You had better ask your supplier to solve this problem for you.

Every time I launch the iCamviewer on my iPhone 4S and load my only camera (DLink DCS2100), the camera image comes up pretty much immediately, then goes away less than a second later, and the 'unable to connect to your camera...' message comes up.

There's another certain _ _ _ _ scope software that I use that connects to the camera fine via Firefox and the application on my Mac Pro desktop, so I know the port forwarding and such are correct. I even tried opening ports 1-9000, and putting the camera in the DMZ of my linksys router... same iCamviewer behavior across the board.

I think it's weird that the image appears then goes away. So it is clearly connecting initially, but can't hang on.

I have a big problem with Chinese IP Camera SunEyes model SP-FQ01 (http://www.suneyesgroup.com/21-mini-box-ip-camera.html). I bought 8 (eight) cams of this model for inside surveillance in our factory, but the manufacturer "forgot" to inform me that he don't provide Linux-software for those cams. In our factory is not allowed to use Windows or Mac and this is very big problem...
Now I try to view stream-url of those cams, because I have to create web-based system for surveillance and video-storage, but without stream url for video-stream I'm not able to make anything...
I will be very thankful, if anybody know more about these cams and if can help me to find/view video-stream url... If need tests, I'm ready to provide IP address of one of the cams...
Thank you in advance!

CCTV Camera Pros received the following inquiry recently from a customer looking for a network PTZ camera with Mac remote viewing support:

I want to install an exterior PTZ camera that will be compatible with my Mac based network. I would prefer a wireless IP PTZ but would like you to tell me about all of the Mac compatible PTZ's you have available.

Here is the recommendation that CCTV Camera Pros supplied:

Thank You for contacting CCTV Camera Pros. The following outdoor PTZ cameras are compatible to be remotely accessed by Mac:

http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Outdoor-IP-PTZ-Camera-p/ip-v97151.htm
http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/IP-PTZ-Camera-p/vivotek-sd7313.htm

Please take a look at these products and let us know if you have questions. CCTV Camera Pros can support you by performing all of the remote access setup remotely over the Internet. As long as you or a local installer runs the cables and mounts the cameras, all network and Internet support is handled by our customer care center via phone, chat, and remote login support.

Also, there are no outdoor wireless cameras that will communicate with an indoor wireless network reliably. We highly recommend hard wiring all outdoor cameras unless you are communicating between two buildings with a direct line of sight between the transmitting and receiving antennae.

Is there any wireless IP camera receiver that has an AV out jack (RCA)? When I am at house where the IP camera is located I would like to view the camera without the computer. They make these receivers for analog cameras why not IP cameras.

We've decided to upgrade our security system. We want to phase out our existing IP cameras and put in something with more resolution. There will be about 60 cameras on the LAN. We were thinking about mega-pixel cameras with a good virtual zoom and wide-angel coverage rather than PTZ cameras. With so many cameras we're concerned about bandwidth on the LAN and video quality. We thought gigabit ethernet cameras would be a good idea, as well as H.264 compliance, and we'd like to use POE (802.3at at the switch). Our system is centrally located and uses a Gb LAN. We would really appreciate some advice.

The visual distance depends on the camera in use. normally it is around 30 meters. the camera actually can cover a lot more but up to 30 meter the things are clear enough.

Visual distance of about 20-30 meters，It is very similar to the camera angle and shooting range and people with normal eye sight.

i work on aproject containg a hotel surrounded with a large garden and the garden has along fence and the owner wants to put cameras on the fence and i want toknow the distance that can camera view .

thanks

Hello,
Thanks for the suggetion It is really helpful to all .

Thanks

troyoff,

Thank You for posting to our surveillance forum. Please let me know if your customer needs an indoor or outdoor surveillance camera.

Most likely I would recommend using a single analog CCTV camera with of our our 4 channel iDVRs. If you have not seen info on the iDVR yet, please check them out here: H.264 stand alone DVRs.

Please let me know what you think and if you need outdoor or indoor surveillance.

