5442 series with active deterrence or something similar?

[reaver]

We are finally ready to put up some cameras after shelving our plan for years.

I am all for the 5442 series after seeing all the reviews however the wife wants something like the DH-IPC-HDW3849H-AS-PV because of the active deterrence, flashing lights and speaker and all that. I've seen the reviews on the 3849 and they don't seem to work very well.

Is there a camera that has good low light performance like the 5442 but has some flashing led lights built in? We don't want the LED lights to be on all the time, we just want it to flash when it detects someone.

If it matters, we will be putting cameras in a typical suburban house - driveway, sides and back of the house. Planning to use PoE and a Dahua NVR so we can use the app to view the cameras when we are away.

 

[wittaj]

You are asking for too much from one camera.

Active deterrence cameras (strobe lights) are not designed for high quality images. They put in the cheaper, lower cost smaller sensors in them to help keep the cost down.

Their primary purpose is the active deterrence concept of lights and audio, while the 5442 is on video performance.

You have to decide if you want active deterrence or quality video.

Further, most here find that cameras and motion activated floodlights or LEDs that come on with motion ends up causing problems with image exposure and are bad for surveillance cameras.. What happens is then the camera is momentarily blinded and you lose the ideal capture when the lights kick on and the camera adjusts from basically no light to a lot of light.

Motion activated lights are not a deterrent. There are enough videos here showing that perps do not flinch when a floodlight turns on. They avoid homes all lit up, so go with floodlights on all night.

Watch this video someone posted and how the floodlight comes on and they don't even flinch. But then the audio comes on and they don't know which way to run LOL.

https://ipcamtalk.com/attachments/whatsapp-video-2020-07-28-at-7-23-08-pm-mp4.73970/

Either keep the lights on all night or not at all to ensure the best chance of capture.

Here is usually what happens when a motion activated floodlight or camera LED comes on - it just about completely blinds the camera right at the moment of optimal opportunity to get the picture. There are 3 deer in this picture and two of them are lost in the blinded white while the camera's exposure adjusts to the rapid change in available light:

Or this example that completely missed the perp:

The Typical picture of a Perp on Nextdoor-type Apps with Consumer Grade Cameras like Ring, Nest, Arlo, Canary, Wyze, etc.


Absolutely stay away from the 3849 camera - way too many threads here of how poor performing it is.

The red/blue flashing lights are more gimmicky and are certainly not a deterrent. With any ambient light you won't see the red/blue flashing unless you are looking right at the camera.

If you want active deterrence, your best bet is to go with the 2MP IPC-T5241H-AS-PV that will blink the white light. This is on the ideal MP/sensor ratio and will perform comparably to any similar 2MP fixed lens camera by Dahua. I have two of them. I have some of the other active deterrence cams as well, and would opt for the 2MP in every instance except for indoor, one could go with the IPC-HDW3449HP-AS-PV that has the red/blue lights that will bounce off the walls and be much more impressive than outside.

 

[fenderman]

The dahua dual lens camera DH-IPC-PDW5849-A180 has audio alarms though it is not as loud as some of the other dahuas with built in speaker. The 8mp bullet with the 1/1.2" sensor also has audio alarm. Frankly there is no reason why they cant add active deterrence with audio and strobe in some of their better cams.

Hikvision the hikvision equivilant of the dahua dual lens is available from annke for 200 and it supports both audio alarm and a white light strobe.
The Hikvision DS-2CD2387G2-LSU/SL turret also supports both audio alarm and a white light strobe. and is a great low light performer with its 1/1.2 sensor.

If you are using active deterrence with an NVR you need to consider how easy it is to disable it when you are home so that it doesnt drive you crazy when you step outside.

 

[looktall]

I have one dahua tioc camera.
It's really handy for setting an ivr rule and then being able to walk through the scene and get a real time visual feedback of when it actually triggers.

That's the only time I use the flashing lights. They're turned off otherwise.

 

[reaver]

You are asking for too much from one camera.

Active deterrence cameras (strobe lights) are not designed for high quality images. They put in the cheaper, lower cost smaller sensors in them to help keep the cost down.

Their primary purpose is the active deterrence concept of lights and audio, while the 5442 is on video performance.

You have to decide if you want active deterrence or quality video.

Thank you for sharing all your insights, you brought important things that we really have not considered at all. Thanks again!

 

[wittaj]

Don't get me wrong - they certainly have a place in camera arsenal.

The flashing lights do scare away the deer and other things eating away at what little garden we have LOL.

Like I mentioned I do have several that are more overview duty to let me see what is going on, but the audio is the better deterrent in my experience. These things are loud enough to spook a middle of the night perp, but not loud enough to wake up the whole neighborhood either.

But for picture quality, I would go with a different camera.

 

[reaver]

We were initially thinking of buying 4 of the same model but to your point we are now leaning towards picking different models based on how we want to use them in a specific area.

What 5442 model with a speaker would you recommend?

 

[wittaj]

The 5442 series doesn't come with built in speaker, but you can add an external.

If you have light or are willing to use the built in white LED, the 4K/X is a great camera. It has a louder than most built-in speaker.

 

[fenderman]

The 5442 series doesn't come with built in speaker, but you can add an external.

If you have light or are willing to use the built in white LED, the 4K/X is a great camera. It has a louder than most built-in speaker.

I dont believe the 5442 has audio outputs unless they recently added it...

 

[fenderman]

You can look into whether the NVR can trigger an alarm on camera A when motion is detected on camera B. This will allow you to mix and match. This can be done with third part vms like blue iris, I dont know if the nvr can do this.