I am looking to upgrade our current 960H analog DVR to either NVR or BI. I will be running a max of about 8 cameras around the house/property with one of them potentially being a wireless camera (I am ok with that on being isolated).
I am in IT by trade to I have access to certain hardware for free. Looking over the currently available inventory it seems I should be able to build a BI instance cheaper than I can buy a comparable-performance NVR:
BI:
several dozen Optiplex 9020 towers with the older i5-4570 3.2ghz 4core cpu and all the RAM you could want
poweredge r430 dual socket xeon e5-2620 no RAM
poweredge r620 dual socket xeon e5-2640 no RAM
POE:
plethora of dell powerconnect 24port 10/100 unmanaged poe switches
several cisco catalyst 2960s 10/100/1000 24 and 48 port managed switches 750w
Any of the above would be free as they are decommissioned from service right now due to a recent virtualization project. I would need some drives and some RAM but...
I'd prefer to spend most of my actual money on cameras. Probably starting off with 4-6 and then later adding either a super high-end 7th and a wireless 8th. The goal is recording on motion, holding as much history as possible. Our current DVR has yet to let us down with its basic config so I'd imagine the basics are fine no matter what I do.
I'd like to stay around $1000 but it is what it is. I have been looking at some of the gw security options from amazon for comparison. I have the skillset to build anything from end to end so I'm not intimidated by difficulty or maintenance but I do have 2 jobs, 2 kids and 2 hobbies so I don't want something I have to babysit. I will have a display attached 24/7 this time around so a pc-based solution will be monitored. I won't do too much email alerting and other stuff, pretty low key. I have a carport I will be installing 4 of these cameras on and they are a cablefitter's dream so not too concerned with that either.
Please advise. Thank you
I am in IT by trade to I have access to certain hardware for free. Looking over the currently available inventory it seems I should be able to build a BI instance cheaper than I can buy a comparable-performance NVR:
BI:
several dozen Optiplex 9020 towers with the older i5-4570 3.2ghz 4core cpu and all the RAM you could want
poweredge r430 dual socket xeon e5-2620 no RAM
poweredge r620 dual socket xeon e5-2640 no RAM
POE:
plethora of dell powerconnect 24port 10/100 unmanaged poe switches
several cisco catalyst 2960s 10/100/1000 24 and 48 port managed switches 750w
Any of the above would be free as they are decommissioned from service right now due to a recent virtualization project. I would need some drives and some RAM but...
I'd prefer to spend most of my actual money on cameras. Probably starting off with 4-6 and then later adding either a super high-end 7th and a wireless 8th. The goal is recording on motion, holding as much history as possible. Our current DVR has yet to let us down with its basic config so I'd imagine the basics are fine no matter what I do.
I'd like to stay around $1000 but it is what it is. I have been looking at some of the gw security options from amazon for comparison. I have the skillset to build anything from end to end so I'm not intimidated by difficulty or maintenance but I do have 2 jobs, 2 kids and 2 hobbies so I don't want something I have to babysit. I will have a display attached 24/7 this time around so a pc-based solution will be monitored. I won't do too much email alerting and other stuff, pretty low key. I have a carport I will be installing 4 of these cameras on and they are a cablefitter's dream so not too concerned with that either.
Please advise. Thank you