Pondering indoor cameras. Suggestions?

bp2008

bp2008

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Mar 10, 2014
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I am considering putting cams inside my house since I am finally going to have a second server capable of running BI so I could keep it separate from my main cams.

I have two cameras in here currently.

1. A cheap and terrible daylight-only cam in the corner above my desk. The camera is terrible but it has a great view of half the house and a switch is nearby.
2. A Trendnet 1 megapixel Pan/Tilt with IR, on the ceiling between the living room and kitchen.

Here is a rough, slightly off-scale drawing of my house as it currently is. It had my lights and outlets mapped already, so I left them there but grayed them out (rectangles are outlets, circles are lights). Green rectangles are my network switches. The garage already has cameras.



I'm thinking maybe 3 Hikvision DS-2CD2432F-I, 1 for each door into the house: http://www.aliexpress.com/item/DS-2...ork-Camera-w-3D-DNR-Up-to-10m/1739284508.html

I'd put a PoE switch on the fridge and have all 3 cameras up there near the center of the house pointing at their respective doors. These would be on motion record to SD card, BI server, and a hidden FTP server, and of course they would be battery backup'd along with the rest of the network and servers.

I know some of you guys have tried that camera model, and I'm wondering what the wall mounting options are. Kind of looks like you just drill a hole or two in the (weighted?) base and use that.
 
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The base is plastic, and is not weighted, but it supports the camera well when sitting on a flat surface.

For wall mounting, the base has a plastic insert that pops out exposing 3 screw holes. After screwing the base onto a surface, the insert snaps back onto the base to hide the screw heads.

2432F_base1.jpg2432F_base2.jpg
 
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Nice. That looks great. Anyone try the WiFi version of this? I have one great location for one that would be best with WiFi since it is over the kitchen cupboards and there is no cat5 anywhere near.
 
The one I have is running wifi. I'm taking to my Mom's house tomorrow, and I won't be using it with Blue Iris there, but I put it on a demo version of BI, set it at 1080p, VBR, Highest Quality, and 15fps, and BI seens to have no problems, and is holding a steady 15fps and reports a bit rate of ~980 kB/s.
 
For a in-home install I went with the DS-2CD2432F-I cameras

DS-2CD2532F-I is less intrusive/obvious than the DS-2CD2432F-I imo.

I wanted to use cameras which would 'blend in' as best as possible, like a smoke detector, rather than look like obvious cameras and the DS-2CD2432F-I was the best i could find.

Something to consider.

hcam.jpg
 
Sure does look small. Is that only a 2-axis dome? My ceilings are all slanted except for a 6 inch space in the middle. And I don't have an attic so I wouldn't be able to hide the cables.

I ordered one 6mm DS-2CD2432F-IW earlier today which I will try placing in my kitchen on top of the cabinets which don't reach the ceiling. It will be facing down the hall toward the garage. This should prove to be excellent for watching the garage and kitchen where there is a sliding glass door. The existing PTZ will watch the front door area and living room window. That leaves bedroom and bathroom windows as the only other remaining points of entry, but I'm not about to put cams in bedrooms and bathrooms so it'll have to do.

I do agree these camera companies should go to more effort to make concealed cameras. But I guess IP cam technology isn't quiet small enough and low power enough yet. It seems all the hidden camera products are analog or terrible or both.
 
bp2008 said:
Sure does look small. Is that only a 2-axis dome? My ceilings are all slanted except for a 6 inch space in the middle. And I don't have an attic so I wouldn't be able to hide the cables.
Click to expand...

They are 3 axis. If you cant hide the cables i agree you're better off not using domes then.
 
bp2008 said:
Nice. That looks great. Anyone try the WiFi version of this? I have one great location for one that would be best with WiFi since it is over the kitchen cupboards and there is no cat5 anywhere near.
Click to expand...

