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Your lens sounds like it's got the IR filter permanently attached. Some cams have been doing this to reduce cost on non-IR cams, rather than installing a filter over the sensor. Most of the Mega IR lenses are IR corrected, not IR blocking, so this was probably installed by the camera manufacturer, not the lens manufacturer. I believe the popular GoPro camera uses IR blocking lenses, so you can check with people who sell accessories for them. Here's another thread with links to IR filters you can buy, which may or may not fit your camera: viewtopic.php?p=231106#p231106

I've got a bunch of license plate test clips with Hik and Dahua cams under different conditions, including front and rear plates, linked in this thread: http://www.cam-it.org/index.php?topic=4344.msg22283 I accidentally complicated things due to the Dahua's independent IR control (it only switches via the light sensor, not by software or mode), and you can see the Dahua's IR coming on and off during the Hik tests, for instance. Still, it's an interesting comparison. They're all up close with the default 4mm-ish lenses, so the IR would be much dimmer with a long lens unless you had separate illumination. This is all with a Cali plate, so it's very IR reflective and washes out quickly with lots of IR.

I've got some cams where over-sharpening highlights the low light noise enough that it detects this as motion. This is mostly a problem as the light drops but the cam hasn't switched to night mode yet, and I get it for about 20-30 minutes at dusk.

I'm not familiar with the cam, though it looks like a Foscam, and this type of cam typically uses an M12 or board cam lens. Here's what you need to check when buying a replacement lens: - The lens needs to be the right size for your sensor - 1/4" in this case. Many lenses are for 1/3" sensors, and will give better quality, but will have a different field of view than the same size lens for a 1/4" sensor. - Ideally you'll want a MP rated lens, but on inexpensive cameras like this, it often doesn't make much difference. - Since this is an IR cam, you'll need an IR corrected lens to give good focus in both IR and daylight mode. This is usually called out in the description, but not always. Some IR lenses are IR blocking, not IR corrected, and will disable your night vision. Lenses for cameras like the Gopro often have IR blocking built in. - M12 lenses are focused by turning them in and out in their threads, and some M12 lenses need to be turned in far enough that they hit the IR filter before they're focused. This is hard to tell about before you try it. Even if they spec the back focal length, which most vendors don't, you'd need to know the clearance of your IR filter to know if it'll fit. Of my bag full of 6 M12 lenses tested on one camera, 3 fit ok, and 3 hit the IR filter before they were focused. If you keep turning after you hit the filter, you can crack it or break the housing. If there's a forum for these cameras, you might check there and see which lenses others have had luck with. It's a jungle out there. Good luck!

Did you try this from the previous posts? It's not clear if they were going to change it or not:

I'd suggest asking in the ip cam forum. Lots more traffic there, and it shouldn't matter that you're using hybrid cards for them. Many people like Hikvision and Dahua in that price range, though ACTi has some that might barely fit your budget. I'm running a variety of Hiks, Dahuas, and Vivoteks on my NV6480 system with good results.

As suggested earlier, it's hard to go wrong with the Hikvision 1080p/3MP domes and bullets if you're on a budget but want decent quality. The domes are only 2 axis, so if you're going to mount it on a flat ceiling, you're OK, but on a wall or on a slanted roof, you'll have tilted video. The bullets don't have this problem.

You can build a tiny mini-ITX PC and load the NVR software of choice on it. They come quite small, though the smallest ones have limited space for hard drives and accessories, and you'd need external POE. Here's a little Antec case - 8.4 x 3.1 x 8.7 inches, but with external power brick: http://www.amazon.com/ANTEC-OEM-ISK110-VESA-Antec-Mini-ITX/dp/B0064LWISQ/ref=sr_1_6?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1381868420&sr=1-6

If it supports MJPEG, that'll be an option in the drop-down for encoding. A good mobile app that supports lots of cams is IP Cam Viewer Pro. They have a free version that you can test it with.

One of my Hik bullets crashed a few weeks ago, then twice in one day last week. It wouldn't respond to pings or the web page, and required unplugging at the switch to restart. It's installed right next to another, and I swapped cables at the camera end to check it out. It's been OK since, and I think it may have been a bad/stressed connection at the camera plug. I won't know for sure until it's run for another month or two, though.

