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Welcome to the forum. I am an IT professional with more the 45 years expedience. The IT experience helps a little but not a lot when it comes to cameras.
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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.
13) Use a router that has openVPN built in (Most ASUS, Some NetGear....)
Cameras to look at
IPC-HDW2231R-ZS
Review-Dahua IPC-HDW2231RP-ZS Starlight Camera-Varifocal
IPC-HDW5231-ZE
Review-Dahua Starlight IPC-HDW5231R-ZE 800 meter capable ePOE
IPC-HFW4239T-ASE
IPC-HFW4239T-ASE
IPC-T5442TM-AS Review IPC-T5442TM-AS-LED (Full Color, Starlight+)
IPCT-HDW5431RE-I
Review - IP Cam Talk 4 MP IR Fixed Turret Network Camera
DS-2CD2325FWD-I
My preferred indoor cameras
DS-2CD2442FWD-IW
IPC-K35A
https://ipcamtalk.com/threads/review-dahua-ipc-k35a-3mp-cube-camera.37581/#post-373517
Read,study,plan before spending money ..... plan plan plan
Test do not guess