Soundy

Umm, first we need to know if your DVR uses a composite or VGA monitor...

Maximum run will vary a little bit depending on the ACTUAL output voltage of the power supply - a non-regulated supply will realistically be producing something in the 16.5VDC range, which at 300ft/100m will give you a little over 1V of loss.

You may not NEED the heater for the DC area, but heaters do not and cannot CAUSE moisture.

First thing is to look for and seal any other places moisture may be getting in - possibly through a mounting point or fitting. If you're punching through a wall directly to the warm inside air, it's also likely that that warm, moist air is getting inside the dome. Once you know all possible leaks are sealed, open the camera up on a DRY day (and I mean DRY) and allow it to air out as much as possible... then reassemble it with a small desiccant pack inside (you know, those little baggies of silica beads that come packed with most electronics - those are designed to absorb several times their own weight in water).

Just about every new machine I see listed only has the 64-bit version if it also has 4GB or more of RAM; less than that, they include 32-bit. For most people, there's currently no real benefit to running 64-bit Windows except to make use of more than 3.5GB or so of RAM.

Is there some reason you think you NEED to use a 64-bit OS?

I'll second the recommendation for a PZM mic in this situation - they have excellent omnidirectional pickup, inherently tend to reduce echo, and don't suffer at all from proximity effect. Placed in the middle of the ceiling, it should pick up room sounds nicely without getting any direct noise from ceiling air vents or buzzing lights. For monitoring, you just need to run it into a very basic mixer. Anything from Radio Shack should suffice, although you can do better at a pro-sound supplier. For the camera, hardwired is correct again, you don't need high-quality video for this, so anything in a "nanny cam" type idea should do fine. Covert cameras can be had built into clocks, toys, computer speakers, smoke detectors, alarm sensors... just about anything you can imagine can have a camera hidden in it. That said, you could also go with just a simple, small, low-profile dome in a far corner of the room - there's really no need for this camera to be HIDDEN, you just want it inconspicuous... that just means you don't want a big obvious box with monster lens pointing right at the subjects. Something like a Pelco IS90 flush-mounted in the ceiling is discrete and unobtrusive: (just for scale, the white ring is a little bigger than a CD - the smoked dome would look even better in your case, but I can't find a good picture of that).

Agreed there... especially since IP was noted (at least here) as a future consideration and the request was supposedly for them to cable with UTP for the analog cameras in preparation for upgrading to IP later. Assuming MiamiRob presented it to them as such, this would indicate that they're not really listening to the customer's desires/requirements and just trying to throw out whatever they can to appease him. In other words, they appear to be operating on the "if you can't dazzle them with brilliance..." model.

Not sure I understand the question. The camera is located at my residence in Canada but it is being recorded on my NUUO NVR back at my office in the U.S. He's asking why you can't record it locally (at your residence) and then just playback the video from remote when you need to.

Found this that might be helpful: http://www.nonags.com/freeware-shaplus-bandwidth-meter_3521.html "ShaPlus Bandwidth Meter remains in tray and displays the approximate bandwidth consumed for the session, day and month. This will be useful for people with limited bandwidth allotted per month."

Do keep in mind, that you won't be using that full 500kbit constantly - with any form of B-frame compression, unless you're aiming at a scene that's constantly changing, it will use far less than that on a regular basis. Even without in-camera motion detection, a static scene will generate very, very little traffic. Use a camera that DOES have built-in motion detection, that can use that to trigger the data stream, and you cut the data usage down even more. I'd say fire the thing up and monitor the bandwidth locally for a couple weeks, see how much it uses *real-world*, before giving up on the idea. Simplest way to do it is to plug the camera into any spare Windows PC (even Win98 should do), and run any sort of basic freeware/open-source traffic tool. Heck, even Windows Task Manager will show you the Bytes Sent/Bytes Received data.

If you want one that gives you actual angles of FOV, try this one: http://www.sweeting.org/mark/lenses/cctv.php If you want something a little more inclusive, and don't NEED to run it online (ie. something you can install on a desktop or laptop), check out http://www.jvsg.com/cctv-lens-calculator/ Edit: just came across this one, it's a small install, very clean and slick, and FREE: http://www.cam-techsecurity.co.uk/cctv/lens-calculator

Very top-right, where it says "0 new messages" - clicking that will go to your inbox.

I think a legend of the thread icons along the bottom would be a cool idea. It's there when you look at the thread list for a particular forum, but it would be nice to have it for the predefined search results as well (View unanswered, View new, View active, etc.)

Ah, didn't see that... but not quite the same thing, as that would, it appears, go right to the end of the thread. "View first unread" will take you to... well, the first one in the thread that you haven't read yet. Particularly handy if the thread has filled out a couple pages since you last checked in on it. Edit: just checked, the board I took the screenshot from has the "View latest" link as well, in the same place as here.

