Worlds First Review - Dahua - IPC-Color4K-X / DH-IPC-HFW5849T1-ASE-LED - Full Color 4K Camera

[steve1225]

I had an iPhone8 (released late/2017) until a few months ago ... got my wife's iPhone 13 hand-me-down when I got her the iPhone15. The price of the iPhone8 (at release) was $700 for the 64GB model. I can currently buy an iPhone15 (128GB) for $800. The low-light performance of the iPhone 15 blows away the iPhone 8 ... it's (literally) night-n-day! ;-)

If you compare between 6-8 generation old mobiles and the newest one - yes there is huge image sensor / lenses difference.

But in case mobiles there is another area which changed all mobile photography - AI.
Today mobiles can take 10-20 shots for the same picture and choose/combine best elements from them using AI.

CCTV cams and DSLR are years behind in AI and ISP technology comparing to mobiles.

I.e. take the existing 5442-S3 (with current bells & whistles), how much improved low-light performance can you get (via sensor size/technology and/or lens) for $400/$700/$1000 price points?

Here is different problem.
Both HIK and Dahua are using latest Chinese image sensors and image signal processors.

Both are a few years behind comparing to top western constructions.
Due actual China vs USA situation, Dahua/HIK will not return to using western technology for their products (due USA bans they don't have access to it).

Only western (not Chinese) companies can use latest western technology.
But theirs products (like Axis, Bosch, Motorola/Avigilon) costs 5-10x more..

 

[alekk]

As always, great info @steve1225 ... and others who have chimed in.
I appreciate the education.

 

[CCTVCam]

You comparing here Sony Full Frame (43mm so 1.7" diagonal, for comparison 1/1.8" = 0.55" and 1/1.2" = 0,83" ) 12 Mpx cam based on Mirror-less DSLR construction. Something at price 5k USD with lenses.

To 200 USD cctv camera done by Chinese company.

Very unfair...

I've made no secret of the fact it cost £5k fdor the body in all my posts above. However, unfair? No. 8 years have lapsed since and whilst that size sensor and lens may remain expensive due to the very low numbers being produced, when you look at the DSLR and phone market, some much smaller sensors with very good low light sensitivity have emerged for what must be a much lower cost due to volume. Yes CCTV is never going to get the very latest and best sensors due chip manufactureres probably wanting to keep prices and profits high - you can hardly sell into 1 market at $200 then sell to another at $30. However, as I've been at pains to point out, several low light devices have gone through several generations of these chips, which on the face of it should mean the last generation chips are no longer a threat to current flagship products and should have recovered their research and tooling costs at this point, which means further production costs should be lower giving rise to the possibility they could be produced much cheaper for the cctv market as chip manufacturing cost would be bare production only. It seems though many ccd's never cross over between market niches. Whether there are other physical restrictions to intergration I don't know.

 

[CCTVCam]

House market and SMB (small medium Businesses) are the biggest market (by both volume and sales) for both Dahua / HIK.
Of course in main (not OEMs) brands they try to sell also more profesional solutions for bigger companies.

I'd like to see proof of that. I'm pretty sure 99% of householders buy Ring, Arla etc simply because they want plug and play. Very few consumers can be bothered with time consuming and technically difficult pages of settings in NVR's and cameras.
In my own area, there's only 1 other house with commercial cameras ie Dahau / Hik. Every other home out of thousands have RIng et al. with 1 having a wireless simple set up PTZ from Amazon from some Chinese brand.

 

[steve1225]

I'd like to see proof of that. I'm pretty sure 99% of householders buy Ring, Arla etc simply because they want plug and play. Very few consumers can be bothered with time consuming and technically difficult pages of settings in NVR's and cameras.
In my own area, there's only 1 other house with commercial cameras ie Dahau / Hik. Every other home out of thousands have RIng et al. with 1 having a wireless simple set up PTZ from Amazon from some Chinese brand.

House/SMB market are the biggest for Dahua. So it means they sells more to house/SMB sectors comparing to public sector (due ban / security history) or big corporations (due VMS problem and ban).

It don't means that is more popular comparing to all other brands in all markets / countries (especially in USA).
It only means what generates cash for HIK / Dahua.