I'm using an old laptop, as well as an Android tablet like BW mentioned. The tablet's good because it's easy to carry around and has super long battery life, while the laptop I use is left in a fixed location. I use an ancient IBM T30, which doesn't have HDMI but was free, and it's connected to a monitor in the location I use it. The laptop is always on, pulling 21W with the lid closed, and the monitor's off until I need it, when it takes a few seconds to turn on and pulls another 35W. It runs 24x7, and has run a few weeks with no problems. My problem with using a laptop attached to the TV was as BW says - it just took too long to switch inputs and turn things on. With the dedicated monitor, I hit one switch; with the Android, I hit a switch and swipe the screen, and it's ready. Laptop and monitor power usage will cost me about the same as buying another Android tablet if I keep it on for a year, but it's working well so far.

When doing side by side testing, be aware of the combined IR output of multiple cams. My first tests of the Hiks had much better night images because I was comparing side by side with a Dahua (IR always on in the dark), and the Dahua IR combined with the Hik IR gave both cams much better images than they would have had by themselves.

Yeah, cost is a problem for decent hybrid capability. The NV6480 cards sometimes go for as little as $200 used, but you have to keep a sharp eye out, and you don't get a warranty with it. Lots of people like the Nanos, but I don't have any experience with them. The only affordable cards I'm familiar with at all are the bluecherry cards, and those only through other people's posts. They're not top end, which is why they're less expensive. Best bet is to ask around more and see what other people suggest. Try a search here and at cam-it.org for bluecherry to see if they might do what you need.

Doesn't Foscam provide software for recording? Most manufacturers do. Assuming you're on a budget and not looking for corporate/industrial features, since you have Foscams, it's hard to beat Blue Iris for inexpensive, well supported software. It's not recommended for MP cams on old, low power PCs, so whether your 2 720P cams would be too much for your PC would depend on the PC's power. You can download a demo version to try out. If you check the BI user forum at cam-it.org, you'll see lots of issues with Foscams maintaining their frame rates, dropping out, etc, so you should test it out first. There are other free and cheap software NVRs that others can recommend.

Yeah, that's interesting. I'd say it's stuck in night mode on the image processing, except for the bits of color here and there. It could be that it's in night mode with the IR filter out and daylight messing up the spectrum, but that would depend on how the software people handle this, and there's really no way to tell that. Are the IR LEDs on when it's like this? I'd agree with BW; try to exchange it and hope the next one works better.

The usual reason to need this is stealth, like the teddy bear cams, or no power available, like the trail cams.

It would depend on your budget. If you could afford an NV6480 card, I've had good luck with mine, but I got it cheap on ebay; they're very expensive new. It comes with robust NVR software, and should work fine on your system. If you want to keep the cost down, I'd look at one or two of the bluecherry cards for the SD analog cams (whatever configuration would work for 8 cams) and Blue Iris to record the IP cams and the bluecherry outputs. This should work well with your current system. Blue Iris is a good starting point, as it's not expensive and doesn't have ongoing fees for licensing or whatever. It also supports a wide variety of cams, NVRs, and capture cards. There's a demo version that's good for checking out how well it works for you. Another BI option, instead of capture cards, would be to get an inexpensive analog DVR that BI supports. Some users have Zmodo DVRs that they view and record from BI, for instance. I'd do 2 things to work out this decision: - Ask about a good hybrid solution in the IP cam forum here (along with with your budget), as it gets a lot more traffic than this one, and many of the people posting are familiar with a lot more systems than I am. - Go to BI's user forum, cam-it.org, and search on things like DVR and bluecherry, as well as asking for other people's recommendations. The main benefit of this option is that you can convert from analog to IP cams as you go along without needing a whole new system, though you may need different software to support a lot of MPs at a high frame rate, since BI puts quite a load on even a powerful system in that situation.

Forgot to mention the Blue Iris community forum - cam-it.org. The Hik cameras are very popular there, and there's lots of BI info. It tends to be more of a budget crowd than here.

Cam 1 has the typical low-light Hik image, with those lines of noise. This is the main weakness in this camera. Are both of them set at the same max exposure time? The Hik looks a lot better in low light with a longer exposure, but this causes motion blur and can reduce frame rate.

