Those who are still waiting and thinking of going elsewhere ask yourself the following, would you rather spend your money with an online seller who advertises they have 999 in stock when
@EMPIRETECANDY is hardly able to keep them in stock?
Or patently wait like myself and others have done to deal with
@EMPIRETECANDY who ACTIVELY engages with this online community directly and is
honouring warranty for one of
@hmjgriffon cameras.
UPDATE
After a fast 3 day turnaround from HK to Australia the cameras, NVR and mounts arrived on the 16th of February as promised.
INITIAL TESTING & OBSERVATIONS
Upon arrival all 8 cameras were tested, checking firstly that they turned on, IRs activated in low light and listen for any abnormal noise upon zooming in or out. The last check failed on 3 cameras which like others have reported emitted a clicking noise that was louder when zooming in than out.
Since you have to open the camera to install an SD Card and after reading post 1445 by
@nbstl68 (thanks bud!) I decided to crack one open and fix the problem. After several silica bag position changes later two of the three were noise free, the third is another story.
My usual disassemble, reposition silica bag, reassemble and test routine wasn't working, it seemed no matter where I positioned the silica bag it wasn't happy. Without being able to see what was going on inside when zooming I decided to fix this one 'live'. In order to troubleshoot the problem I removed the loose silica bag and held the two halves together while zooming in and out, to my amazement the noise was still present, no wonder why the position of the bag had no effect.
I then observed how the two halves come together and if there were any interferes. The only thing I could see which might pose a problem was the white IR connector cable which could possibly be touching the foam ring once the camera was reassembled. So I tried gently bending the cable out of the way so there would be a gap once the two halves met. I then re-tested and was quite pleased when zooming resulted in silence.
I have't been able to see if my last fix method is reproducible as all my cameras are now functioning normally but it could be something to try if you aren't finding the position of the silica bag is having much effect.
The loose silica bag placement was identical on the 3 cameras I opened, positioned well away from any movement of the lens barrel. I assume the other 5 were similar and why they don't exhibit a similar issue I cannot answer. I can only report my findings in the hope it may help someone out.
INSTALLATION AND FUTURE PLANS
Due to the extreme heat we have had to endure recently in Australia installation of the first 5 occurred several days later. A 6th is due to be installed once another junction box is received from Andy tomorrow (3 day turnaround again!).
Positions for cameras 7 and 8 are still to be determined.
Thanks again
@nayr,
@EMPIRETECANDY and the admins of this great community.