Thanks.
-Mike

I have a client that wants 1 camera at his property in the country. He wants to record only on motion and wants to be able to view the camera from home. Would you recommend using a wireless camera or a analog camera. Using a wireless camera I would need to run the cat5 wire back to a router and have an internet connection, correct? From here would the client be able to view the camera from his home. OR, would it be better to use analog camera and run it back to a dvr, connect the dvr to an internet connection? I wouldn't need a computer set up out there, would I?

Al

We recommend LinkSys routers. They are the easiest for us to support and perform very well also. We have port forwarding instructions for LinkSys routers here:

http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/LinkSys-Port-Forwarding-s/122.htm

Please let us know if we can help further.

A customer recently contacted CCTV Camera Pros looking for a megapixel IP camera with the following requirements:

I'm wondering if you could advise of a camera product that would satisfy all or most of these features:

- Megapixel (preferably)
- outdoor use
- IP (built-in server)
- PTZ (remote through ip client)
- full time NTSC video out (for supplying an "in-house" channel) - still works even if IP client is accessing
- on-board storage (memory card - for several hours of history / high resolution stills stored forever during alarm events)
- 2-way audio
- day and night (low light) imaging

Here is CCTV Camera Pros reply:

Thank You for contacting CCTV Camera Pros. I am not aware of any megapixel PTZ camera on the market. The idea behind megapixel is to actually phase out PTZ.

Check out this megapixel model (non-ptz):
http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Outdoor-Megapixel-Camera-p/vivotek-ip7361.htm

Please let us know if we can help further.

The customer followed up with:

Thanks for the suggestion - that is a fairly good grouping of the options I was looking for. Would I be able to get a simultaneous "video out"?

CCTV Camera Pros reply:

Although that megapixel camera does not have an analog video output, that camera is compatible with this IP camera to analog decoder which basically can give you an analog/CCTV output with BNC anywhere on the network that the IP camera is on:

http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Video-Decoder-p/vivotek-rx7101.htm

Please let me know if you have any questions about how to use this product.

Im looking at purchasing the Zavio F731E Outdoor IP Camera, Infrared, Weatherproof camera. I want to make sure i have the necessary modem and router to support the camera and have a painless setup. Right now i'm using the ATT 2wire modem/router. After doing a little research and talking with ATT support, i was told that this unit didnt support UPNP which i needed for an IP camera. Is there a modem and router you recommend i buy before i purchase the camera i spec'd above. Thanks for any information you can give me......Jeff

That camera is compatible with NUUO IP camera software: http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/NUUO-IP-Camera-Software-s/297.htm. The email alert software works really well in NUUO also.

Customer Support: You can watch some videos of NUUOs capabilities here: http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/NUUO-Surveillance-Systems-s/296.htm#videos

DLink Camera Customer: We are getting false positives with the DLink software, do you think it is the camera or the software?

Customer Support: It is likely the software is too sensitive.

DLink Camera Customer: So for the one camera we could use SCB IP+ 01 NUUO IP Camera Software
Customer Support: that is correct.

DLink Camera Customer: It would run off the PC and record to the hard drive?
Customer Support: correct

DLink Camera Customer: Provide motion detection recording on a set scheduleSend out email alerts when motion is detected after hours? Include snapshots of the detected motion in the email alerts? Provide a web interface to view the camera over a browser?

DLink Camera Customer: Does it do these things?

Customer Support: yes it does all of those things.

Customer Support: Do you have an outgoing mail server (SMTP) that you can use?

DLink Camera Customer: Is there a trial or demo version of the software?

DLink Camera Customer: Yes we have an internal Exchange server
Customer Support: ok. Yes, there is a trial version. You can download the NUUO IP camera software trial here: http://videos.cctvcamerapros.com/downloads/NUUO/NUUO-Trial-3.2.16.zip

DLink Camera Customer: Ok, so we currently have the DCS900 camera installed and working. We would just need to purchase this software and install it on a PC that is on the same subnet?