A couple of possibilities: - Moisture in your dome could be causing both blurriness and colors being off. - IR filter getting stuck can cause color problems as well. Leave it in either day or night mode and see if the problems go away or quit changing. If you post screen shots of what it looks like, that's always a big help.

For POE switches, there are 2 things to look out for: - Make sure they have POE on enough ports - some only offer it on, say, 4 out of 8 ports. - Check the total power budget. Many switches only supply 7-8 Watts average per port when all ports are used, rather than the full 15.4 W the spec provides for. An 8 port full power switch would have a 123 W power budget. How much this matters depends on the power draw of your cams. For the PC, it totally depends on what NVR software you use. Some use low CPU, some use high. This can be affected by whether the camera or software does motion detect, whether it transcodes the video or writes what comes off the camera, and other stuff. Some care about lots of RAM, some don't. Generally, more MP and higher frame rates require higher CPU power. A bunch of D1 cams are easy to support, but as you add more MP cams, the CPU has to work a lot harder. Cost is a factor, too. Some software requires a per-camera license, annual upgrade fees, and such, others don't. Likewise, making sure the software supports your cameras is critical. I run 2 systems: - Blue Iris, which is inexpensive, has great features and support, and no per-cam license, but requires a pretty powerful PC to support a lot of MP. Mine is on an i5-3570k, and currently runs 9 cams, 12MP total, 10 fps with no problem (65% CPU utilization, bumping to 80% when I connect a remote client viewer), but it's close to its limit. It wouldn't support 25 fps (or even 15 fps) with the same cams. There's a BI user forum over at cam-it.org with a lot of posts about PC performance. - Aver NV6480 hybrid in an i3-540 box, which is much less powerful than the i5-3570k. On this, CPU usage depends on how many cams you display on the matrix, not how many you're recording. This records the same cams as above full time, with about 25% CPU, and I ran it for a while at 22MP, 10 FPS, with no problems. This is a backup system, so I leave it on 1 cam display to keep CPU and power usage down. Best bet is to find some free or demo versions of software packages and test them out with your setup to see how they work and how you like them. There are lots of discussions of various packages in the IP cam forum here. For the card, it's important to read the specs closely, and make sure it'll support all your cams at full resolution and frame rate. Some can be misleading in the way they spec things, and require you to drop frame rate or resolution as you add more cams. You also want to google for user reviews of the card to see how people like them. The Aver lets you select IP or analog for each channel, and allows either for all 16 channels. You'd have to check on how other boards work - the less expensive Aver NV5000 can be expanded to 8 channels total, but only the first 4 can be IP cams.

The Hikvision ds-2cd2032 is a popular 1080p/3MP POE day/night bullet at a reasonable price. There's a bunch of info in the IP cam forum - read up on them there.

I've been using an Aver NV6480 16 channel hybrid card and it works very well, though I only use it for IP cams, no analog. It's not cheap if bought new, but it doesn't require a high power PC. Mine's running on an old 1st gen i3-540 PC. They also make the less expensive NV6240, but it's only 8 channel. Bluecherry makes more affordable cards. You want to check their specs carefully and make sure they have drivers for your PC (64 bit vs 32 bit, etc), as well as searching on the models to see how they've worked out for other people. http://store.bluecherry.net/capture-cards For hybrids, you connect the BNCs to a cable at the card, and it gets the IP cam data from the PC's network connection. All my IP cams connect to a POE switch, which is part of the network, and the PC connects to another switch. The other option is to set up a PC as an NVR and get a couple of 4 channel encoders for the analog cams. I almost did this when I switched over to IP cams, but decided I'd be better off buying IP cams instead of encoders, and just retired my analog cams. Best bet is to put together a list of options, what they'd cost, and how long each solution would work for you. Long-term, a high power PC running NVR software and a couple of Bluecherry cards might be the most flexible option, as you can retire the analog cams and inexpensive cards when you move to more IP cams.

The only ones you'll find in that range are inexpensive cams like Foscam and their clones. Many people like them, but many people complain about them. It's hard to find decent quality PTZ for under $600, and most of them aren't very small compared to non-PTZ.

CFL is compact fluorescent. If you google CFL spectrum and white LED spectrum, it looks like neither one puts out much IR. I'd be surprised if white LEDs put a lot of energy into the IR spectrum, but I've never researched it in depth.