Soundy

Time to drag him kicking and screaming into the 90s?

Yeah, Apexis is another Shenzhen company.

Exactly my point. And again, that's a single camera... just imagine how clunky it becomes if you want to view or review multiple cameras. Can you imagine a 32-camera site setup with these things?

Well then, there you go - see three posts above. Single-channel analog DVR. You didn't list a built-in screen, but I'll assume that's not a deal-breaker. Was easy to find, BTW... just google "mini video recorder with built in monitor". Actually, the first hit is a "spy store" with a TON of these type of devices, even one designed to look like a cel phone.

The more detail you give, the more we can help. Sometimes it's good to know WHY specific criteria are given. More to the point, it's often more useful to know what the actual end result is, because there may be other ways to get there that you haven't thought of. Do they want covert, do they just want small? Do they want easy-to-operate? You could have said up-front, "Client doesn't have a PC and doesn't want to get one just for this" and that would have negated a lot of the responses right off. You can never give too much information.

Come to think of it... my boss has just such a thing, I totally forgot about it. He used to use it with a camera on his ski boat... we've also used it for a couple of temporary covert installs: http://www.cctvvideo.com/pvr-g20.html

Some NAS units... yes. Why didn't you state that in the first place? Why can't the client just pop out the SD card and plug it into a laptop (almost all of them have SD slots now)? Why can't it be a four-channel? Why can't the other three channels just sit idle? Hmmm, single-channel recorder, completely self-contained, no PC required, just plug in a monitor and review? Got it:

That doesn't make any sense - WiFi bridge? You're still using the WiFi connection. And no, that's not the only weakness. For any more than one camera, it needs to integrate with some kind of VMS to be practical, both for live viewing or searching. Regardless of the network connection, I don't expect you'll find any software designed to centrally manage searching and playback of recordings from multiple of these camera - that's kind of a BASIC FUNCTION of surveillance systems.

Search: http://s.dealextreme.com/search/dvr Results: http://www.dealextreme.com/p/single-channel-mini-dvr-audio-video-recorder-with-sd-card-slot-53835?item=1 http://www.dealextreme.com/p/car-1-channel-mini-dvr-w-sd-slot-114706?item=2 http://www.dealextreme.com/p/single-channel-video-backup-mini-dvr-support-tf-card-s-dvr-silver-103180?item=4

How about just a camera that records internally?

Or skip the central recorder altogether and get cameras that record to internal storage (SD card, etc.)

And the standard advice applies here: WiFi is not recommended for surveillance cameras except as a last resort, and only using the proper equipment (such as Ubiquiti point-to-point, MESH, etc.) This is fine if you want a single camera... what if you want four? Eight? More around your house? You going to view them all one at a time? What if you need additional storage? Can you record for three months straight with one of these?

No idea what the cost was for the ones we upgraded, but I don't think it was that much to get them separately.

^+1 for the VCM-24VF. Versatile, solid, good picture... hard to beat it for the price.

I think you're over-estimating the importance of having the heater, personally. Remember, its intention is to keep the dome clear of condensation, not to warm the camera's ****les. The camera's electronics generate plenty of heat on their own, most of which is being contained inside the housing. And like I say, if it comes down to needing it later, the heater module can always be purchased separately and added in - two screws, and plug it into the main board.

Hmmm not familiar with their implementation, so I don't know what else to tell you... in general, if you're defining something specific for the analytics to look for, such as a person moving through the frame, it shouldn't be affected by lighting changes. Are you sure it's not a separate "motion-detection" function that's triggering the alerts?

http://bit.ly/HMeZHX

Whose analytics are you using? The lenses should not be a factor here - analytics need to be told what's what and what to look for, and then they just watch for whatever changes you tell them to watch for. If you teach the system that the lighting changes are normal, it shouldn't be a problem.

Send her in here, we'll straighten her out I don't know what sort of problem she's expecting... you tell him what you want, you give him some money, and a few days later the brown UPS truck rolls up (with a very cute driver, in my case) and drops off your new toys. Doesn't get much easier - not like you have to drive across the border yourself. Maybe she's worried about the cute UPS drivers?

Well that's just a lousy camera design then. There are plenty of domes that have no problem looking right back along the surface they're mounted to.

www.videolan.org

As far as the price difference, I suspect the CNB indoor domes you're looking at are also plastic, vs. cast aluminum, so there's also a difference in the cost of materials and construction there (all their outdoor domes, AFAIK, are also vandal-resistant). As to whether they can survive outdoors under-cover... sure they can. I have one outside my back door, in fact - plastic dome, not sealed at all. One caution though, if you're in a damp environment, is that damp air can also cause fogging of the bubble if it gets inside. I've had problems with the sealed domes fogging, in fact, on a site near the ocean that we did in the winter, so the air was very damp - the damp air got sealed inside the dome and was no end of problems until we opened them up in the summer to let them dry out. Putting an un-sealed dome outside, regardless of it being under cover, means there's the potential for this as well.

I've never been told I need one... couldn't tell you if the company has something other than a standard business license. From what I can tell reading that website, they're mainly referring to physical security (guards, dogs, patrols, etc.) and alarm installations, which do require a qualified alarm installer, because alarm systems are considered to involve life-safety matters.

According to the manual for the 9600 series (downloaded from HIKvision's website), the only Panasonic camera supported is the WV-NP240.

Yeah, pretty sure I could teach Martial Arts for $2.49/class... I dunno why anyone would pay hundreds of dollars for it. I mean, I've seen every Jean-Claude Van Damme movie at least twice, how hard can it be?