New Here and some system setup questions..

M

Magna86

n3wb
Aug 20, 2021
16
19
VA Beach
Good Morning,

I'm in the process of building a house and shop and want to get Cat cable run through the house before the insulation and drywall start going up but I have a few questions.

Should I run cat 5 or 6 cable?

I plan to run 6 cameras at the house. One at each corner on the soffit and one at each door.

For the soffit cameras they will be about 40ft off the ground so looking for recommendations for those cameras. I've read alittle about 5442 Dahua series cameras and heard about Hikivision cameras as an options for better than entry level. These will be near floodlights if that makes a difference.

The garage will have soffit cameras as well but those are only 12-13ft off the ground and I have one by the entry door plus inside. My goal is to have two separate systems with their own NVRs.(or cheap PC) I'll be able to run internet from the house to the garage and it's about a 60-70ft run.

I'm interested in being able to view these without them dialing back home to China or whatever countries servers they came from. Which systems can that be turned off on?

Look forward to hearing what you guys think and if I'm missing something or other camera ideas. I don't want to pay for subscriptions for use either. Plenty to learn and read about here.

Thanks,
Magna
 
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Magna86 said:
Good Morning,

I'm in the process of building a house and shop and want to get Cat cable run through the house before the insulation and drywall start going up but I have a few questions.

Should I run cat 5 or 6 cable?

I plan to run 6 cameras at the house. One at each corner on the soffit and one at each door.

For the soffit cameras they will be about 40ft off the ground so looking for recommendations for those cameras. I've read alittle about 5442 Dahua series cameras and heard about Hikivision cameras as an options for better than entry level. These will be near floodlights if that makes a difference.

The garage will have soffit cameras as well but those are only 12-13ft off the ground and I have one by the entry door plus inside. My goal is to have two separate systems with their own NVRs.(or cheap PC) I'll be able to run internet from the house to the garage and it's about a 60-70ft run.

I'm interested in being able to view these without them dialing back home to China or whatever countries servers they came from. Which systems can that be turned off on?

Look forward to hearing what you guys think and if I'm missing something or other camera ideas. I don't want to pay for subscriptions for use either. Plenty to learn and read about here.

Thanks,
Magna
Click to expand...

Welcome @Magna86

Q: Should I run cat 5 or 6 cable?
A: Not Cat5 .. at least Cat5e .. better Cat6 just a little more than Cat5e

Q/Issue: I plan to run 6 cameras at the house. One at each corner on the soffit and one at each door. For the soffit cameras they will be about 40ft off the ground .. The garage will have soffit cameras as well but those are only 12-13ft off the ground ..
A: Hopefully you have plenty of time to learn more before you run your lines...

Seriously, how much time do you have to figure this out?

What are the functional purposes of the cameras? Sunset / Scenic views?
 
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:welcome:

Read the material in the Wiki, in the blue bar at the top of the page on a real computer. Once you have at least done a quick scan of that material your ideas will change to reality. CAT5E or CAT6 cable is fine. Even a 4K camera only uses about 10Mb/ps and both of those cable styles will support 1Gbps. The important thing is to use cable that is rated for the application, in your case probably CMR rated.

At 40 feet high the cameras would need to be 24 or 36mm lenses to "see" anything meaningful. Up close, where it counts, all you'll see it the tops of heads and never be able to actually identify anyone when it becomes critical to do so. Even your garage soffets are too high for identification purposes unless they are in the 12mm lens range and the ID is made at 30 or 40 feet from the camera. The general recommendation is to mount cameras no higher than 7-1/2' above grade to be able to get real identification shots.

Using four cameras to cover the entire perimeter of the house is not going to be very good coverage. I have a small ranch house and have ten cameras on perimeter duty with additional cameras at the entry doors. The cameras on the corners look back toward each other so that they can "watch" each other for added security.

Whatever you finally decide on, be sure to build in room for expansion. That will probably happen as you notice weak coverage areas and want to improve coverge generally anyway.
 
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You have to first decide what is the purpose of the cameras - to IDENTIFY or to OBSERVE and at what distance. One camera cannot be the do all, see all.

At those heights, unless you get some powerful optical zoom cameras, will only be observation cameras.

