Hikvision camera selection 5mp or 8mp?

Roveer

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I'm setting up an 8 camera system at a fairly large estate in NJ, USA. The client wants to cover all the 'doors' at the house as well as a camera pointing up the 600 foot driveway and a camera at the gate.

I'm going to use Hikvision equipment purchased from bhphotovideo to avoid any grey market problems that I've read about.

I'm going to use a bullet camera at the gate and considering domb camera's at the other locations. this home has a large overhang from the roof so fitting domb's seems like a good choice. Comments?

I was going to buy 2 varifocal (bullet for the gate) and one varifocal domb to help me decide what focal length to buy for the other locations. I figured I'd set up the varifocal at each location determine the best picture and see what focal lengh it was set to then decide which fixed focal lengh camera to get for each location. Comments?

I will be buying nightvision camera's but it's not terribly critical to have perfect night vision. As the client has requested, for the camera's around the house, it's just to see if anyone is there, not 'who it is', but at the gate they wanted better quality.

I've watched a couple of comparison videos on youtube and noticed there is a fairly big difference between 5mp and 8mp. Possibility the ability to read a license plate or see a face clearly at some distance. Comments?

I'm going to put these all into a hikvision nvr and the client will use the app on phone/tablet to view camera's. Unlikely the nvr will be connected to a large screen display.

So my questions are as follows:

1. Does the varifocal plan I described above sound like it will work?

2. I'm trying to decide between 5mp and 8mp camera's. I'm leaning towards 8mp (cost is not really an issue for this installation) but I know there might be some drawbacks. Any advice is appreciated.

3. Suggestion on which nvr version to use? 8 camera's all together, but this might grow in the future, so I'm thinking 16 channels. 76/77 series? or 96 series (which seems like overkill). I'm thinking between 4-8tb storage.

So what I've come up with using my own research is as follows:

Gate Bullet: DS-2CD2685FWD-IZS 8mp wdr bullet, nightvision, varifocal
Initial Domb: DS-2CD2785G0-IZS 8mp, domb, nighvision, varifocal - will use to determine focal lenght for other locations and will then use fixed fl dombs for those locations.

Does this all sound like a good plan, or have I gone wrong in my thinking? Appreciate your input.

Roveer
 

SouthernYankee

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:welcome:

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!) in the wiki also.

Quick start
1) Use Dahua starlight cameras or Hikvision darkfighter cameras or ICPT Night eye cameras ( ) 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

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

Your research is flawed. Junk every thing you think about IP cameras and start over.

Assumptions made on scanty information are dangerous and should be avoided. (from a coast guard maritime rules of the road 1969 ) words to live by.

There are not any good night cameras over 4MP at this time, unless you mount a lot of additional light.
 
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Roveer

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OK,

I did a deep dive after reading the cliff notes and wiki. Here's the configuration I've come up with. I took to heart the warnings about bullet and domb. Sorry about the table. Tried to make it straight but forum displays it this way. Also, looked at lower MP cameras for all but the front gate and they were more expensive than the 8MP. Looked at sample video's and I believe they will be fine. Night vision is not extremely critical. Am interested in your comments on where you think I may have gone wrong.

Camera Focal B&H
Number Location Type MP Length Model Cost #1
1 Front Gate Turret 8MP Varifocal DS-2CD2H85FWD-IZS $487.00
2 Driveway Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00
3 Garden Slider Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00
4 Front Entry Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00
5 Garage Area Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00
6 Rear Sliders Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00
7 Basement Door Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00
8 Kitchen Slider Turret 8MP 4mm DS-2CD2383G0-I $218.00

9 NVR - Rack DS-7616NI-Q2/16P $557.00
10 NVR - Storage WD81PURZ $438.98

$3,008.98
 

fenderman

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The 8mp cameras you selected all have 1/2.5 sensors which will result in poor low light and night vision. 500 bux is insane for a varifocal 8k hikvision.
The newer 1/2 sensors is what you should be looking for.
 

SouthernYankee

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you should only use Hikvision darkfighter for low light. They are 2 MP or 4 MP. 8 MP are useless at night unless you have additional light and a lot of it.

In my opinion B&H are way over priced.
 

Roveer

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Thanks for the input. I will look at the sensor size and darkfighter (low light was not of high importance, but I don't want it to look like crap either).

