C7 in CA

Thanks for posting that. Sorry I missed your first reply. I just realized I have been missing some message notification emails. weird... Good point about not having time to mess with DIY'ing the speedbump camera. I'm usually in the same mindset. But From what I can see from the spec's and pictures it is simply a bullet cam press fitted into a hole in the speedbump. The camera specs don't look like anything special. But I haven't seen one in person so what do I know?

I live in Ukiah. 110 miles north of SF on 101. Other then one client that sends us all over the U.S. we work jobs as far south as San Rafeal. Actually, we recently finished a large residential job in Kentfield. You would know the family's name if I could post it. It's good to have a "neighbor" on the board...

Yeah, the law varies from State to State. The way I see it is it comes down to expectation of privacy. If I'm on your front porch I have no expectation of privacy; if I'm a guest in your home using the bathroom I have an expectation of privacy. Thanks for the link scorpion! LoL I had looked at Scruit's videos before, but missing that one.

Welcome to the forum! What part of California are you in?

I think the newish ieee802.3at standard says 60 watts POE! But I don't know if the standard has been ratified. I could power my laptop on 60 watts.

Yes, others are having the same issues. Here is a discussion about it: http://www.cctvforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=15854

My opinion is that if you live in a city big enough that it makes a difference then the day should start and end at the office.

The good news is 8 meters is pretty close. And glad to hear you will install motion lights. I'm not sure how tight or wide a shot you are looking to get at 8 meters, but you can probably get just the shot you are looking for with a 1/3" CCD sensor camera with a 2.6-9mm verifocal lens. You might want to check out AVTech DVR's. About as affordable as they get and lots of guys around this site are familiar with them. They aren't without their faults. So figure out what features mean the most to you and then read these forums to see which DVR's are having problems delivering those features.

I've always associated supercircuits with being lower end on the quality scale. But I really have no experience with their products. I am suspicious of the spec saying 240' IR range. I see there are a ton of LED's on that camera but 240' is a claim I would have to see to believe. Besides, you can have too much IR just as you can have too little. 240' of IR is probably more then you want to squeeze into a 75' area. And we can't tell if 6mm lens is right without more info like how far the camera will be from the 25' X 75' area. And what do you want to see? If you want to see faces and license plates you will probably need better cameras and more of them. If you just want to see the white pickup backing into the little red car then you are on the right track.

Cool. Cameras are great! but the best deterrent I have found in residential settings are motion lights. With cameras I can put a hoodie and sunglasses on and unless you know me I will be unidentifiable. When motion lights come on I don't really know if I have attracted attention or not. I use to be a licensed repossessor. Even though I was acting within the law it always worked out better if I got in, and got out without being confronted (by either the debtor or law enforcement). In 3 years I never was "caught" by cctv. But those pesky motion lights popping on got the cops called on me many, many times. Ideally you would have both. If you can post pictures of what you are trying to cover perhaps someone here can suggest a camera.

You will want a DVR to record what happens most likely. If the budget is tight but it would really help to just be able to see what is going on outside you can probably just run a camera from outside to your TV. So it all depends what you want to accomplish with the cameras.

What timing... We've been told there is a job coming up in Orlando. Sounds like this summer some time but no dates yet. Problem is the "for sure" date isn't really final until a couple of weeks out. But either way, that would pretty much be a hole-in-one to end up in the neighborhood within weeks of a workshop. What's the economy like down that way? This is the second time in a year or so that I have been down there. You guys are either growing, or have a lot of potential.

Do you have the manual? I would try setting up network access so I could check for any weird monitor setting. I don't really think it's that, but I would want to check. I'm not saying you made any changes, but I see odd things happen sometimes when equipment like this gets moved around. You can try defaulting the machine. That might be done through a software setting, or there might be a jumper or reset switch that would need to be moved/pressed inside the case. If you don't have the manual maybe you can post a picture. Someone here has probably seen one, or even worked with a similar unit in the past. The problem sounds like it could be serious, but I wouldn't give up yet.

Do you know the make and model of the DVR? Are you using all the same connectors and cables when you switch from monitor to spot? Do you have network access to the DVR? Might be able to find some obscure monitor setting that got tripped up on the power cycle... Have you tried power cycling the unit again?

