Soundy

This. Analog cam in the elevator, encoder at the end of the cable runs. One assumes the traveler cables all make their way eventually to the mechanical room and terminate in the same area, so that's where you'd place a 16-channel encoder. Plug that into the network at that point, and you're golden. If they REALLY want *megapixel* in the elevators, there are a number of adapters that will do ethernet over coax upwards of 1000m, some of them including power as well. They can get spendy, but they'll solve your problem. Check out some of these: http://www.altronix.com/p_php/specs.php?model_num=eBridge1CRT&sessUid=300&language=1&header=1 http://www.veracityglobal.com/products/ethernet-over-coax.aspx http://www.divitex.com/analog-ip.php http://gemelec.com/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=706&category_id=68&manufacturer_id=0&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=1

Shouldn't be a problem. As long as the light isn't shining directly on the lens, you shouldn't notice it at all.

So much for HDcctv being a simple, drop-in replacement for analog...

Welcome! And don't worry about asking stupid questions... remember:

There's lots to choose from, but you get what you pay for - the CNB VCM-24VF is a killer deal. The only thing that MIGHT be more suitable for watching your drive-thru lineup is a box cam with longer lens (5-50mm or so), depending on the distance from and size of the area you want to watch, but then you need the proper weatherproof enclosure as well.

There are many potential causes of interference - pictures or video clips would help determine what the source of yours is.

Microwaves are extremely well shielded to protect users from their radiation - I don't think the camera would have a problem.

Are you using baluns?

Hmmmm, there's nothing I can find in the literature on that camera that suggests it actually switches to B&W at night - the specs list only the color TVL, whereas a day/night camera would normally list two separate TVL numbers for color and B&W. That aside, it's definitely not an ICR type, so there's no mechanical switch involved. Night mode and IRs in this type would normally both be switched by a light sensor near the lens - if the IRs are turning on and it's not switching modes, that would indicate the camera is defective.

As MP counts go up, you lessen the need for auto-tracking - rather than having the camera need to decide which ONE of potentially multiple objects to follow, you simply record the entire scene in high detail, and zoom on various points of interest after the fact. That's not good enough though. Maybe, maybe not... , Ye canna change the laws o' physics, Cap'n! A PTZ and a panoramic fixed camera in the same location will see exactly the same angles. How about a 360-degree panoramic camera? It has one advantage: it still gives you greater detail at the long end of its zoom. But that advantage is diminishing, as I say, "as MP counts go up".

RG59 is just a pair of copper conductors; the only difference is that one of them is wrapped around the other, instead of them being twisted together or side-by-side. Using it for power is a little hokey, but there's no reason it won't work just fine.

If it's a PC-based system, yes - Remote Desktop, Remote Administrator, VNC, Teamviewer, etc. will all work (although you may not see live video if you have a hardware-compression card). As far as standalones, from what I've been able to determine with the Dahua unit I've been testing, EVERYTHING that can be configured directly through the OSD, can be configured from the web client.

If you're using Siamese cable you already have both video and power cables coming from each camera back to the head end; presumably your power supply and DVR are close to each other. Why not just put each camera on its own channel?

Probably, but check the fuse on that channel - both cameras together will draw 800mA (or 0.8A) with the IR on, so if the fuse is smaller than that, it will blow once the IR turns on.

Well, most already have 100Mbit network connections, if not gigabit... most will stream their video out as fast as the connection will allow. SOME will recompress the video for streaming and either auto-detect the speed, or allow the user to select the max speed... what other benefits are you looking for? As it is, most will let you use the full bandwidth you have available (since they're also designed to stream over 100Mbit or faster LAN)... the thing that's limiting video quality is most often the concessions made for reducing storage requirements - bitrate, framerate, resolution, etc.

The problem you run into with that is that most video is already being compressed for more efficient storage, so in many cases there's little advantage to the ability to re-stream at substantially high bandwidths.