It is simple LOL do not chase MP - do not buy a 4MP camera that is anything smaller than a 1/1.8" sensor. Do not buy a 2MP camera that is anything smaller than a 1/2.8" sensor. Do not buy a 4K (8MP) camera on anything smaller than a 1/1.2" sensor. Unfortunately, most 4k cams are on the same sensor as a 2MP and thus the 2MP will kick its butt all night long as the 4k will need 4 times the light than the 2MP... 4k will do very poor at night unless you have stadium quality lighting (well a lot of lighting LOL).

To identify someone with the 2.8mm lens that you probably had in the past, someone would have to be within 13 feet of the camera, but realistically within 10 feet after you dial it in to your settings.

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My neighbor was bragging to me how he only needed his four 2.8mm fixed lens cams to see his entire property and the street and his whole backyard. His car was sitting in the driveway practically touching the garage door and his video quality was useless to ID the perp not even 10 feet away from the camera.

Here are my general distance recommendations, but switch out the Dahua 5442 series camera to the equivalent 2MP on the 1/2.8" sensor or equivalent Hikvision works as well.
  • 5442 fixed lens 2.8mm - anything within 10 feet of camera OR as an overview camera
  • 5442 ZE - varifocal - distances up to 40-50 feet (personally I wouldn't go past the 30 foot range but I like things closer)
  • 5442 Z4E - anything up to 80-100 feet (personally I wouldn't go past 60 feet but I like things closer)
  • 5241-Z12E - anything from 80 feet to almost 200 feet (personally I wouldn't go past 150 feet because I like things closer)
  • 5241-Z12E - for a license plate cam that you would angle up the street to get plates up to about 175 feet away, or up to 220 with additional IR.
  • 49225 PTZ - great PTZ and in conjunction with an NVR or Blue Iris and the cameras above that you can use as spotter cams to point the PTZ to the correct location to compliment the fixed cams.

So you will need to identify the distance the camera would be from the activities you want to IDENTIFY on and purchase the correct camera for that distance as an optical zoom.

Main keys are you can't locate the camera too high (not on the 2nd story or above 7 feet high unless it is for overview and not Identification purposes) or chase MP and you need to get the correct camera for the area trying to be covered. A 2.8mm to IDENTIFY someone 40 feet away is the wrong camera regardless of how good the camera is. A 2.8mm camera to IDENTIFY someone within 10 feet is a good choice OR it is an overview camera to see something happened but not be able to identify who. Also, do not chase marketing phrases like ColorVu and Full Color and the like - all cameras need light - simple physics...

If you want to see things far away, you need optical zoom, digital zoom only works in the movies and TV...And the optical zoom is done real time - for a varifocal it is a set it and forget it. You cannot go to recorded video and optically zoom in later, at that point it is digital zoom, and the sensors on these cameras are so small which is why digital zoom doesn't work very well after the fact.
 
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Welcome from the other end of VA!

Camera selection and placement is not really hard but you need to establish what your goals are first. Do you want to see if someone walked up your drive? Or would you like to give the police a clear shot of the perp that broke into the garage? Totally different selections and numbers of cameras required. At 40 feet up, you won't be able to do much more than tell the cops if they came down the sidewalk or driveway, and if it was a pickup or a sedan.

Run two cables to each corner, if not three. As @sebastiantombs says, "Cameras multiply like rabbits". Running cable now is cheap and easy compared to running it later, even with an open attic. And leave several feet of cable at each end.

As recommended by others, read the wiki. Study the wiki, then come back and ask more questions.
 
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Yes, if they are 40 feet high they will only be overview cameras, especially the fixed, and most varifocal.

Even a fixed 6.0mm lens (the largest economical fixed lens available), in real world conditions will only IDENTIFY a complete stranger within 26 feet, but realistically about 18 feet or less at night. You lose all that distance just in the vertical. Now that doesn't mean for people you know, of course at 40 feet high with a 2.8mm fixed lens you will recognize people you know based on their body shape, how they walk, hair color, etc., but would never be able to get a clean picture of a complete stranger.

If you want to identify someone, then the cameras need to be lower (no higher than 7-8 feet) or if they are higher, then an optical zoom to "flatten" the angle to be able to IDENTIFY someone at 100 or 200 feet out.
 
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I put a couple of cameras up about 30'-40' for overview, just to see people and vehicles move around and where they go.
As far as people, you can see how bald they are, or what color a car truck or tractor is.

This was after I had over 20 cameras down at 7-10' to see who is coming in and what they are carrying.
 
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Yep, even at 7 or 8 feet, it can miss someone that is trying to avoid cameras.

And that is magnified if it is the wrong camera choice for that height as well.