Customer Support: yes, that is correct.

DLink Camera Customer: There is nothing else to purchase to make it happen?

Customer Support: If you have a computer already, you just need the NUUO NVR software.

DLink Camera Customer: Great, thanks for the information.

Customer Support: There is nothing else to purchase. Let us know if we can help further. Your welcome for the info.

Does he need to use Internet or is it possible to install these ip cameras in just a local network? Usually LAN is way more reliable.

AFAIK required bandwidth for 640x480 camera at 10 frames per second using "Motion JPEG" compression is 3-4MBit/s.
But in case if you choose MPEG4 or H.264 you need less than a 1MBit/s for each camera.

There is a theory if you need to recognize somebody you know you should have at least 40 pixels/foot (vertical) and you need 60 pixels per foot in case if you want to identify somebody you don't know.

So if you have 1.3 Megapixel camera with 1/2" sensor format and 8 mm lens you are going to have 42 pixels/foot at 40 foot from camera and width of the field of view 31 ft.

If you need more (like 60 pixels/ft) you can put lens with higher lens focal length (12 mm, with 19.9ft) or put 3 Megapixel camera.

In case if you would have a 3Megapixel camera

An installation partner recently contacted us with the following question regarding remote IP camera recording:

We have a client that wants to install 2 surveillance systems using IP cameras. This is a car repair shop. They are looking for a system that will provide coverage for the following:

1 Outdoor Camera to cover parking lot
1 Indoor Camera for the office
4 indoor cameras for

We want the ability to expand to additional cameras in the future.

Features to include:

full time recording during business hours
motion recording during non business hours.
alerts if motion is detected during off hours.

Cabling distances can exceed 300’. We will most likely power the cameras at their location.

This client has a second location. Is it possible to install an IP based system that allows the 2nd location to just have the IP cameras and have them connect over the internet to the main system? There will be a an estimated 4 cameras at the 2nd location.

CCTV Camera Pros response:

The challenge for remote recording of IP cameras is the limitation of available bandwidth. The typical DSL Internet connection has an has an upload speed of between 256KB and 512KB per second upload speed. The typical cable Internet connection upload speed is between 512KB and 2MB per second. It takes about 1MB per second upload speed to transmit an IP camera at 12 frames per second using 640 x 480 VGA resolution. As you can see it is just not realistic from a bandwidth speed standpoint unless the customer wants to record at a very slow frame rate and/or smaller resolution.

The second issue is reliability. If the Internet connection goes down on either end, so does the recording.

Al that being said, CCTV Camera Pros does not recommend recording IP cameras remotely over the Internet unless there is a very reliable and very fast Internet connection available on both the camera location and recorder location.

Please let me know if you want to discuss further or need anything else.

Response:

If you want something that definitely works and is very high end, please take a look at our megapixel cameras:

http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Megapixel-IP-Cameras-s/343.htm

These work with these stand alone NVRs:
http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Network-Video-Recorder-s/299.htm

or with this PC software:
http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/NUUO-IP-Camera-Software-s/297.htm

You can watch some videos online about the NUUO software here:
http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/NUUO-Surveillance-Systems-s/296.htm#videos

I’m considering a security camera system for my home and hope you will help. I want cameras with enough “resolution?” so that I can recognize / identify someone at 30-40 ft. Most of the small system I’ve seen for home use are “useless” in that the resolution is so poor at a distance you can’t see faces just blurry figures. I doubt anyone with bad intentions will walk up and look in the camera at 3-4 ft. What type of outdoor cameras should I be considering.

Thank You,
Joe & Barbie R.

A customer recently made the following inquiry to CCTV Camera Pros:

Do you have any setup that has 4 wireless cameras, with I/R night vision that I could see on my iphone?

Here is CCTV Camera Pros response:

Justin,

If you also want to record the video from the cameras, you can use this system:

http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Network-Security-Camera-System-p/ip-sysm4zo.htm

I can not advertise the price, but if you call me for a quote, I can give you a better price on that system that what is advertised on the website.

