After a recent 4am car burglary, I'm motivated to replace the 2016 EzViz Sam's Club 3MP DVR special with a better system.
I have a Synology DS1520+ with 3.5TB set aside for surveillance, and I've been planning to use that for 3-4 outdoor cams (yes even if I have to buy a couple camera licenses).
I'm testing two Amcrest cameras, an IP5MP-T1179EW and an IP8M-T2599EW. They seem pretty good especially at $50 and $77, but after reading many posts here ("chase sensor size, not MP" and "8MP doesn't see IR"), I wonder if I should get something lower-res with better night vision. I like turret, would consider bullet. I don't feel varifocal or PTZ is worth the extra expense, since the system will likely be unattended when I most need it. Don't see a great need for AI either--I'll record 24/7, so at best it would just eliminate swaying trees from the motion-detection bars during playback. I was hoping to be under $100 per cam but $150ish might be worth it.
I see lots of recommendations here, as recently as yesterday, for cameras from EmpireTech, Loryta, and WizKam, none of which are supported by Synology. Maybe I could tell Synology it's the Dahua equivalent and get away with one of those. Any recommendations for Amcrest or Hikvision? One thread here comments on the Amcrest IP8M-2597EB-28MM with a 1/1.8" sensor for $125 but it's out of stock and the white models are not on the Amcrest site at all, so it may be discontinued.
BTW if someone wants to argue that I should forget Synology, buy BlueIris, and used this old Lenovo Tiny computer I had planned to set up as the Synology monitoring computer, I'll listen
.
Thanks for all the help,
Mark
I have a Synology DS1520+ with 3.5TB set aside for surveillance, and I've been planning to use that for 3-4 outdoor cams (yes even if I have to buy a couple camera licenses).
I'm testing two Amcrest cameras, an IP5MP-T1179EW and an IP8M-T2599EW. They seem pretty good especially at $50 and $77, but after reading many posts here ("chase sensor size, not MP" and "8MP doesn't see IR"), I wonder if I should get something lower-res with better night vision. I like turret, would consider bullet. I don't feel varifocal or PTZ is worth the extra expense, since the system will likely be unattended when I most need it. Don't see a great need for AI either--I'll record 24/7, so at best it would just eliminate swaying trees from the motion-detection bars during playback. I was hoping to be under $100 per cam but $150ish might be worth it.
I see lots of recommendations here, as recently as yesterday, for cameras from EmpireTech, Loryta, and WizKam, none of which are supported by Synology. Maybe I could tell Synology it's the Dahua equivalent and get away with one of those. Any recommendations for Amcrest or Hikvision? One thread here comments on the Amcrest IP8M-2597EB-28MM with a 1/1.8" sensor for $125 but it's out of stock and the white models are not on the Amcrest site at all, so it may be discontinued.
BTW if someone wants to argue that I should forget Synology, buy BlueIris, and used this old Lenovo Tiny computer I had planned to set up as the Synology monitoring computer, I'll listen

Thanks for all the help,
Mark