C7 in CA

Thanks for the timely report on this. Ideal rebrands this I believe. I was made a great deal on one from my local supplier. I think I will hold out and see what your outcome is. A straight exchange on the defective unit would have been great but I can see their point on not just sending out units every time someone says one is broke. Too bad your distributor didn't just pony up and give you an exchange over the counter. At least a loaner or something... You said it was a nice machine, so I am hoping your battery issue is an isolated one. Does it have a focus meter or do you have to focus by eye from the 2.5" screen? How well does that work?

Also I would check to see if the DVR's even support 3TB's of storage. For example I have read spec's on some DVR's that say it only supports 750GB of storage.

Yeah, around here the mice will chew right through any unused wires, but when they get to a pair with some voltage or signal on it they seem to just nibble enough insulation off the wires to cause intermittent issue like you experienced. Makes it real hard to find the problem sometimes even with test equipment. I may just be lucky, but the only time I ever have rodent problems is where cables enter a building. The mice chew through the cables to get into the building. TDR is Time Domain Reflectometer or Time Domain Reflectometry. I have an Agilent Technologies CAT6 certifier that has TDR. Basically you tell the tester what type of cable you are testing and it can tell you how long the cable is based on how fast the test signal is reflected back down the cable. --very handy. I don't think the TDR in my tester would have found this based on the fact that it wasn't a complete break. But I think the added resistance would cause the attenuation to read high. But that wouldn't have told me where the bad section was. Just that there was a cable issue. And that points out the importance of testing new installs. Because if I didn't have a test result of this cable right after install then the test after the problem occurred may look unremarkable. On problems like this it really helps to be able to compare before and after results.

I agree. Thanks Mike! Mike has some of the best comparative pictures I have seen on the site in a while.

Hey wait a minute! I didn't say anything about there being great info over here!!

Hey! That's my other stomping grounds! Great info by some very experienced techs over there. unfortunately too many of them are full of themselves.

Glad you found a crimper. If you don't have the flat silver satin cable you should be alright with CAT3 or CAT5. I am usually able to get the CAT5 jacket tucked into a 6p6c plug end with little problem. Just make sure the conductors are untwisted and fanned out back past the cable jacket far enough back that the strain relief clamp of the modular plug crimps down on the jacket and flat fanned out conductors. Is your pin-out straight through or crossover?

Well guys, Not sure what to say other then Your Mileage May Very. The machine is new and came with Vista. I don't know if that has anything to do with it but it's working just fine so far!

My computer tech just bought a Dell XPS with Vista. We likes it a lot, and a week earlier he had the same arguments about Vista that are being mentioned here. (And this is coming from a Linux and Mac guy) Now he says Vista works well when it comes on a machine designed for it. When it comes to computers I am not an authority; more like a power user. So from my perspective all I can say regarding speed is office 07 opens faster under Vista then I have ever seen office 03 open under XP. The machine boots fast too. But I still won't be rushing out to replace my XP laptop. And I agree these capture cards should be made to operate under Linux before Windows...

No cable box. Just a couple of standard TiVo's. There was a recent thread were we were wondering about DTV, HDTV through these amps. I don't think anyone had an answer But they say DTV right on the face... Did you call tech support about HDTV? Are you going to try the splitters?

That should work, but your signal loss may be unacceptable. I would suggest something tailor made for the job like this: Here's the write up: http://www.channelplus.com/product_detail.php?productId=60 You might be able to find similar equipment less money, but I have had good results with this unit.

That is pretty cool. At sandman you can get get the cool no-dial red phone, auto dialer, and security bracket for 50 bucks. Where can we find the Vinyl Lettering? It would have to come pre spaced on that backing paper...

Funny how they are servicing the other elevators. I guess they forgot about car #30.

I think I know! But your answer would be written more eloquently then mine...

I too have seen this problem. Have you tried defaulting the unit? I haven't bothered, but I would be curious to see if defaulting would help. I don't remember the unit doing it when I first got it. Maybe even power cycling it would help? I have mine running, but don't use it much other then it is being tested on the bench. I will say the thing just keeps running. Never had a lockup and have always been able to access it remotely. But playback features and video quality are pretty sad.

I'll be sure and leave my dunce cap at home

with a black sheet over yourself and the monitor .. or yah wont be able to see anything good enough on the monitor to be able to focus properly Thanks for the tip!

Thanks for that tip!

Looks good! Uh, yeah. Nice neighborhood though. Do you have a shot of a person or car driving by? It's hard to really see the resolution with the available subject matter.

This pdf was on the page of the link given in the first reply: http://www.txdps.state.tx.us/psb/forms/forms/CompleteCompanyLicenseApplicationsInstructions.pdf It is the complete company license application. This looks like the step by step instruction you asked for. All the forms are there and it tells you all the fees and requirements to get your license. So welcome to the business world. Obtaining your license is just the tip of the iceburg when it comes to the confusing bureaucratic gauntlet. But don't feel bad. I sub out about 90 percent of my bookkeeping. if you need help filling out the forms you should check into hiring an administrative assistant for a day or two through a temp agency.

No Problem, happy to help out. I haven't seen them used in years. I use to see them on weird stuff like keyboards and pin pads on old terminal equipment. Serial equipment too.

I have a client with 3 CNC machines that he wants to monitor from home. He just wants to log in periodically to ensure the machines are not in fault mode. We looked into networking the machines (obviously the best way to monitor) but that isn't going to happen. So it's CCTV time. The CNC machines have 12-15" monitors and the cameras will be mounted high and 10 to 12 feet away. There is an option to mount on the machine but I really don't want to go that route. Lighting is decent and doesn't change. The monitor normally displays a beige background with status info, and the error screen changes to black background with orange writing. It isn't important to read the messages as much as it is to simply tell it is displaying an error sceen. So I think the project is very do-able. Budget is flexible but not unlimited. I am thinking about Arecont 2100's with 50mm lens fed into a POE switch. No recording needed. So what do you think? What is the best way of capturing the most data possible from these displays? Update: I pointed a cheapo bullet at an LCD monitor and got good results! well, good color rendition but no resolution. I'm hopeful Megapixel may make the display readable. I'm seeing a mild shadow roll horizontal on the video, but otherwise very usable image!

Nope, No modem. Now the guy is out of the office today and left no instruction. So much for wanting it done yesterday...

Here ya go: http://www.cablesforless.com/browseproducts/RJ12-Modular-Connector-With-Offset-MMJ-Clip--6P6C.html I have a handful of these floating around here somewhere. Sorry I can't seem to find them. But I don't have the crimper anyway...

We cracked it open. Lots of processor type stuff, but nothing like motherboards and video cards and such that I would recognize. And no standard peripheral ports. Just a couple of unusual connectors tucked away. Probably for servicing or equipment options they didn't buy? I have picture of the outside of the machine I will post later. I agree cctv is a somewhat desperate work around. I didn't even consider cameras until the client hit a brick wall with the manufacturer. When I first got the call I figured it was going to be a simple networking project. Who'd a thunk any million dollar computer operated machine made in the last 15 years wouldn't have a network jack?