Help me to choose the right outdoor ip camera

[Dominique BOYER]

Hi,

I need an outdoor IP camera for my home (this camera will be managed by my synology nas with surveillance station) :
Here is the important specs for me :
- very good nightvision
- in ceil mounting (dome)
- zooming capabilities
- POE
- 4 MP
- if possible PTZ

I've selected 2 references but if you think there is better please tell me :
- Hikvision DS-2DE2A404IW-DE3 (PTZ)
- DS-2CD2145FWD-I (not PTZ)

budget : 250€ max.

Thanks a lot

 

[SouthernYankee]

------------------------------------------------------
For a starting camera do not use a PTZ, learn about cameras first.
Unless you are setting up the PTZ to automatic tracking, it is really not worth it for a security camera. What are you going to do sit there and look at it moving it around. It is much better to use multiple cameras to cover an area.

Do not use a dome camera for outside, it reflects light and collects dirt.
------------------------------------------------------

My standard welcome to the forum message.

Please read the cliff notes and other items in the wiki. The wiki is in the blue bar at the top of the page.

Read How to Secure Your Network (Don't Get Hacked!) | IP Cam Talk in the wiki also.

Quick start
1) Use Dahua starlight cameras or Hikvision darkfighter cameras or ICPT Night eye cameras (https://store.ipcamtalk.com/) if you need good low light cameras.
2) use a VPN to access home network (openVPN)
3) Do not use wifi cameras.
4) Do not use cloud storage
5) Do Not use uPNP, P2P, QR, do not open ports,
6) More megapixel is not necessarily better.
7) Avoid chinese hacked cameras (most ebay, amazon, aliexpress cameras(not all, but most))
8) Do not use reolink, ring, nest cameras (they are junk)
9) If possible use a turret camera , bullet collect spiders, dome collect dirt and reflect light (IR)
10) Use only solid copper, AWG 23 or 24 ethernet wire. , no CCA (Copper Clad Aluminum)
11) use a test mount to verify the camera mount location. My test rig: rev.2
12) (Looney2ns)If you want to be able to ID faces, don't mount cams higher than 8ft. You want to know who did it, not just what happened.

Cameras to look at
IPC-HDW2231R-ZS
IPC-HDW5231-ZE
IPC-T5442TM-AS
IPCT-HDW5431RE-I
DS-2CD2325FWD-I


Read,study,plan before spending money ..... plan plan plan
Test do not guess

 

[Dseg42]

@SouthernYankee boom nailed it.
Also look at IPC-HDW4231EM-AS

 

[Dominique BOYER]

------------------------------------------------------
For a starting camera do not use a PTZ, learn about cameras first.
Unless you are setting up the PTZ to automatic tracking, it is really not worth it for a security camera. What are you going to do sit there and look at it moving it around. It is much better to use multiple cameras to cover an area.

Do not use a dome camera for outside, it reflects light and collects dirt.
------------------------------------------------------

My standard welcome to the forum message.

Please read the cliff notes and other items in the wiki. The wiki is in the blue bar at the top of the page.

Read How to Secure Your Network (Don't Get Hacked!) | IP Cam Talk in the wiki also.

Quick start
1) Use Dahua starlight cameras or Hikvision darkfighter cameras or ICPT Night eye cameras (https://store.ipcamtalk.com/) if you need good low light cameras.
2) use a VPN to access home network (openVPN)
3) Do not use wifi cameras.
4) Do not use cloud storage
5) Do Not use uPNP, P2P, QR, do not open ports,
6) More megapixel is not necessarily better.
7) Avoid chinese hacked cameras (most ebay, amazon, aliexpress cameras(not all, but most))
8) Do not use reolink, ring, nest cameras (they are junk)
9) If possible use a turret camera , bullet collect spiders, dome collect dirt and reflect light (IR)
10) Use only solid copper, AWG 23 or 24 ethernet wire. , no CCA (Copper Clad Aluminum)
11) use a test mount to verify the camera mount location. My test rig: rev.2
12) (Looney2ns)If you want to be able to ID faces, don't mount cams higher than 8ft. You want to know who did it, not just what happened.

Cameras to look at
IPC-HDW2231R-ZS
IPC-HDW5231-ZE
IPC-T5442TM-AS
IPCT-HDW5431RE-I
DS-2CD2325FWD-I


Read,study,plan before spending money ..... plan plan plan
Test do not guess

Thanks a lot, your quick start is very helpful even if there is no explaination for each point.
Also for point 12, it depens on the lens size, with 6mm lens you can put the camera in higher position and have good details on face.

