Soundy

Wiiiiiiild!

Just for the record, these baluns don't do anything special to the power and data wires, except "adapt" the RJ45 plugs out to wire tails. You can get the same thing by just splitting the wires out and using basic screw- or punch-terminal baluns on the video pairs. My standard wiring for Cat5 has been blue pair for video, orange and green for power, and brown pulled aside for a "spare" - it could just as easily be used for data on a camera that supports it.

http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/2933.52

We've been using these recently: http://www.3xlogic.com/prod/1053/visix-series-ip-camera-solutions - primarily the VSX-2MP-VD model, and a few of the VSX-2MP-D indoor dome (not as pleased with these, they have stranger flicker issues under fluorescent lights). They have some minor installation annoyances, but that's really all they are: annoyances, nothing that's a deal-breaker like the Areconts I've used.

That's the thing, they actually have a decent picture... but not good enough to justify the headache. Especially since they're definitely not the BEST image for the price.

There must be power going to the poolhouse - how about ethernet-over-powerline adapters?

Read the whole thread, Sean - there are pictures of the damage. Some of these had parts assembled in the wrong order. Some had setscrews that were drilled but never stamped with the hex shape. These are manufacturing-level issues, not "re-packing" damage. The worst part is, Arecont didn't even want to accept them from ADI after I brought them back - they insisted that I should have called them from site and gone through troubleshooting steps on the phone before bringing them back to the wholesaler. It took our ADI rep screaming at them about the PHYSICAL DAMAGE for them to begrudgingly take them back. Someone mentioned firmware issues with Acti in the other thread... these are no better. I've had some cameras that had issues that were fixed with a firmware update... subsequent units that were already at the newer firmware level when we got them and still had the issues. Vigil has weird problems with some Areconts, partially cropping the image on some streams... works fine on some cameras, but not on others with the same firmware. One Vigil developer said Arecont's SDK is horrible to work with. These have nothing to do with re-packing either...

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=22353&hilit=arecont+fail

Run screaming away from Arecont.

DVRs don't really "rewind" - video records continuously, you just skip back to previously recorded footage. I would guess that there may have been a change in the record function, intentionally, accidentally, or through some fault - maybe switched to an alert-only mode, or using motion-detect recording but with the motion zones cleared, or something else that's in some way preventing it from recording.

A PC can be as reliable as you can afford to make it. Proper cooling, good case, solid name-brand power supply, enterprise-grade drives... you can make that thing bulletproof.

QNAPs are NAS/NVR units, they don't have "channels" as such, and they don't do analog cameras at all.

I'd be surprised if the city didn't require a publicly-accessible retail property like that to maintain a minimum level of lighting... and if the city didn't, their insurance should. Turn off the lights, someone trucks through the parking lot at 3am, trips over a curb, breaks a couple teeth on the pavement... you KNOW the lawsuits will be flying fast and furious, and any liability insurance will go right out the window.

Adam has nailed it, I think: most standalone DVRs use their own drive formats (since a lot of them are Linux-based, it may be ext2/ext3), so simply popping in a FAT32 or NTFS formatted disk won't work. Most will prompt you to format or in some other way "prepare" the disk, but yours may not have. Hmmm, interestingly, I found the manual for this unit (http://www.x-vision.co.uk/PDFI/E4DVRCD%20Inst1.2.pdf) and it suggests that the DVR DOES use a standard Windows-compatible format and that the drive can be plugged directly into a PC and files accessed that way. However, it will probably still be necessary to use their "format" function to properly prepare the drive.

If there's not enough light for a Monalisa to get a clear picture, there's probably not enough light for people to walk safely across the lot, and you should be more concerned about liability issues...

Typically, you have to match both the format used by the MUX, AND the VCR... Fortunately these aren't usually all THAT different from one brand to the next, and some MUXes actually have a number of options in the setup menus for proper support of a wide range of VCRs. Unfortunately, it will be hard to say just what other MUX and VCR (besides the original types) will fully match up to what the tape was originally recorded on - trial and error is probably your best bet.

Things are always better after a good flush...

Get the serial number off the card's sticker and ask GeoVision about it... if they're a legit seller, they won't mind you verifying the card's authenticity before you buy it. If they balk at the suggestion... turn and walk away.

Where are you located? This sort of audio monitoring may be illegal... Keep in mind too, the mic will not be directional with the PTZ - you can zoom in the picture, but not the sound, and if it's any distance away from the desk, you're probably going to hear more ambient/room noise than actual conversation. IF this can be done legally, you'd probably find it much more effective to just use a basic two-wire intercom system, like an AiPhone, with a small, inconspicuous call box right at each desired location. He won't be able to monitor it over his phone, but...

Alright, last job we completed, we used the standard SD5 dome (WV-CW504) for the front door ID shot... client added a "customer awareness" monitor at the last minute and asked us to feed that camera into it. Since they used a basic HDTV, of course, the picture is not great... So, they've declared they want an all-HD image there, meaning we need to replace the 504 with a MP camera that we can then run from the Vigil DVR's HD Viewer on the monitor via HDMI extender. Only problem is, Vigil doesn't support the newest megapixel 504 IP dome... so we need something else in a supported MP dome camera with equivalent (or near-equivalent) backlighting capabilities to the SD5. Optionally, I suppose we could use a camera with HDMI out and feed that directly to the TV... but I haven't seen any domes with this feature, and since the wiring for the existing camera is sealed in a brick wall, we'd almost have to just add a second camera in a different location. Any suggestions for this - SD5-equivalent with HDMI out?

Get a GOOD TDN camera, like a CNB Monalisa, and forget about the IR. A parking lot will (or SHOULD) have more than enough lighting for these cameras to provide a really good picture.

Any particular thinking behind that? Having just used two of these on a site, I can say it's way cleaner and easier than having to extend all those runs from baluns to power can, and really, no more expensive overall than separate baluns + power can.

I suppose it depends on your definition of "better" - this is actually a pretty good image already. Shockwave is correct though, you should try it with a person moving about the scene - some cameras achieve better low-light images by using a longer shutter speed, which will lead to motion blur and make the image unusable for any kind of identification. A static scene like this isn't really useful as a comparison. Example: an IQ511 watching the street in front of my place, under the street lights... not bad, color cast is kinda weird because of the narrow-band lighting: Except with a 1/5s shutter speed, a car going through at a mere 30km/h is badly smeared:

When I was in Edmonton, I was at a bus loop right beside the RCMP K9 training facility... one pole there, they had something like 8 or 9 cameras of various types clustered on one pole. I think I managed to snap a picture with my phone, I should check...

Typical dome PTZs tend to be fairly homogeneous devices, with a couple lens or motor options available from the factory, but ultimately with few variations. The style you're talking about are designed to take a wide range of factory- or customer-designated cameras and lenses - regular cameras, IP cameras, thermal cameras, wide-zoom-range lenses, mondo National Enquirer telephoto lenses... Yup - they tend to be high-torque, high-current motors. Dome PTZs tend to be smaller, lighter, more compact camera assemblies that can move faster with smaller motors... this type not only has a larger, heavier housing, it may also have a heavier camera, as well as badly off-center weight balance, all of which require a lot more torque to move with any kind of decent speed. When you need the camera to respond fast, you need a beefy motor Not necessarily. Some I've seen are using pretty cost-effective wireless (Ubiquiti or similar)... some may use active baluns over UTP... depends on the surrounding infrastructure, I suppose.