Soundy

^The fact is, few inventions, EVER, are the sole work of one person. Debating "who thought of it first", "who made it work first", and "who patented it first" are all pretty meaningless, since all three are quite often different people. Not always... but more often than not.

I know, I know. It's like the boy-racers in their Honda Civics, who instead of saying "yeah, I have a 1.4l motor", they have to talk code ("Dude...I got the J28 motor with VTEC"...) Brand names are helpful for "the rest of us". Thanks again. So for a 16MP Avigilon camera, that would be the equivalent of "VTEC KICKED IN YO"

If you're using coax for the cameras, 18/2 for power is the most common... we usually used 22/4 station wire. Or you can get Siamese wire that has coax and 18/2 wires joined by a web. Or, use Cat5e with baluns (balanced/unbalanced line adapters) to send video over one pair, and power over two or three other pairs. Using UTP gives you the advantage that it's an easy upgrade to IP cameras should the desire ever arise. It's been YEARS since I installed a camera with IR. We've been mostly using CNB analog cameras that have sufficient low-light performance, that IR isn't needed.

Hmmm, I think nine... although not all currently functional. Two on the street out front, one each on the front and back doors, one for the side parking lot, one for the driveway into that parking lot, one currently-disconnected PTZ on the back, and one sitting on my bench for testing... I have boxes of working cameras, just no desire to run wires all over the house to hook them up... the two on the street out front are IP cameras connected to a router that's tied into my WPS network... the two door and one driveway cameras are using baluns to run over the three unused pairs in my phone wiring (Cat3) up to my computer room. The other two outside cameras are just running out the window of the computer room.

Faulty camera is the diagnosis, then... 90% certainty of that.

IP does tend to be a bit more for the cameras, but by the same token, you don't need capture hardware on the recording end, so you save some there. Also, if you don't need the resolution, there are standard-def IP cameras that cost less than megapixel. In any case, for analog, I highly recommend this camera: CNB VCM-24VF - we use these extensively indoor and out: they're vandal-resistant, flush or surface mount, 2.8-10.5mm lens gives a lot of range, and they're a true-day/night camera that works great with very low light (so IR not required in most instances).

How are you connecting the DVR to the smaller monitor? Doesn't the big one have HDMI or VGA inputs?

If you're already familiar with IP cameras, why not just use a couple IP cameras and a small NVR, like a QNAP or something?

Sounds like a faulty camera. If you switch the screwy camera to another channel, does the problem move with it?

Hey, it's a lead-free lens even! This just gets better and better!

I've done similar to that using a 2x2 sheet of 1/4" or 3/8" plywood - attach the pole mount to that for additional support. The mount could also go all the way up to whatever ceiling is above the tile.

Keep in mind that temperature can play a (minor) factor as well... few if any of the online calculators take that into account. None of them are meant to be anything but approximate anyway.

Had one of a new-ish employee trying to use stolen department-store credit cards to purchase lottery tickets... got a dozen or so different segments of him swiping two or three different cards every time the other employee went to the back of the store. The company's loss-prevention people loved the pictures from the two megapixel cams behind the counter

As well as any other 12V power supply. Ohm's Law applies just the same. The only potential concern might be the total current supply capability of the unit, and unfortunately there's no mention of that in the specs... Nobody ever claimed it did. It's 12VDC regulated output to the camera... same calculations, same limitations apply whether you're using this or an Altronix can or a wall-wart. According to http://www.netkrom.com/voltage_loss_over_cat5_calculator.php - 12V, .55A, 150', three pairs of 24AWG, you should only see 0.4V loss at the load. (and according to this, three pairs of 24AWG is the same effective gauge as 18AWG). One thing I HAVE discovered with these units, they have built-in, auto-resetting protection on every channel... I had a CW504 dome that would fire up and then go out after 30 seconds or so, and the status light on that channel of the VPS would go from green to yellow... unplugging that cable, the light would go back to green, and the cycle would repeat after plugging it back in. We traced it to a damaged cable that was putting a short on the power... the unit detected the overload and shut down that output, then reset it once the short was removed.