Have you thought about building your own? Looks like $400 speedbump + $200 camera +$10 hole saw = big savings...

Looks good to me!

I know of a company that just spent well over 10,000 dollars to recover data from a mis-configured raid 5 array that lost the raid controller. I don't know a lot about recovering lost data, but these drives weren't even overwritten! So it's an expensive process to say the least. Insurance covered the costs. Great analogy with the chalkboard...

15-20 feet is pretty close. And if you are adding more light you might get away with using more affordable cameras. It all depends on available light. Those Nuvicos are nice, but you probably won't need all that IR. As a matter of fact it is probably too much IR for 15 feet. I prefer visible light over IR any day... And yes, these cameras are designed to be on 24/7. I have many cheapo bullet cameras still working that have been out there for years.

I do feel your pain. I have had an annoying neighbor in the past. Luckily I can be devious beyond compare... They backed off in short order! How about setting up all kinds of whirligig type devices all over the yard to keep his harddrives spinning? It will make it more difficult for him to search for motion (i.e. you in the backyard) on his system. If he keeps popping up soon after you go out back he probably has an alarm set on motion to keep tabs on you. The whirligigs will make that annoying real quick. If it were my neighbor he'd be looking at my new privacy screen by now. I think I would play about 105 db's of fingernails on a chalkboard by day. (8am to 10pm (or whatever local laws allow)) and 135 db "cat fight" type noises randomly throughout the night. I realize 135 db's is likely to cause uncontrollable bowel movements and I'm sorry. But hey, you want him to hear it don't you? Privacy Screen

It does look like shutting off HDD info works. I thought I had seen that before and it didn't work. Seems to be working now...

How far are the cameras from the subject of interest? and how dark is the area? What's the budget for the cameras? If you want color, and good night time recordings you need a camera with day/night function and a mechanical IR cut filter. This camera is probably bigger then you would prefer, but check out the Nuvico CB-SD21N-L. If that is too big or over budget then I would think about using a cheaper color bullet camera and install some big 'ol motion sensor flood lights. As you can probably tell from your current cameras, if you want to Identify the bad guy the cameras have to be pretty close to the subject. Just something to think about...

You would think it would toggle on/off from the display/HDD setting... I mean if you might want to turn off the HDD remaining display then you might want to turn off the OW display too. Oh well, I guess that's why it's a 200 dollar DVR and not a 2000 dollar DVR!

I would systematically swap inputs around at the DVR and the quadrant to see if the problem stays at a specific port on the DRV or quadrant. If the problem moves with the port swaps I would try the camera directly connected to the DVR. If the camera is ok I would start swapping out baluns and re-terminating connectors until I found the problem. If the problem persists I would look at the cables.

Are you doing CCTV work now? Many states require a contractors license to do this work. You may have to prove past experience in the trade you are applying to be licensed for. For example in California it is 4 years of Journeyman level experience in the trade you wish to be licensed in to qualify for a contractors license. And do yourself a favor; Don't undercut your labor rates to get jobs. It's a slippery slope you won't want to be on. If clients see your labor rate is negotiable then you will spend all your time negotiating your labor rate. Have different equipment grade options to help keep projects within budget instead. Your labor rate has to be set based on your expenses; not what the other guys are charging. If your expenses are 10 grand a month and you have 1 billable hour a month you have to charge at least 10 grand an hour just to cover expenses. If you have 100 billable hours a month then you have to charge at least 100 bucks an hour to cover the same expenses. --That's simplified, but you get the picture... You are smart to keep your day job until you get some momentum going. Every market is different, but I think you will have a lot of work ahead of you to get to a point where you are bringing home 6 figures installing CCTV. The CCTV only jobs are generally smallish and competition is tough when you are going up against "trunk slammers" on your bids. You might want to broaden your scope of offerings to include alarms, access control, IT, Telecom, ect. More system integration stuff. That opens up the bigger jobs and hopefully weeds out the "fly by night" guys that tend to underbid the smaller jobs. That's not to say you can't make a living on CCTV only. I have guys in my area doing it. I'm just saying it takes a lot of "8 camera installs" to bring home that kinda dough!

Why not just use dyndns? You mentioned having good luck with it...