Can you suggest another vendor other than BHPhoto? I am in USA, East Coast.

Thanks,

Roveer
 

SouthernYankee

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You can try the forum store, it was relabled Hikvision cameras. https://store.ipcamtalk.com/ .

Check out Nelly's
@Sean Nelson
Nelly's Security


Or you can look at Dahua cameras. A forum member is china provides international camera and excellent service and support. There are a number of posts on his excellent service.
@EMPIRETECANDY
EmpireTech Andy

He has stores on Amazon and Aliexpress, if what you want is not listed there email him to see if he has it.
 
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hikwpg

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The 8mp cameras you selected all have 1/2.5 sensors which will result in poor low light and night vision. 500 bux is insane for a varifocal 8k hikvision.
The newer 1/2 sensors is what you should be looking for.
Can you link one of these cameras?
I can’t seem to find them.
Just the 1/2.7-1/2.8


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

pinecone

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The 8mp cameras you selected all have 1/2.5 sensors which will result in poor low light and night vision. 500 bux is insane for a varifocal 8k hikvision.
The newer 1/2 sensors is what you should be looking for.
Would you please explain the measurement "1/2.5" I see these specifications of sensor sizes tossed around but I don't understand what the unit(s) of measurement are. I assume by your comment "1/2" is a larger sensor.
 

fenderman

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Would you please explain the measurement "1/2.5" I see these specifications of sensor sizes tossed around but I don't understand what the unit(s) of measurement are. I assume by your comment "1/2" is a larger sensor.
Sure. Inches 1/2.5=.4 which is less than 1/2 =.5
 

crc2004

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I deleted my prior comment because I didn't completely read the original post and my comment didn't make sense.

You may want to show the property owner some nighttime footage where the face is a blur vs detailed enough to ID the person, they might reconsider their low light requirements.
 

Roveer

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I deleted my prior comment because I didn't completely read the original post and my comment didn't make sense.

You may want to show the property owner some nighttime footage where the face is a blur vs detailed enough to ID the person, they might reconsider their low light requirements.
One of the reasons I came to this forum and posted what I did was to get the type of feedback that I'm getting. As one poster noted, trying to make selections based on spec's is not a good way to approach camera selection.

In the few days that I've been posting/reading I've learned a lot about camera's in general. It's unfortunate that there is this hole between high resolution and low light/night vision but it's pretty obvious that this is where a lot of attention has to be placed when selecting camera's.

I've noticed that the really good darkfighter gear is 400+ per camera and I really don't want to be there, but at least I've been shown (through posts) that this exists. Your comment about showing the client the night-time footage is exactly what I'll be doing so he can make the cost decisions based on performance.

I appreciate everyone's input it has helped me tremendously.

Roveer
 

pinecone

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Sure. Inches 1/2.5=.4 which is less than 1/2 =.5
thank you. That makes perfect sense. Glad to know. However, makes me wonder why they don't just specify in inches or millimeters. Guess somewhere down the line the fractional representation just became the de facto standard.
 

fenderman

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thank you. That makes perfect sense. Glad to know. However, makes me wonder why they don't just specify in inches or millimeters. Guess somewhere down the line the fractional representation just became the de facto standard.
It is specificed in inches. 1/2" or 1/1.8" basic fractions.
 

hikwpg

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thank you. That makes perfect sense. Glad to know. However, makes me wonder why they don't just specify in inches or millimeters. Guess somewhere down the line the fractional representation just became the de facto standard.
They do spec them in millimetres, you just have to remember the US is still stuck in imperial system dark ages.
Which is funny because they seem to be ok with millimetres for lens sizes!

This has the metric sizes if it helps.
Image sensor format - Wikipedia

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
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reeves1985

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IMHO if you want a great system at a reasonable price the only way to go ATM is dahua.

Hikvision have some great stuff and used to be top dog for a long time.
Dahua upped their game and hikvision upped their prices and it is now more difficult to get their good gear from reputable sources at a reasonable price.

I started off with hikvision and still use their nvr as my main recording platform for nvr. As well as still running some of their older 2032 cameras.

But now as I'm adding to my system and recommending to friends and family you just cannot look past the dahua stuff.
 
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