In the spirit of Christmas, I'm going to war... who's coming with me?

Hello guys! It's come to my attention that we have a Christmas light cord cutter in our development, which has been going on for 3 years now according to neighborhood facebook reports after I announced my own problem yesterday... This is the 1st year we had any holiday lighting, and our christmas light was in the yard only 4 days before someone cut its cord about 15ft from my front door. It was a clean cut so I stripped it back, spliced and reinsulated the cord within 5 minutes of noticing, putting it right back out in service like it never happened. I suspect this may antagonize the vandal, and I await their return.

For the sake of clarity and to respect your time/expertise as I seek your guidance, I've summarized wants and needs in the following sections:
Goals
Hardware/Software needs
Existing Equipment
Current Progress

Goals:

• Record anything entering my front yard, with the potential to capture identifying characteristics of people in my yard at night
  • Secondary goal - Cover as much of the surrounding yards as is reasonable. I live on a cul-de-sac (about 500 ft from stop sign to end, my attached garage is ~170 ft from the stop sign).
  • Since I want active alarms on motion in my yard, I'd likely use separate cameras to monitor neighboring yards/street, so that I don't get alarms as my neighbors come and go
• High quality picture
• Phone alerts
• Recording. Quickly identify and view past periods with motion sensor activation
  • Secondary goal - Live feed on my bedside tablet would be nice, but not a necessity
• Heavily prefer purchasing thru Amazon, ideally prime 2 day shipping.

Hardware/Software Needs:

• 3 wired PoE outdoor security cameras
  • Front pointing North/South across yard - longer field of vision ideal to capture anyone entering yard from next door neighbors yards, front yard is only 50ft or so off street
  • Back pointing West straight back - wider field of vision ideal, capture anyone cutting between houses from backyard
• Flood light - EXIR or regular?
  • Is it helpful to use an External IR flood light for nightvision clarity/quality?
  • Better idea to light up my yard like its daytime than try to improve night vision quality?
  • I'd most like to apprehend the people responsible, so I'd lean towards IR/nightvision so as not to spook them
• Blue Iris - I want to record, detect motion, and get alerted on my phone. I want it to be device agnostic mostly, so I can expand and change equipment down the road. I'm under the impression this is the best solution.

Existing Equipment:

• i7-3770K (4 cores, 8 logical), 32GB RAM, 12TB spinning disks, 200GB SSD
• Vera automation controller, likely not tying this in directly, poor camera support
• cat5e & cable dragging skills
• Gig PoE switch
• Post lights in every yard on street from dusk-dawn, house lights thru evening, so there's some ambient lighting even at dead of night - not sure how this impacts night vision
• 2 story house, cameras likely mounted under eave of attached garage for aesthetic reasons, potentially could mount under eave on 2nd story, but this would likely result in too sharp a downward angle
• 80lb Rhodesian Ridgeback, 60lb Boxer - aggressive front window barkers

Current Progress:

Please advise of better options or suggestions:

• Reviewed Hikvision product comparison spreadsheet (Hikvision Product Comparison)
• I think I prefer bullet vs dome, correct me if this should not be the case.
• Based on spreadsheet, maybe I should be most interested in these cameras:
  • Amazon.com : Hikvision DS-2CD2T42WD-I5(4MM) 2688 X 1520 Network Surveillance Camera, 4 MP, Black/White : Camera & Photo
  • Amazon.com : HIKVISION V5.3.3 4MP International version POE EXIR Network Bullet Camera DS-2CD2T42WD-I8 4mm firmware upgradeable : Camera & Photo
• Possible IR flood light: Amazon.com: CMVision-IR200 - 198 IR LED Night Indoor/Outdoor Long Range 300ft IR Illuminator w/ FREE 12V Power Adapter ( Up & Down Position Adjustment only): Musical Instruments
• By the way, this is about 4 times as expensive as the StarShower Christmas Laser projects you see at Walmart, but its WAY brighter, covers a larger area and its sturdy metal construction - despite the higher cost I'm happy with the purchase. I'm looking for similar satisfaction with security cameras, I'll pay for quality: Amazon.com : Almatess Christmas Laser Lights Outdoor Waterproof RGB Moving Landscape Star Projector with 19 Feet Long Cable Garden Laser Lights for Christmas Decoration, Holiday Lighting, Party, Disco : Patio, Lawn & Garden

In my experience the IR lights that use many small LEDs like the one you linked (198 LEDs) are not as good as those that use fewer but larger LEDs. I have some 6-LED UNIVI brand lights that are much more effective than similar-priced lots-of-small-LED lights.

In your case, I'd think a motion-activated, very visible floodlight might be preferred as a deterrent. You can trigger a light from a PIR sensor or the alarm output of a camera, if you select one with alarm out.

Just FYI, based on Nextdoor reports in my neighborhood, the laser light projectors are attractive to thieves.

Thanks for the input and advice, I'll look more in that direction.

I've heard the same regarding thieves. I've not secured mine yet, but I'm getting a bike lock to secure it to my dog tie-out I hammered in with a sledge - getting that out of the ground isn't possible without a crowbar and fulcrum, so if they want to take it, it won't be a quick grab for them.