Review - Dahua SD49225XA-HNR 2MP 25x Starlight + IR PTZ AI Camera with Deep IVS & SMD Plus

Are there any problems having the PTZ lower around the 9' - 10' range? Reason being is that if I go higher there are tree branches that end up blocking the view to the sides.
 
I have it at the corner of my garage under the eve. No issues at all.
 
I have it at the corner of my garage under the eve. No issues at all.

Same here but opposite corner. I had mine above the garage but it struggled to track anyone who walked straight up to it since they would fill the image frame. It routinely lost them as they had to walk almost directly under it going to the front door. I moved it opposite side of the house and it does a wonderful job now.

With tracking you need the target far enough that it has plenty of room in front of them to keep in frame while they move. When they get so close it's just their face its, too easy for them to walk out of frame and the PTZ loses them.


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Mine works very well.
 
Same here but opposite corner. I had mine above the garage but it struggled to track anyone who walked straight up to it since they would fill the image frame. It routinely lost them as they had to walk almost directly under it going to the front door. I moved it opposite side of the house and it does a wonderful job now.

With tracking you need the target far enough that it has plenty of room in front of them to keep in frame while they move. When they get so close it's just their face its, too easy for them to walk out of frame and the PTZ loses them.


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that makes logical sense, thanks. So...do not position it in the walkway where the subject walks underneath it
 
Same here but opposite corner. I had mine above the garage but it struggled to track anyone who walked straight up to it since they would fill the image frame. It routinely lost them as they had to walk almost directly under it going to the front door. I moved it opposite side of the house and it does a wonderful job now.

With tracking you need the target far enough that it has plenty of room in front of them to keep in frame while they move. When they get so close it's just their face its, too easy for them to walk out of frame and the PTZ loses them.


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at what distance would a person hog up the image enough for the camera to get whacky? 10'? 5'?
 
at what distance would a person hog up the image enough for the camera to get whacky? 10'? 5'?

Mine is mounted under the eve on a single story so it's only a foot above their head. Delivery drivers would walk up the driveway straight towards the camera and then take a sharp turn into the sidewalk at about 5ft. Most of the time the camera would not make that quick pan.


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This is good to know. Wouldn't of thought of being too close to pan fast enough or subject taking up all of image for tracking purposes
 
It all depends on when the camera tracks them and what tracking size you use for that deep IVS (not the object size, the tracking size). For example, if you have it start tracking someone at 150 feet out and have the tracking target size at 60, then by the time they get close to the PTZ they appear to be "moving" too fast to be tracked because they consume such a large part of the image at that point.

So I have one of my closer cameras set up as a spotter cam that then "resets" the view to a wider preset and a smaller tracking size as they are now closer to the camera.

I set my neighbors PTZ up in a similar fashion - he put his on the first floor eave of the garage and guests literally walk under it to walk from the driveway to the front door and it tracks them flawlessly using this method. Once they get to a certain point on the driveway, another preset is called that "resets" the PTZ to a preset with the tracking target size of around 15 so that this can happen.
 
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It all depends on when the camera tracks them and what tracking size you use for that deep IVS (not the object size, the tracking size). For example, if you have it start tracking someone at 150 feet out and have the tracking target size at 60, then by the time they get close to the PTZ they appear to be "moving" too fast to be tracked because they consume such a large part of the image at that point.

So I have one of my closer cameras set up as a spotter cam that then "resets" the view to a wider preset and a smaller tracking size as they are now closer to the camera.

I set my neighbors PTZ up in a similar fashion - he put his on the first floor eave of the garage and guests literally walk under it to walk from the driveway to the front door and it tracks them flawlessly using this method. Once they get to a certain point on the driveway, another preset is called that "resets" the PTZ to a preset with the tracking target size of around 15 so that this can happen.

I like this idea!


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Here is the view angle from beginning of my asphalt entranceway (is only 1 way in, 1 way out for cars or humans) to my house.
And then from house to entranceway. I think around 150'-180' distance.
I am leaning towards option 5 location as catches all of front of house and can rotate to catch all side of house.
Same could be said of option 3 location too though. Hmm...
PTZ location options.jpg
Frontyard x8 2021-01-08 02.51.04.147 PM.jpg
 
@Holbs - I like the option 5 for the points you highlight; however, the area looks flat and from that location looking up to the main street - you get your neighbor parking in the driveway with a vehicle of any size and you probably are not tracking anyone coming down until they are past that vehicle. Camera at night with even a sedan in the driveway only seeing an upper torso could struggle identifying it is a person. Personally I would go higher to start tracking them walking up at the main street and count on the lower cameras to get good ID where the PTZ can't at close range.
 
@Holbs - I like the option 5 for the points you highlight; however, the area looks flat and from that location looking up to the main street - you get your neighbor parking in the driveway with a vehicle of any size and you probably are not tracking anyone coming down until they are past that vehicle. Camera at night with even a sedan in the driveway only seeing an upper torso could struggle identifying it is a person. Personally I would go higher to start tracking them walking up at the main street and count on the lower cameras to get good ID where the PTZ can't at close range.
When neighbors park in their spot, it is 99% of the time as close to front door as possible. But when visitors over, yes... it could be a rare issue. I'll put at option 5 for testing purposes. Easier to install on 6' ladder too :) Shall replace the 5442 sitting there currently.
 
Or mount it between the windows on 2nd floor from the window lol (it looks like they could open such to accommodate that lol)
 
Or mount it between the windows on 2nd floor from the window lol (it looks like they could open such to accommodate that lol)
nobody in this house but me & my mossberg shotgun :) If I put in between windows, will not be able to rotate to the side/rear of the house.
 
This seems to be the thread for help so maybe someone has another thing to try.

Main problem is very poor focus at lower focal lengths. (Pretty much until it is around 80mm or higher.)
Since the camera didn't have auto tracking, the supplier (Andy Empiretec) was kind enough to send me the firmware update which is DH_SD-Prometheus_MultiLang_PN_Stream3_V2.800.107J000.0.T.200310.
I received a ton of assistance from Wildcat1 on setting up and it is in general, incredible for the price.
So far, I have tried; All modes of focus, Lens initialization, adjusting Target tracking size, disable and enable PFA, Adjust Focus limit, Focus sensitivity, zoom speed, rebooting, etc.
I am out of ideas and it is super annoying. Someone mentioned the camera simply may be defective. I don't know and after a year of owning it, I don't think anything can be done with the supplier. Others also mentioned they do not have this issue.
Another thing to note is that I only set the camera up to auto track during daylight hours. I figured night time would be worse and it is by testing. Maybe I should save my configuration and load a different firmware to see if it is a physical failure or a software problem.

Here is a clip from today. Take note to how when it focuses, it is blurry AND nothing in the frame is in focus. I figured maybe it is focusing on a tree branch or SOMETHING but everything is out.

Hopefully a determination can be made this weekend, I'm tired of seeing crap captures.
 

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That looks great, now adjust the zoom. Just kidding, I'm new at this.
 
No that is a very good question to be fair as in if I adjust the zoom ( tracking Size ) then I find it does not keep track as much and returns home so it is either 1 or the other but not both.
Tracking Size for this test was set @25