If you want to make any of the cameras wireless, you can use this add-on wireless camera system to do so:

http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Wireless-Security-Camera-System-p/wifi-en95610.htm

If you do not need to do recording and you just want to access the cameras remotely from your iphone, then you do not need the NVR that comes with the IP camera system that I linked to above.

Please let us know if you have any other questions.

Sincerely.
-Mike

Follow up iPhone questions from customer:

1. Which out door IP cameras wired and wireless will work. I phone/mac. I guess you could put in a housing.

   All of the IP cameras on this page have been confirmed to work with the iPhone & MAC using safari: http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/iPhone-Surveillance-Camera-Systems-s/347.htm

   These network video servers can allow any CCTV camera that we supply work with iPhone & MAC:
   http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Zavio-Network-Video-Server-p/v111t.htm
   http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Video-Encoder-p/vivotek-vs7100.htm

2. I would guess the software could be run on a MAC that was using Parrells running Windows. Will the software allow recording.
   You can not use your MAC for recording. For recording, a windows PC is required or a stand alone network video recorder (NVR).
3. Can the software allow viewing and recording for multiple locations.
   Viewing from multiple locations is not a problem. Recording is more tricky because if requires a lot of upload bandwidth speed to do.

Please post any follow up questions.

Thanks.
-Mike

A customer emailed us with the following questions related to the iPhone surveillance & security camera systems that we are promoting:

1. This can be wired directly to a router? Or a number of them to a router.
   Answer: Yes, the IP cameras are wired directly to a router or network switch and yes you can connect multiple IP cameras to a router or switch
2. Also will the wireless IP camera work with this that comes up on the same page.
   Yes, this wireless camera has been tested are works great: http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Wireless-IP-Camera-p/zavio-f312a.htm
3. I assume this will also work with IP camera system.
   It depends on which system. Some of the systems do not directly support remote login with the iphone, but you can still access the camera directly (outside of the recorder) to see a live image from the iphone.
4. Is there anyway to use a mac computer with this software as the recording media and have the cameras go hardwired into a router or wireless router.
   Unfortunately, you can not use a MAC with the recording software, but you can view the cameras from a MAC in the safari web browser

Please post any follow up questions related to iphone surveillance camera viewing to this forum topic.

Thanks.
-Mike

Here is the response that we received from Arecont Vision:

Yes, you can use an Arecont HSG1-O-W-IR infrared housing with IR illuminator capability with any of the day night megapixel cameras.

CCTV camera pros added the housing to our website here:
http://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Arecont-Infrared-Housing-p/hsg1-o-w-ir.htm

Arecont Vision Support,

Recently we had a customer ask us if the Arecont Megapixel IP cameras that we supply can work with IR illuminators and infrared camera housings. If so, they also want to know if there is an output from the camera that can trigger the IR illuminators in an infrared housing to turn on when the camera switches to night mode (when the IR-cut filter engages).

Specifically the day night models that we need to know if they work with IR or not are:

• AV1305-DN
• AV1300-DN
• AV3105-DN
• AV5105-DN
• AV2100-DN
• AV5100-DN
• AV3100-DN
• AV2105-DN
• AV3130

Thank You.

Yes this is possible. You need to install a 2nd network into the PC. Then connect all of your cameras to a network switch. Connect the PC to the switch using one of the NIC cards. This will isolate all of the network traffic from the IP cameras on a separate network

The other NIC will connect to your router that has internet access (the one the rest of your network is on).

No cross over cable will be used. You will need to setup IP addresses on all of the IP cameras using the software they came with because a switch is not going to supply any IP addresses via DHCP.

A customer of CCTV Camera Pros contacted us with the following question:

Our IP cameras are using to much network bandwidth and I would like to setup a standalone configuration using a PC with two network cards and a standalone router with no wan connection.

1. Is this possible?
2. Is the second nic connected by a cross over cable or straight thru to the router?