whether the supply is rated 300mA, 3A, or 300A. This is BASIC electronic theory. I would suggest brushing up: http://www.the12volt.com/ohm/ohmslaw.asp

The 3A rating on that is irrelevant; it's only a rating of the maximum it can provide. The load (camera, in this case) will simply draw however much current it needs. A fuse isn't intended to limit the current output; it's intended to melt down if the circuit draws too much current (usually due to a short or component failure), thus protecting the rest of the circuit.

Is it JUST the LCD display that's going black, and the rest of the image is okay?

Ah-hah... I think we may be approaching the truth! Question: how many analog cameras are actually providing a PROGRESSIVE image? I've only ever dealt with one (that I can remember) that actually had an option to switch to progressive output, and that was a Pelco IS90. If a camera is using a standard interlaced scan, then the vertical resolution of the DVR is really being wasted at D1, and whether the vertical grid on the test image appears properly or not is a factor of the camera, NOT the DVR.

Yes indeed! It's disguised as a heavily-modified 1991 Civic and goes 'thud thud boooom, thud thud booooom'

Done. We can't really say if that's "better" without a better picture of the layout, and what you hope to actually capture. Everything is a trade-off - the farther the camera is from the subject, and/or the wider the angle covered, the less detail you'll get... for example. You could put the cameras WAY up the tower and cover the entire yard, but not get a lot of detail (remember the old joke about people on the ground looking like ants from an airplane - "Those ARE ants, idiot - we haven't taken off yet!") Another down side to mounting the cameras too high is that you'll get the tops of people's heads more than faces - fine if you want to just watch activity in the yard, not so much if you want to identify people (unless you have some super-advanced bald-spot-recognition software). Usually, you want to look at a combination of angles... like, if you have a gate, have a couple higher-up cameras to catch all the movement, and then a lower one with a tight shot on the gate, so you're more likely to get clear facial shots of anyone who uses the gate.

Yeah, but he's looking for something that also has dry contact outputs... how many do, and how many are just TTL? I did find this on the A&E sheet for the IQEye Alliance-Pro domes: Doesn't specify dry contacts, but given the use of "relay" I would tend to assume it...

Sure but not with a 3 Megapixel imager! SMPTE 292 and 424 are the HD-SDI transport stream specs at 1.5 Gb/s and 3 Gb/s respectively. The 3Gb/s 424 came along to support 60 frame progressive for sports and can be used for 3D. So I guess it makes sense to design cameras that adhere to the standard but talk about using a shotgun to swat a fly. Hahahah, nice analogy! You want to really stir up some fun, go join the HDcctv group on LinkedIn and tell them that - I'd kill to see Todd and Craig's reactions to that. Bet survtech would too - trolling them has become a hobby of ours Yeah, post that, and see if Craig can come back in any less than 2,000 words...

Of course, barrel distortion will affect how the lines appear as well, so it's not really a fair assessment unless you're using a long enough lens to avoid the distortion. Actually, it's not an entirely accurate assessment anyway, because it doesn't account for any flaws or chromatic aberrations in the lens itself, either. A fingerprint smudge on the front element would throw the whole thing off.

I actually find them great when mounting a VCM on the ceiling, because the camera's BNC and the balun together, wedge nice and tight between the side of the back-box and the two mounting studs, thus holding the wires in place while I fiddle with getting the rest of the camera body aligned.

I think Synopsis is the most accurate term for what you're doing... could expand it with "Motion Synopsis" or "Object Synopsis".

I've never had a problem mixing-and-matching balun brands and styles. Our last job, we used GEM BLN-MTL2 baluns at the cameras (they fit nicely inside the VCM back-box): At the head-end, we used EV16P-VPS rack-mount balun/power supply units:

Yes, good point: LIGHTNING may not be unpredictable, but the terrain and conditions can be, which effectively makes lightning's behavior unpredictable. The house with the plumbing is an example: once the conditions were understood (the well-grounded plumbing in the target wall), then it all made perfect sense, but without that study (which was only undertaken once initial mitigation efforts with poorly-grounded lightning rods failed), the behavior couldn't be accurately predicted. As far as lightning being attracted to trees: remember that wood is also a good insulator... and one of the best insulators is WATER. Yes, pure water actually a very good insulator; it's impurities such as minerals and metals in the water that make it conductive. A rain-wet tree COULD be attractive to lightning depending on what other impurities are present, but inherently, the wood and water themselves should not attract lightning.

Your original budget figure is more accurate - you should expect to spend no less than $150 for a *quality* camera, ideally closer to $200+, so there's $1600 right there.

Ummm, one thing you need to understand is, IP cameras do not give "better quality images" BECAUSE they're IP... what IP does, is get around the resolution limitations of analog video standards. Thus, IP cameras CAN provide higher resolution... but ONLY via IP. If you use an IP camera with an analog output, that analog output will still be limited to D1 resolution. It won't look any better on your analog DVR - the high-resolution image is still only available via the IP stream.

http://www.3xlogic.com/prod/658/ndvr-series-ip-video-recording-solutions

You are correct to say that lightning takes the path of least resistance; however, the path of least resistance is the highest point as air is one of the best insulators out there.

Love that style... have a similar Husky knife that's served me well for years. Just picked up this version as well, it's pretty slick: Tried those a couple time times... problem I find is, with all the extra stuff poking out everywhere and the crappy weight balance, most of it just isn't that usable, especially the screwdriver tips. I love my PicQuik drivers - bits all work in my screwgun and quick-change tips, and you don't have to worry about them all dumping out everywhere like the drivers with all the small bits stored in the handle: A MegaPro driver with tamperproof bits is also a must for me:

First, a little clarification (hopefully without confusing the matter): IP (or properly, TCP/IP) is just a data transport method. IP cameras *per se* are no clearer than analog, particularly after being recorded in a compressed format. However, analog video is limited to about 0.3MP (720x480 with NTSC video); it's not possible to have higher-resolution cameras when you're connecting with analog. IP avoids this limitation by digitizing the video in the camera and sending it over the network - thus, you can have cameras that are 1, 2, 3, 5 megapixel... even 8, 10, and up to 16MP cameras are available. So what you're really asking about are MP (megapixel) cameras. IP cameras (including those that output 640x480 VGA resolution) do cost more, mainly because they're processing the video internally... on the other hand, you don't need separate capture hardware (DVR card, etc.) to digitize the analog signal, so a recorder is generally cheaper - in a car environment, you could even pick up a small used laptop, install some NVR software on it (many cameras include their own basic NVR software), and record it all there.

I have never even given one of those cameras a thought because we do 99.9% IP. But that video stream is staggering. They must send the raw stream over the wire and do nothing at all on the camera. Raw, uncompressed, full-framerate 720p and 1080p video, in fact. Makes for really stunning live video. Of course, it still has to be compressed for storage, at which point you end up with video that should be indistinguishable from IP megapixel video. Ostensibly, the idea behind this is to allow easy-retrofit upgrades to HD video for existing coax-cabled analog systems - unplug your old analog gear, plug in the HD gear, and away you go. Cost-wise, the equipment is no cheaper than IP, and you're still stuck with a closed, point-to-point system. It's a nice idea for some circumstances, but I don't think it will ever get beyond a niche product.

Nice find!