Not in USA, but World Wide. Not only as HIK/Dahua main brands, but also in all sub / OEM brands (thousands of them).

WIFI cams are popular in the USA. Not so in Europe. Brands like Ring/Arlo etc are so weak here.
If someone have a few cams over house, in 99% cases here there are POE powered and installed by alarm/cctv technician or company.

I known a few people working at Polish Dahua resellers. And I known for who they sell Dahua (HIK or other brands) products. They sell trucks loads of equipment - but 95% of that are cheap and medium models (up to Dahua 3xxx or HIK 2xxx), for installations in houses and small companies (SMBs). 5xxx (due price) are not so popular here, higher ultra models are used only for very specific big projects.

ps. Due bans, strange history of management errors and changing ownership Dahua almost don't exist in the USA now and never had big market share in USA.

But HIk/Dahua are #1/#2 in Worldwide - so Europe, Asia, Africa or South America they are strong. In last years they start losing a lot of public sector/big corporation markets in western countries - due bans/security history and big push by VMS providers to exclude HIK/Dahua.

So they start moving more into house/SMB markets and 3rd countries where public sector/bigger companies don't have a ban problem.

There is a lot articles / reports about actual state / business results of HIK/Dahua at ipvm.com (paid subscription required).

ps2. SMB - Small Medium Businesses: in Europe Small Business is one with headcount up to 50 people, Medium one in up to 250 people.

 

[David L]

Top end Axis cam model with 4/3" 12Mpx sensor from Sony and varifocal 4x lenses with normal F1.7-4.0 aperture. 2-2.5K USD price tag.

AXIS Q1808-LE Bullet Camera | Axis Communications

This powerful camera delivers outstanding 4K and ultra-high light sensitivity. It’s available with a wide lens or a tele lens. Plus, with PoE out you can connect and power an additional device.

www.axis.com

I like the POE out for second CAM...

 

[David L]

My OEM Dahua CAM identifies as a Night Light

 

[CCTVCam]

House/SMB market are the biggest for Dahua. So it means they sells more to house/SMB sectors comparing to public sector (due ban / security history) or big corporations (due VMS problem and ban).

Again I don't believe it until I see a worldwide market share anaylsis from Dahua.

This market analysis report compares the market shares of the biggest brands and projects shares going forwards. This slide is for the Asia Pacific market which is probably the biggest on the planet and shows residential purchases are currently about 30% shrinking to nearer 25% by 2030. The biggest sectors combined are Commercial, Government and Industrial (which are all non consumer).

Video Surveillance Market Size, Share | Industry Report, 2030

The global video surveillance market size was estimated at USD 73.75 billion in 2024 and is projected to grow at a CAGR of 12.1% from 2025 to 2030

www.grandviewresearch.com

Maybe in the US, residential may form a larger share due to the import / use restrictions on Chinese cameras, but I'd suggest for other markets, this report suggests residential is only a fraction of the overall market for the more commerically orientated brands.

Anyway, back to the main feature. I won't be engaging in this again so not to support diverting the topic away from the review.

 

[steve1225]

This market analysis report compares the market shares of the biggest brands and projects shares going forwards. This slide is for the Asia Pacific market which is probably the biggest on the planet and shows residential purchases are currently about 30% shrinking to nearer 25% by 2030. The biggest sectors combined are Commercial, Government and Industrial (which are all non consumer).

I repeat - house & SMB...
And even put definition of SMB - small & medium businesses - with headcount up to 250..
In Yours graph Commercial means mostly SMB.. And both residential + commercial here are the biggest parts of pie.

This graph is for Asia only. And is general - for all manufactures.
But it confirm what I said - residential (house market) & SMB are the biggest growth markets for HIK/Dahua..




If You look at world wide market share data, all other biggest companies (Axis, Bosch, Flir, Hanwha/Samsung, Avigilon/Motorala, only one exception is Uniview here) are brands which DON'T DO residential market and Small Businesses in what reasonable numbers.

Their prices are to high for those markets...

They mostly sell to Public sector (Government) & bigger companies / Industrial.
In this share pie they have 23% market shared world wide, based mostly on those markets.
They mostly do bigger projects for big money, using big network of consultants & resellers & installers.