Not ruffled... just saying Q-See is one of those that may be a crap shoot... they used to be a bottom-of-the-barrel brand, but more recently seem to have been sourcing from better manufacturers. Like many other names, they don't make their own equipment, they just rebrand a variety of stuff from multiple other manufacturers. Overall, more powerful, flexible, expandable, and just plain usable. Most standalones have painfully basic user interfaces that are a nightmare to navigate. I like having the ability to load utility software, such as disk-diagnostics (HD Tune, DLG), network monitors (Wireshark, et al.), IP camera finders (IQfinder, etc.), and so on, right onto the DVR - not only does it mean I don't have to pull out my laptop for a lot of tasks on-site, it also makes it easy to perform them remotely. Tools like HD Tune can monitor disk fitness, system temps, and other performance and reliability aspects and alert me to potential problems BEFORE there's catastrophic data loss, or a system failing at a critical time. It also makes it easy to add massive amounts of external storage through iSCSI, SAS, and such. Or even just a bit of extra with an eSATA, USB or Firewire external drive (few standalones support external storage of any kind; with a Windows-based DVR, just about anything that can be given a drive letter, can be used for an additional storage target). In most cases, I believe it's used to send "triggered" events - like, you could set a system to upload and/or email still images when there's an alarm or motion trigger. Ask all you want, just remember to be patient Sometimes it may take a day or two to get that first reply... but as soon as it starts, you'll get more conflicting opinions than you know what to do with

People for the Illogical Typing of Acronyms im one of them ... You must belong to the AAAAA - the American Association Against Acronym Abuse.

Running low-voltage and high-voltage in the same conduit is against electrical code in most developed countries. DON'T do it. Option 1 is out. Option 2: if the camera supports it, I'd use 24VAC rather than 12VDC - you'll get lower voltage loss. If the illuminator needs 12VDC, add a regulator AT the illuminator to step down the 24V. 12/24 in the same conduit with signal is fine. Option 3: there are a variety of ethernet extenders that will carry PoE over a long run as well. I'm looking right now at an offering from NVT that does ethernet and PoE over coax up to 2500': http://www.nvt.com/content.php?type=product&key=ec1701&cid=root. Others have offerings that will do it over UTP.

Pain In The Arse

There's some out there that will work with anything that has WDM driver support... they tend to be pretty limited though, and the overall quality and stability will depend on the driver itself (which isn't provided by the software).

Do you know how much current they supply and to what distance? Eg. if using 12VDC 550ma cameras. Should be no different than any other 12VDC power source - it's 12V regulated output, so distance all depends on the cameras and how much loss they can handle. The jacks use three pairs for power by default, so you get the max range possible - specs page says up to 750'. The first site we used them, they added another camera to an area we didn't have a wire, so we split off a pair from the next closest camera... probably close to 150' to the first camera and another 50' to the second, both running over only two pairs. Both CNB VCM-24VFs, rated about 250mA at 12VDC, so that would be a total of around 500mA, and they're running no problem (then again, those cameras will also work all the way down to 10V or so).

First time we used these, we terminated everything in a patch panel... but there were several IP cameras that needed to be connected to a switch, and we had a separate rack all to ourselves fro the VPSs, patch panel and switch... latest job, we had to share a rack and had no extra space for a patch panel and only one IP camera, so we just terminated all our runs with RJ-45 plugs. It doesn't take long once you get the hang of it... one of our members here made a YouTube video for it, although I can't recall who. Been meaning to do one myself. If you have the room, definitely terminate to a patch panel - makes it much easier if you need to switch any cameras to IP later, as you just move your patch cable from the VPS to the switch. www.3xlogic.com - really nice systems: all systems are hybrid, and the NVR is the exact same system just minus the analog capture card. IP and analog cameras all in the same interface. It can also do motion-detection recording and analytics for any cameras, in the server - IP cameras don't have to have their own motion detection, like you see with some other NVRs (you CAN use theirs as well, but it's not required - always nice to have options).

Possibly... we also all have jobs and families and lives and do this in our spare time. We get to it when we can. I've never even see a "TVT" DVR... but put it this way, I'm a hardcore proponent of PC-based DVR, but I've been REALLY impressed by the Dahua I've worked with (after having the likes of Digimerge, GE, National, Digital Watchdog, and various other junk foisted on me to support). If I HAD to do a standalone, I wouldn't hesitate to use a Dahua.

^Good idea... only works if OP is in the UK or other EU country that uses SCART. Never seen a TV in N.A. that had it.

^^At least that is (partially) true: http://www.snopes.com/politics/military/stabbedmarine.asp