No more "go to first unread message" button either. Previously, if you looked at a thread list, any threads with new unread messages would have this button at the start of the topic line. Example from another board:

Well, that's going to depend on the video poster providing that information, regardless of the site.

I would assume this "control box" is not with you underwater So if I'm following this, the camera is already running through the umbilical to the control box up on dry land, and you need to capture the S-video output from that box, into the laptop? If that's the case, all you need is a USB capture device that has an S-video input... such as the aforementioned Adaptec Gamebridge. Install that along with the included software, plug the camera's control box into it with an S-video cable, and you're off to the races!

I'm not familiar with the setup in the GV, but I've done something along these lines with a Vigil DVR. Basically, I took an alarm output of a separate Video Analytics box, to an alarm input on the Vigil machine, then told the Vigil to send a specific preset to the camera when that input was tripped. Worked pretty well, but the problem was, Vigil only supports one alarm-triggered preset per camera (or did at the time, I don't know if they might have improved on that now). Motion-tracking CAN be done with a standard PTZ, but requires specific software to control the camera. I don't know if there's any that will integrate cleanly with the GV, but you could probably run both on the same system.

Check these out - records up to 4GB internally, no DVR required: http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electronic/a0f3/

So the way that the connection works is that cate5e extends from the head-end through the conduit and then just before the cate5e connects to the cameras, an RJ-45 connector is inserted in a balun and then a coax connector connects the other side of the balun to the camera, right? Correct. Some baluns have an RJ45 jack and split out wire tails for other things like power, control, or audio, in addition to a BNC for video... others simply have a pair of screw or snap-down terminals where you connect one pair of wires from the Cat5e; you then split out the power/control/audio from the Cat5e jacket yourself. This all depends entirely on the camera, the balun, and how the installation is done. You could run to a sealed junction box, put the balun in that, then run coax and 18/2 from there to the camera. Some domes have sealed back-boxes with enough room for a balun inside. With box cameras, you can use environmental housings that usually have lots of room for the baluns to reside. In theory... and in practice. In fact, typical passive baluns will generally let you run video over twisted pair for upwards of 1000'. Active baluns can extend that to half a mile or more. Not that I've ever seen... with UTP or coax. Plenum cable (FT-6 rated) has an outer jacket with a higher fire-time (FT) rating (meaning it takes longer to burn through when exposed to direct flame); there's no reason the cable's internal construction would be different from riser (FT-4) cable. The main drawbacks to it are that the jacket tends to be stiffer, which makes it harder to work with sometimes; the jacket tends to be a lot thinner, at least for coax, which makes some connectors not fit it well; and mostly, it tends to be two to three times the price of riser cable. Ultimately, the use of plenum cable will depend on your local electrical codes. Usually, it's only needed for cable run through a plenum airspace (where the return air for the HVAC system runs through open ceiling areas) over a certain distance (which will be stated in code). If the building has ducted air returns, then it doesn't have plenum airspace, and you don't need plenum cable. If the cable is in metal conduit, it doesn't need to be plenum rated. If you do need to run through plenum, your code will probably allow up to 3m/10ft of non-plenum cable - this allows for "jumpers" from conduit to camera without needing to enclose the entire length.

Thanks for this great info. So if coax is used PTZ cameras need a separate cable run (siamese cable?) for power or an electrical plug near the camera? But if cat5e is used, PTZ camera can get their power over the same cat5e cable over which the camera transmits video? Is this true for most PTZ cameras for just for some PTZs? It would mainly depend on the camera's power needs and the length of the run, but yes, most cameras can happily be powered over the Cat5e. This is true of both fixed and PTZ cameras. With "standard" wiring though, PTZ also needs an additional pair for its control signal. I've never done a direct comparison. There are 12VDC-only cameras that are more expensive than "similar" 24VAC or dual-voltage cameras, that are better in other areas (and sometimes just more expensive because of a brand name). There really SHOULDN'T be a significant difference - the addition of a rectifier and voltage regulator technically shouldn't add more than five bucks to the manufacturer's cost of a camera, although it does require a bit more space, so you won't find them in very small designs. The most common way is for all the cameras to share one central power supply, preferably with individually fused outputs, but multiple central supplies can also be used, or even a separate "local" supply for some or all cameras. There's no hard and fast rule as to how it HAS to be done, though - sometimes some creativity is needed just to make things work. A central supply is done mostly for convenience and ease of maintenance.

It might help to start off with something like, "You know how, in apartment buildings, they can tune a channel on the TV and see the security camera? Well, I wanna do that at home with my FiOS..." - might help them clue in a little quicker to what you're after.

You can't plug it in directly - you need some sort of video capture device. I use one of these to plug cameras into my laptop for adjusting/focusing: http://reviews.cnet.com/search-results/adaptec-gamebridgetv-avc-1410/4505-5_7-31653718.html What does this cable/three-pin connector normally plug into? The pins are PROBABLY video, power and ground, so you'll need something to split out the video and power pairs, then take the video feed and plug it into the capture device.