gmguys

I am playing with a DS2 and forward port 80 to it's static ip and it works well. I use a free dns service, I don't know how secure that is though. Still working on it now.

Never used dahua so I can't say one is better than the other.

They are work horses and cheap on eBay. No problems and easy to use. Oh they weigh about 45 lbs.

Sometimes you have to play csr roulette to get the answers.

I have upgraded a few with Seagate and WD green drives and they work fine. I called the pelco tech and he gave me the links for all the software to download from there ftp site. I used 1 and 2 terrabyte drives. The machines all had sata connections.

VCM-24VFH does have a small power resistor heater and little control board for it(mounted on the back next to the main board). They work great for the money. The little heater gets hot when it's cold perfect for here around Chicago(touched it to see...OUCH!)

I have the same camera(looks like a Honeywell HD73) tried everything but no luck. Just a bad design. They kinda look like CNB makes them for Honeywell?

Yep sounds like hard drive.