I thought I would document my experience With QNAP's Surveillance Station software running on a QNAP 563 NAS. This was my first time setting up a surveillance system and there were lots of unanswered questions. I decided early on not to use Wi-Fi due to my concern for privacy and the better reliably of a hard wired system. Wi-Fi would have been a lot easier to install and after spending 3 days fishing wires, I can see why it is popular.
The hardware used for the cameras was an add on to my home network and consisted of two Hikvision 2CD2333-1 3MP cameras purchased from Nelly's Security, a TP LINK TL1008SG 8 port PoE switch, and two CMVision CM-IR110 Infrared illuminators all purchased from Amazon. The CMVision illuminators are showing signs of water condensing on the inside of the glass cover plate even with its IP66 rated enclosure. I wonder how long I can expect them to last? The illuminators send out a 850 nm IR beam and work well with the cameras. The 2CD2333-1 cameras were listed in the QNAP recommended camera list and run firmware version (V5.2.0 build 140721). I didn't have the guts to try one of the newer 4 MP cameras with newer firmware because they were not on the list.
The top half of this diagram shows what I added to my home network. My family has music, movies, and homework stored on the NAS.
I went down a few blind alleys. One of the many mistakes I made was to connect both the camera and lamp to the same cable using a PoE splitter to power the lamp. The camera draws 7.5 watts with the IR on and the lamp draws 12 watts. The 40 meters of 24 gauge solid copper communication cable will not support both. I had to separately power the 12 volt lamp using the supplied 12 volt power supply. I later discovered from the 802.3af spec that it will only source 14.5 watts at the source (PoE switch).
Another mistake I made was to mount the IR lamp 1/2 meter above the camera. Rain reflected the light back into the camera. This caused continuous alarms. I then moved the lamp off to the side of the camera and am awaiting the next rainstorm to find out if it works. The constant alarms in rain may have been caused by my inexperience setting up the camera event options.
Setting up the Hikvision camera and Surveillance Station software was moderately easy. I followed the QNAP tutorial to assign the two cameras IP addresses and set up a 1.5 TB partition on the NAS for recording the images. I also set the NAS to reuse that space on a weekly schedule. The QNAP 563 that I am using has a quad channel AMD processor and five 4 TB drives. With two 3MB cameras there is no slowdown. I will be expanding the system with three more cameras.
Setting up the Hikvision cameras was/is not easy. False alarms due to cloud shadows, leaves and even the IR illuminator turning on is something I still wrestle with. At this point I am reading all threads on making these adjustments. Someday I'll figure it out.
The hardware used for the cameras was an add on to my home network and consisted of two Hikvision 2CD2333-1 3MP cameras purchased from Nelly's Security, a TP LINK TL1008SG 8 port PoE switch, and two CMVision CM-IR110 Infrared illuminators all purchased from Amazon. The CMVision illuminators are showing signs of water condensing on the inside of the glass cover plate even with its IP66 rated enclosure. I wonder how long I can expect them to last? The illuminators send out a 850 nm IR beam and work well with the cameras. The 2CD2333-1 cameras were listed in the QNAP recommended camera list and run firmware version (V5.2.0 build 140721). I didn't have the guts to try one of the newer 4 MP cameras with newer firmware because they were not on the list.
The top half of this diagram shows what I added to my home network. My family has music, movies, and homework stored on the NAS.
I went down a few blind alleys. One of the many mistakes I made was to connect both the camera and lamp to the same cable using a PoE splitter to power the lamp. The camera draws 7.5 watts with the IR on and the lamp draws 12 watts. The 40 meters of 24 gauge solid copper communication cable will not support both. I had to separately power the 12 volt lamp using the supplied 12 volt power supply. I later discovered from the 802.3af spec that it will only source 14.5 watts at the source (PoE switch).
Another mistake I made was to mount the IR lamp 1/2 meter above the camera. Rain reflected the light back into the camera. This caused continuous alarms. I then moved the lamp off to the side of the camera and am awaiting the next rainstorm to find out if it works. The constant alarms in rain may have been caused by my inexperience setting up the camera event options.
Setting up the Hikvision camera and Surveillance Station software was moderately easy. I followed the QNAP tutorial to assign the two cameras IP addresses and set up a 1.5 TB partition on the NAS for recording the images. I also set the NAS to reuse that space on a weekly schedule. The QNAP 563 that I am using has a quad channel AMD processor and five 4 TB drives. With two 3MB cameras there is no slowdown. I will be expanding the system with three more cameras.
Setting up the Hikvision cameras was/is not easy. False alarms due to cloud shadows, leaves and even the IR illuminator turning on is something I still wrestle with. At this point I am reading all threads on making these adjustments. Someday I'll figure it out.