I like my ds-2cd2432f-iw 2.8mm, wifi works great. The DS-2CD2532F-ISW looks interesting too, and I would like to to see it with a 2.8mm lens at night.


ds-2cd2432f-iw 2.8mm -wifi over my front door.

PorchAlert.20140505_115559.jpg
 
Wish I would have found the forums a few years ago before I purchased junk cameras... Though I'm still a newbie, I have learned important lessons about frame rate, camera lens, wifi vs. hard wire, POE, and passive POE....

I started out with junk cameras and wifi...worked fine and I was happy with it for a long time..then realized it was just junk and when I needed to view footage, I couldn't see anything more than blurry images and a camera frame about every 2 seconds... Now I'm streaming at between 5 and 25 frames/sec (depending on the camera) and I can read license plates on cars passing by my house. SO..moral of the story is: a little research, and a bit of advice from people such as myself, or people with much more experience than myself, and you'll save a lot of money and have a better end result.


SO, with the self admission of my limited knowledge being supplied before I offer any suggestions, take it for what it's worth... If you have a decent budget, I'd recommend the Dropcam Pro with the night vision and 130 degree lense. The reviews I've read on it seem pretty positive and the compact design will not make it stick out like a sore thumb.

good luck
 
Heh heh I think most of us started similarly.

I don't like Dropcam because it requires WiFi and isn't compatible with 3rd party tools. You have to use their subscription cloud service and put a constant load on your internet connection to boot. Can't deny they are small cameras though.
 
Guess i'll discontinue my pursuit of any dropcams... I thought (assumed) the pro version was wifi or hard wired... think I was mistaken...thanks...will save myself some trouble and ignore the reviews on the dropcams and stick with something better... I remember seeing something about the subscription to the cloud service, but didn't think it was necessary... My apologies for the misguidance regarding dropcams.


I found what I was looking for.. I was 99% sure I seen a pic of a dropcam with an RJ45 connector on the back.... What I seen was a pic of a dropcam and an Axis cam... the pic showed the back of the axis cam, with an RJ45 connector... Upon further review, I 100% agree that dropcam is NOT a product I will ever buy.
 
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I actually replaced a 2532 with a 2432, thought the image quality and IR throw was better and I really like the PIR motion detector and I can trust alerts while I'm gone are accurate. I had the Cat5 in the wall already, so the 2532 would have been an easier install.
 
bp2008 said:
Sure does look small. Is that only a 2-axis dome? My ceilings are all slanted except for a 6 inch space in the middle. And I don't have an attic so I wouldn't be able to hide the cables.
Click to expand...
Can't access the cavity between your drywall and the roof covering from above by shifting tiles / lifting roof sheets?
 
So I went ahead and ordered a 4mm Hikvision ds-2cd2432f-iw some weeks ago since I couldn't get a 6mm. I guess I just never tried the right vendor.

It arrived at the post office on Saturday and I only just discovered this and picked it up. I got the WiFi version since my access point is perhaps 20 feet away, and I though it would be fine. Of course it isn't fine. It is terrible. Only the sub stream works with any reliability probably because the cam is mounted above the oven and is therefore next to a metal vent. So I have some powerline network adapters on the way to hopefully solve this problem. I know they can be problematic too, but since I really only need this camera to work while nobody is home, I'm not concerned about unexpected noise sources appearing and kicking it off the network.

Sceenie for the curious:

 
bp2008 said:
I got the WiFi version since my access point is perhaps 20 feet away, and I though it would be fine. Of course it isn't fine. It is terrible. Only the sub stream works with any reliability probably because the cam is mounted above the oven and is therefore next to a metal vent.
Click to expand...

I'm surprised. I have 2 x 2432F cams running WiFi at 1080p, 20fps, vbr, 5120 max bit rate, and they are working great.
 
Moving the cam up a couple inches seems to have helped. It used to be that the main stream wouldn't even load (4096 max bit rate VBR Medium Quality) and now I upped it to Highest quality -- same max bit rate -- and it works much better.
 
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