UK Dahua camera suppliers

[Jagradang]

New to the forum, although i have been reading the great posts from this forum for a long time.

I'm looking to setup a security system at my house and have been trying to make the dificult decision between, Hikvision, Dahua and blue iris as NVR / Hikvision, Dahua as cameras (and the various combination of these.

Based on cost, a blue iris system will be a lot more pc sub £350, blue iris, 4tb HDD, 8 port Poe switch then windows maintenance. So i think i've decided on the follow (unless someone here advices otherwise)

i'm looking at a Dahua NVR (8 channel POE) and 3x dahua IPC-HDW5231R-Z cameras. (for now, will add maybe 2 camera at a later stage). But really struggling to find a descent (non-chineese) supplier for Dahua.

so the question:
- is there a UK supplier or a rebrand of the dahua IPC-HDW5231R-Z camera
- whats the best 8 channel NVR to go with this setup
- should i not go with the NVR and pay the extra to just get a Blue iris setup
- Could i get the 8channel Hikvision recorder and just buy these camera?

Any help really appreciated!!

 

[Arjun]

Almost everyone here on the forum is content purchasing directly from Andy.
I find having NVR is a better option; it becomes a dedicated surveillance system and the hardware was designed for one task in mind -- surveillance.

 

[looney2ns]

New to the forum, although i have been reading the great posts from this forum for a long time.

I'm looking to setup a security system at my house and have been trying to make the dificult decision between, Hikvision, Dahua and blue iris as NVR / Hikvision, Dahua as cameras (and the various combination of these.

Based on cost, a blue iris system will be a lot more pc sub £350, blue iris, 4tb HDD, 8 port Poe switch then windows maintenance. So i think i've decided on the follow (unless someone here advices otherwise)

i'm looking at a Dahua NVR (8 channel POE) and 3x dahua IPC-HDW5231R-Z cameras. (for now, will add maybe 2 camera at a later stage). But really struggling to find a descent (non-chineese) supplier for Dahua.

so the question:
- is there a UK supplier or a rebrand of the dahua IPC-HDW5231R-Z camera
- whats the best 8 channel NVR to go with this setup
- should i not go with the NVR and pay the extra to just get a Blue iris setup
- Could i get the 8channel Hikvision recorder and just buy these camera?

Any help really appreciated!!

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Keep the brand of the NVR and the cams the same for less headaches.

BlueIris will stomp the pants off of an NVR.

This is the cam to beat: Dahua Starlight Varifocal Turret (IPC-HDW5231R-Z)

 

[Jagradang]

Thank you for the replies. I do really want the blue iris setup but it will work out to atleast 3 times the price.

Nvr without hdd is around 150gbp,
blue iris will be 400gbp pc + 130 for poe switch but 70 for blue iris (without hdd) so around 600gbp

So in comparison it's alot more pricier and the maintenance is also alot higher.

I think the Nvr route and that camera will be best for me based on price. Unless I can find a cheaper PC setup.

 

[Jinx]

Hi Jag, I'm a newbie here too, I started looking to replace an old system and jumped in to buying a couple Hik,s and a synology drive without doing enough research really.
I found this place before the Hik's arrived and began to regret my impulsive buy but I have now got the system running and it's not bad so it may be an option. I used 'goldenstarmall' on eBay for Hik's and they appear to be real UK versions (although I'm probably easily fooled due to lack of knowledge).

I have now ordered a dahua from empire, which should arrive this week and have won a bid on a cheap optiplex (suspiciously cheap so we will see).

What I don't get is the ability of the Synology may be limited compared to BI but it's very impressive for a crappy processor when BI needs almost top of the range processors. The cheap dell deals are much harder to get here I think but dell UK do do some, ~£450 iirc for a couple year old i5.

 

[Jagradang]

totally agree, reading alot of posts from users talking about the 'cheap dells' for BI. But there far from cheap in the UK making it difficult to justify starting out on the BI route. I decided the Dahua cameras are the ones to go for but still in the air over whether to blow the money and get BI setup or go for the much cheaper option on dahua NVR.

Looking at procing difference it seems to be £300 (dahua nvr + 4tb hdd) vs £800 (for basic BI setup going well into £1000 for a descent new setup)

 

[aristobrat]

What I don't get is the ability of the Synology may be limited compared to BI but it's very impressive for a crappy processor when BI needs almost top of the range processors.

Here's how all of that shook out for me:

Dahua cameras have Motion Detection capability (a feature that can trigger recordings on pretty much any 3rd-party device, to include Synology and Blue Iris). The problem with Motion Detection on cameras (in general, this isn't just a Dahua thing) is that no matter how well you try and tune it, you're almost guaranteed that it will have a lot of false alerts.

Dahua cameras support a more advanced form of motion detection called IVS. IMO, this can be relatively easily tuned to reduce the number of false alerts, but ... right now, it can only trigger recordings on Dahua equipment (like their NVRs). Neither Synology nor Blue Iris see these events, which really sucks, because my experience with IVS on my Dahua Starlights was that it was about as close to perfect as could be --- minimal false alerts.

Both Synology and Blue Iris let you do motion detection in their software, instead of on the camera. I tried this with an older 1-bay Synology NAS, hoping it would have less false alarms than when doing it -. Never found out -- the Synology processor couldn't handle doing motion detection (on the NAS) for just one camera without slowing down the entire NAS to being unusable.

Blue Iris has some pretty advanced motion detection options. You can draw multiple zones on one camera, and even specify to only trigger alerts based on the order of zones something crosses, etc. All sorts of bells and whistles ... it's pretty awesome, but does require processor usage. I'm running seven cameras (see my signature below) all with Blue Iris motion detection on a 2012 i7 processor and it CPU usage is 10-15%. So I would say that would run fine on a modern i5 "not top range" processor.

As good as BI Motion Detection is, I still get false alarms on sunny days when puffy white clouds quickly pass over, creating shadows that roll across the lawn. Never had that problem with using IVS directly on the Dahua cameras. Hopefully one day Blue Iris will be able to support that!

 

[Jinx]

Wow, Thankyou for that reply, very helpful!

I have just today received my HP elitedesk from eBay, I was sceptical but so far, so good and won at £170. Although it's only the i5-6500, all i7s I saw were much higher, even several generations earlier.
I have BI trail installed and running but CPU is mid50% with just 2 cams. I haven't optimised anything yet and not sure I can in trial version?

My Synology 216j is using its own motion detection which is working ok on both cameras, it does trigger false but I'm not too worried yet, I'm certain BI will improve this and hopefully they will use the Dahua features as you mention. No issues with useablity, CPU usage jumps high when live viewing etc but works fine so far, it is dedicated to SS.

 

[aristobrat]

I haven't optimised anything yet and not sure I can in trial version?

I think you can. Give it a shot! The biggest one is enabling "direct to disc" for each camera, as that stops BI from re-encoding from one format to another.

Optimizing Blue Iris's CPU Usage

 

[Jinx]

Very strange, it allowed me to enable, CPU dropped for a short duration down to high 20s then reverted right back up, still enabled but not working!? The note in the link does say it doesn't work on demo but I can certainly enable it.