Little new around here and to the camera game as a whole -- but looking for some advice! I'm torn between a couple different cameras, and this is one of them.
First off, I really only have the need for overview cameras. I know this sounds strange, but I am in a townhouse directly on the sidewalk/street in front, with an access street behind where the garage is. I'm a center unit and only have about a 20-30 square foot area both in front and behind that I am maintaining visual custody of. As such, my IDENTIFY range will be, at most, 3-6m. Anything a little beyond that is a bonus but the community I live in has their own camera systems, maintained by the metro district, with LPR+ at all entry and exit roads/sidewalks, and has a history of making recordings available to homeowners/LEO to support investigations. So, I care more about RECOGNIZE in the 7m+ range, like on the street for passing cars.
Lighting conditions at night are average. There are streetlights out front, but none within about 50m of my door. I keep my porch light on at night (100w equivalent LED at around 4500K), and have a similar light behind the garage. Neighbors behind the garage also have lights, but they would, much like the distant streetlights out front, provide backlight and ambient illumination, and will not be directly helpful. I do NOT want to use built-in warm LEDs, even if the camera I end up getting has them -- both to not call attention to the cameras at night, and also to not attract bugs. Plus, my neighbors wouldn't like it. However, the ability to either fall back to IR if no light is present or activate built-in LEDs wouldn't be unwelcome, like during a power outage, etc -- my cams and NVR are battery backed with about 2hr offline runtime capability.
I have POS Reolink RLC-811A cams up now (I know...I got them for $25/ea secondhand and was budget constrained in initial setup) and want to get something better. I have a decent doorbell camera that I will not be replacing. Sweet spot for my desired FOV is between 2.7-4.3mm, mounted and replacing the Reolink cams.
I'm torn between the 5449T1 in this thread, the Color4K-X, and the T54IR-ZE-S3. Presence of indirect/background lighting with limited foreground illumination makes the 5449T1 very attractive to me, especially with the sensor upgrade on the new hardware revision. Two-way audio and mic quality are pros of both the 5449T1 and the Color4K-X, but I'm concerned about the light performance of the Color4K-X in my situation, even with the 1/1.2 sensor. Neither are varifocal however, which is a big negative. The T54IR-ZE-S3 checks nearly every box save for worse color low light performance than the 5449T1 and no two-way audio. I'm not a pixel snob and will happily go with a 4MP sensor for improved light performance.
As an aside, my dream camera would probably be a new version of the 5449T1 that is varifocal; the fact that it isn't is probably the only reason I haven't pulled the trigger on a pair already. This camera but varifocal, and upgraded to a 1/1.2" 8MP color shooter with the new 1/1.8" 4MP IR shooter would be the bees knees.
Any thoughts all? Appreciate anyone who takes the time to read the above and respond!