Also your recommendations seems a bit outdated, but thanks for point 9 (I'm looking for turret camera now)

 

[SecuritySeeker]

Also for point 12, it depens on the lens size, with 6mm lens you can put the camera in higher position and have good details on face.

No, you'll have good details on the bald spot on top (if he's not wearing a baseball cap). The <8ft advice in point 12 is about the angle, not the distance.

Of course, if you use a zoom lens (13mm or something) and focus on something say 10m (30ft) away the virtual height of the cam at for instance at 5m (15ft) away from the target will be a bit lower than where it's actually placed.

 

[SouthernYankee]

Don't
The lens size is not the issue. Test test test.
Read the cliff notes and other posts.

Test the camera location. Have a friend wear a hoodie, sun glasses, ball cap, walk with head down, can you clearly 100% identify him / her for the police. If not wrong location.

Read, study, test, ask question....

 

[aristobrat]

I've selected 2 references but if you think there is better please tell me :
- Hikvision DS-2DE2A404IW-DE3 (PTZ)
- DS-2CD2145FWD-I (not PTZ)

IMO, you can tell a lot about a camera by looking at the image sensor that it uses.

The first camera (PTZ) looks like it uses a 1/3” image sensor. 1/3” sensors are the ones that were used before Sony came out with the bigger redesigned 1/2.8” low-light sensors a few years back. If you want good low-light image quality, I don’t think any camera that uses a legacy 1/3” sensor should be one that you consider.

The second camera uses a bigger 1/2.5” image sensor that was designed for low light (which is why Hikvision brands this model as a Dark Fighter model).

Between the two models, the second one should do better than the first (in terms of low light).

The forum favorites for price/low light performance are models that use 2MP 1/2.8” sensors.

With Hik/Dahua performance being similar (for similarly spec’ed models), most folks here go with OEM Dahua models (ordered through Andy, see the EmpireTech Andy vendor sub forum here) because they’re easy to source and usually less expensive. What this has resulted in is the Dahua sub-forum here full of posts (including product reviews), where as the Hikvision forum is pretty quiet with much fewer reviews. So when new folks such as yourself pop in with questions about specific Hik models, there is much less first-hand info here to go on.

Also, if Synology Surveillance Station still isn’t able to use the advanced motion detection built into Hikvision/Dahua cameras (Hik calls theirs Smart Events, Dahua calls theirs IVS), you’ll be limited to using basic motion detection, which can be a struggle to “de-tune” (to avoid false motion alerts) while not also missing legitimate motion alerts. I started my build using Surveillance Station but after seeing thread after thread on how Smart Events/IVS out-performed basic motion detection, I moved on to a Dahua NVR and ultimately to an old PC running Blue Iris VMS (which hands down has been the best platform for me and my family).

 

[Dominique BOYER]

IMO, you can tell a lot about a camera by looking at the image sensor that it uses.

The first camera (PTZ) looks like it uses a 1/3” image sensor. 1/3” sensors are the ones that were used before Sony came out with the bigger redesigned 1/2.8” low-light sensors a few years back. If you want good low-light image quality, I don’t think any camera that uses a legacy 1/3” sensor should be one that you consider.

The second camera uses a bigger 1/2.5” image sensor that was designed for low light (which is why Dahua brands this model as a Dark Fighter model).

Between the two models, the second one should do better than the first (in terms of low light).

The forum favorites for price/low light performance are models that use 2MP 1/2.8” sensors.

With Hik/Dahua performance being similar (for similarly spec’ed models), most folks here go with OEM Dahua models (ordered through Andy, see the EmpireTech Andy vendor sub forum here) because they’re easy to source and usually less expensive. What this has resulted in is the Dahua sub-forum here full of posts (including product reviews), where as the Hikvision forum is pretty quiet with much fewer reviews. So when new folks such as yourself pop in with questions about specific Hik models, there is much less first-hand info here to go on.

Also, if Synology Surveillance Station still isn’t able to use the advanced motion detection built into Hikvision/Dahua cameras (Hik calls theirs Smart Events, Dahua calls theirs IVS), you’ll be limited to using basic motion detection, which can be a struggle to “de-tune” (to avoid false motion alerts) while not also missing legitimate motion alerts. I started my build using Surveillance Station but after seeing thread after thread on how Smart Events/IVS out-performed basic motion detection, I moved on to a Dahua NVR and ultimately to an old PC running Blue Iris VMS (which hands down has been the best platform for me and my family).

Thanks a lot, I've learned a lot. I've definitively dropped PTZ camera (also because what SouthernYankee said). For Synolygy it seems that there is some hacks around to get smart events, I will go this way first, and if it doesn't work I will have a look on NVR and Blue Iris)