IP cameras for home security: HW/SW recommend

[Lil'John]

Title sort of states it.

Problem: I want to run security cameras at my house.

I currently have ~14 ports or so open on a switch(D-Link DGS-1024D) for cameras.

My general plan is the following: put the switch and POE injector on a UPS so the cameras can continue to function if the power is out. Use a laptop/tablet to record content. It would remain off of the UPS. Once a day or week, copy records from laptop/tablet to NAS.

I'm still working on a camera count. Current guestimate is 3(4) exterior and 3(4) interior.

Q1: I'm looking for quality discrete interior and exterior cameras. I don't want my house to look like a security bunker. Any recommendations for cameras that are POE enabled? Most of the distances will be 20 feet and under.

Q2: Will a tablet or laptop be powerful enough to record several IP cameras? I'm not hung up on an OS or recording software.

Q3: Is there any recommendations for recording software?

Q4: Will a UPS run a switch plus cameras for about an hour? Any recommended UPS?

 

[mfenn]

To be clear, if you have a non-PoE switch, you would need a PoE injector on every port that you'd like to run PoE over. That's a lot of injectors with 8 cameras. You'd be better off getting a PoE switch at that point.

 

[Lil'John]

To be clear, if you have a non-PoE switch, you would need a PoE injector on every port that you'd like to run PoE over. That's a lot of injectors with 8 cameras. You'd be better off getting a PoE switch at that point.

Yup. That is correct and understood. I've seen "PoE hubs" of 8+ ports so I'm not concerned finding them.

 

[Theguynextdoor]

Interested to see where this goes. Looking to do the same thing in my house since I'm going to start renting out some of the rooms and want to protect my tenants and my property.

 

[JackMDS]

Are you aware of the amount of storage that you will need to store the 24/7 out put of 6-8 Cameras?

 

[Lil'John]

Are you aware of the amount of storage that you will need to store the 24/7 out put of 6-8 Cameras?

Not a full amount. However, I believe storage is based upon two factors: image quality and frames per second.

A standard 2 hour DVD is 8G.

My digital camera(Nikon D60, 10.xMP) takes ~4kx2.5k pictures that are 4MB.

I have a pair of HIKVISION DS-2CD2032-I coming to experiment with. They are only 3MP.

The interior cameras are going to be setup as motion activated.

 

[Gunbuster]

Good camera reviews here: http://www.networkcameracritic.com/

 

[Lil'John]

Good camera reviews here: http://www.networkcameracritic.com/

Thank you for the link.

Lots of good information... I think my day just got wasted

 

[Xtrem]

Not a full amount. However, I believe storage is based upon two factors: image quality and frames per second.

A standard 2 hour DVD is 8G.

My digital camera(Nikon D60, 10.xMP) takes ~4kx2.5k pictures that are 4MB.

I have a pair of HIKVISION DS-2CD2032-I coming to experiment with. They are only 3MP.

The interior cameras are going to be setup as motion activated.

I have 4 Hikvision 2MP Dome ones set up with a POE switch. Switch has NAS and the 4 cameras connected. All of that is on one UPS. The entire system drawings about 40 Watts. The cameras only records on motion detection directly to NAS so it saves space.

 

[Lil'John]

I have 4 Hikvision 2MP Dome ones set up with a POE switch. Switch has NAS and the 4 cameras connected. All of that is on one UPS. The entire system drawings about 40 Watts. The cameras only records on motion detection directly to NAS so it saves space.

Sounds like what I'm trying to do.

If you could share, how much hard drive space does each camera take when recording?

 

[Xtrem]

I really can't tell you because its on motion recording, but I've got two 2-TB drives in Raid1 and I can go back 3-4 months with four cameras. Really depends on your settings