As MP counts go up, you lessen the need for auto-tracking - rather than having the camera need to decide which ONE of potentially multiple objects to follow, you simply record the entire scene in high detail, and zoom on various points of interest after the fact.

Yep. ANY switch will let you add cameras, but if you can get a PoE one for a good price, that's preferable because then you don't need to get separate power to the cameras. The one we've been using mostly has eight 10/100 PoE ports and two gigabit ports - I plug the DVR and NAS into the gigabit ports so there's not a bottleneck funneling all those cameras into the machine. If you're thinking of adding more cameras later, might want to go at least partial gigabit so you have the capacity ready. This is the one we use: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004496TFS/ref=mp_s_a_1?qid=1332704483&sr=8-1 Hmm, my bad, I was thinking of the newer VSX-2MP-D2 models we've been using. Not that it matters if you're running PoE...

That will work with that camera; however... You'll want to make sure of this, because Cat3 looks very similar, but using it for ethernet could be iffy (it SHOULD work in theory, but may be more susceptible to crosstalk and interference, which would manifest as network dropouts). If it IS Cat5, you're good to go with the PoE injector. There's nothing special about running power over coax; the point of this device is to combine power, video and audio all over one wire. If you're going to use the coax for power, just use it for power - center pin for +12V, shield for ground. Also... This camera doesn't support 24VAC - 12VDC or PoE only.

Try connecting your controller to the USB serial port, fire up Terminal or a similar app (PuTTy is a good cross-platform open-source terminal app), tell it that it's "connected", and it should display the incoming data from the controller. Even with the wrong baud rate, you should still see gibberish that shows the controller is sending data. Won't harm it a bit. If you know the camera is working, it's possible that the controller is simply mis-labelled. Almost all PTZs will display their current configuration on-screen during startup. You should be able to see what settings it has so you can match them on the computer or controller.

Yeah... the cheapest ones you'll find go for a bit under $100/set... some of the spendier ones are up to $800/camera. They're great when it's not possible or practical to pull new cable, but not terribly cost effective just as a "quick upgrade". There are some interesting variations... many of these will run power (PoE-spec or otherwise) over the coax, so you don't need separate power to the camera. And almost all of them will support runs of several hundred to a couple thousand meters, which is far beyond the normal ethernet limitation of 100m on UTP, so they can be useful as long-range extenders. NVT has a model that instead of one pair per camera, can connect up to four cameras to one head-end unit... so for four cameras, you only need five modules: one at each camera, one at the DVR... AND they do power over the coax as well. But again, those are one of the more expensive models. Network switch. $20-$2000 depending on size and features. Veracity makes one unit that combines a four-port switch and HIGHWIRE unit in one, so you can put a regular single HIGHWIRE at the DVR, and the four-channel unit at the remote end and plug up to four cameras into it, sending them all over a single coax.

hi. no you cant do settings with it. it is just to set the area you are going to view while using a test monitor. You sure about that? I looked up the manual online, and while it doesn't specifically state that OSD is accessed via the service port, it certainly SEEMS to indicate this... the service port and OSD joystick being accessed through the same opening would point to this being the case. It would be borderline useless to have the OSD accessible ONLY via SDI as that would preclude making any adjustments once the camera is installed.

You don't use a balun (so named because it converts between balanced and unbalanced lines); those are only for running composite signal over twisted pair. You're looking for ethernet-over-coax or IP-over-coax adapters. Things like these: http://www.altronix.com/p_php/specs.php?model_num=eBridge1CRT&sessUid=300&language=1&header=1 http://www.veracityglobal.com/products/ethernet-over-coax.aspx http://www.divitex.com/analog-ip.php http://gemelec.com/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=706&category_id=68&manufacturer_id=0&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=1

It sounds like something's not right with this camera. Have you maybe checked for a firmware update?

"Which OS" is the wrong question to start with - always has been. "Which application" is what you want to start with... then use the OS that it runs on. If you decide on an OS first, you may be limiting yourself to DVR apps that you don't like or that don't suit your needs.