A well planned, implemented, and ongoing updating of a system will end up putting cameras at lots of different heights and locations as deficiencies are found.

A well placed camera lower than 4 feet and at a location one would not expect to see a camera (especially if incorporated with landscaping or otherwise hidden) increases the chances of obtaining a clean ID capture exponentially.
 
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Magna86 said:
So it sounds like if I wanted to run the higher cameras then basically yes they would be overview cameras. My house sits 200ft off the road and on 1acre cleared from a 5acre plot. Time to do more reading!
Click to expand...

Hi @Magna86

If it is a large house, plan for a lot more cameras - even if you only buy and install a few now, run cables to many locations.

Run N+1+ cables to each location while it is cheapest to do so.

40ft high probably great for a couple of PTZ locations :)

Also, plan to run cables or other data wireless connectivity and power to the front of the driveway, especially if you have a mailbox on the road.
( if it is too hard to run power there, you can try a solar panel setup .. various ways to do this .. )
 
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Ok I'm looking at buying a roll of Cat 6 cable. Do I want riser or plenum cable? The cable will travel up the wall and into the attic for 4 corner cameras and back down into wall cavities for other cameras.
 
If feeling super adventurous... since running data cabling for cameras, why not run cabling for alarm system? In addition to 6+ cameras covering my front area...I also have 3 strategically placed outdoor PIR's connected to my home alarm system. Cameras are good to show you what happened LAST night, not right now. Well...you COULD have alerts to your smartphone or such. You could go all advanced and do home automation + Blue Iris + networked home alarm system. If a AI camera detects a human at 9:30am (or 2:30am) anywhere in my night scheduled IVS, my smart TV turns on with UI3 already running. And since AI does miss sometimes, my PIR's do not miss.
Anyways... if you run data wire, think about other wire: 12v/24v wire for IR blasters, outdoor or indoor sirens, alarm panel+PIR+glass break+window/door sensors. Best to run it all now.
 
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Getting the cable is the most important step now. I have open framing in the house for another week or so before insulation and drywall starts. Call me old school I like a dumb house including the thermostat. Wife does want an alarm system. Not sure if I will read up and learn to wire that myself or have one installed. Or using a DIY system like simplisafe. Currently having to call cable company about getting internet service to my new home. About a month a go was quoted a price to have the line run from a pole to my house but now trying to say don't service my area. If it proves true then my only internet option will be HughesNet.
 
Other's here have installed home alarm system. It's kind of a no brainer to run ALL kinds of various low voltage cable now before sheetrock goes up. Whole house audio (speakers in all rooms), Dahua Intercom units in each room by the light switches, alarm cabling mentioned above. Can get alarm wire at your local lowe's, hd stores easily enough or amazon as well. You only have a week or so :)
I installed a DSC 1864 alarm system and programmed it myself for DIY. 100% local, interfaces with Home Assistant home automation software (Blue Iris also interfaces with same home automation).
Heck...slap in 12vdc/24vdc wire everywhere possible for future LED light strips (cove lighting, kitchen baseboard lighting, stairwell baseboard lighting, etc) or 12/24vdc wire for automatic window shades at each window bay.
Just wish you had more time to figure all this out, other than just a week :)
For reference....you can use Cat6 cable for 12vdc/24vdc purposes. Is more spendier than regular alarm cable but if in hurry, it works. It's what I did for 1/2 of my sensors and running my 24vdc outdoor lighting.
 
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Magna86 said:
Ok I'm looking at buying a roll of Cat 6 cable. Do I want riser or plenum cable? The cable will travel up the wall and into the attic for 4 corner cameras and back down into wall cavities for other cameras.
Click to expand...

Hi @Magna86

Probably a good idea to run a couple of conduits up and down the floors for data cables.
 
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You don't need plenum cable unless you are running it inside your duct work. It's mainly for commercial installations.
Run cat5 to any place you might want cameras, wifi, home automation, etc.

You should at least add the minimum wiring for an alarm system. $1 now will save you $100 when the sheet rock is done.
20 years ago I ran wiring even though my wife did not want an alarm, now she is the first to set it.
 
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You want CMR, riser, cable for any and all low voltage wiring. That includes network, coax, alarm, HDMI, auxiliary power and anything else you might install.
 
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Buy cabling in 500 or 1,000 foot spools. Cheaper and you will find all sorts of use for it in the future.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk
 
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I've used Southwire in the past and it seems fine to me.
 
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