In Western countries, thanks to the ban / campaign against HIK/Dahua, they took over almost all of these market sectors (Gov + Big corp/Indu) in last years.

So both HIK & Dahua are concentrating now on residential & SMB markets plus non Western/3rd countries (India, all Arab etc), where the ban is irrelevant.

And yes - residential (house market) & SMB are the biggest growth markets for HIK/Dahua now.. they lost other markets..

ps. if you look at this or any other world wide surveillance camera market share, you can find in google - Your consumer brands (Ring, Arlo, Nest, Blink etc) don't even exists in those reports. First - usually they are not manufactures - theirs cameras are done by big Chinese cctv manufactures (OEM model). Second their global share in cctv market is too small to be a position on those reports.

 

[MR2]

There is a huge difference in FW.
I have one with the original? 2021 fw and am able to dial it in pretty well with one very old very weak street light.
A newer one with late 2023 fw aimed at the same scene (diff angle) is so over sharpened, so much digital noise that I just took it down and am replacing with a 5442

Unfortunately the camera won’t allow upload of the older fw

actually, we've started to notice the same thing with the S2 version, anyone else had a look... might be worth Wildcat having a squiz.

 

[MR2]

ok, what I can see in Milestone with the S2 is very different (with the over sharpening issue) vs the camera's web interface, do you get the same, logged into the camera's interface it looks fine

 

[MR2]

ok, what I can see in Milestone with the S2 is very different (with the over sharpening issue) vs the camera's web interface, do you get the same, logged into the camera's interface it looks fine

ok Nailed it... almost all Dahua cam's come with a default sharpness command in ONVIF of 50 (or that's how it looks in milestone), so if whatever is connecting to the onvif is commanding 50 from the camera you get massively over sharpened, so I set this down to zero and it's now perfect.

 

[bigredfish]

Thats part of it, but I'm also getting artifacts and am unable to dial it in the same as the older fw version.

If I get time this week I'll try mounting them side by side with same settings. But honestly my minds made up. No more of the 4K/X for me until they get it fixed

 

[CCTVCam]

Thats part of it, but I'm also getting artifacts and am unable to dial it in the same as the older fw version.

If I get time this week I'll try mounting them side by side with same settings. But honestly my minds made up. No more of the 4K/X for me until they get it fixed

I have to agree. I loved the idea of a low light 8mp camera but it's been a big disappointment so far. Right from the go they seem under powered on the processing side with many features struggling. There's reliability issues as they don't like power cuts and can become uncontactable. There's a shallow dof through the use of too wide an aperture. The picture doesn't seem as resolved as the lesser 5442 4mp cameras. The picture falls apart when zoomed - something with 8mp should be able to be zoomed in further than 4mp and retain it's detail and definition, but even a slight magification of the picture using the zoom seems to produce blur and artefacts. On a mobile you can zzom right in. On a 4kt camera, even somethign a few feet behind the focal point can rapidly lose definition as you try to look closer.

I think the idea is good. The implementation leaves a lot to be desired. They're just not there. In my opinion, I think it likely needs more powerful processing / memory so theoertically every feature can be run and the camera still runs smoothly (not that most will run every one, but it should be possible for those who have extensive requirements and if it can run everything, it can certainly run less without being stretched), the image detail sorting - compression codec or chip issue? A slightly smaller aperture to give greater dof. Much less in camera compression so detail isn't lost when zooming. Better reliability and stability especially when power is lost. Maybe part of the answer is a big chip such as 2/3rds paired with a smaller aperture lens to give good low light but dof.

It's a pity that camera tech Dahua used to produce that cameras that cost £8k never really came down in price. I know 1 member on here had one and the picture was fantastic at night even in full colour. Can't remember what the ccd size was though - 35mm? I think the trouble with that particular camera is it was the latest CCD at the time and never got the economies of scale due to the pricing. Surely after all these years, there must be a viable large format CCD out there that could be used for CCTV and would gain economies of scale through being put into a mainstream reasonably priced camera. Just thinking out loud....

 

[alekk]

It's a pity that camera tech Dahua used to produce that cameras that cost £8k never really came down in price. I know 1 member on here had one and the picture was fantastic at night even in full colour. Can't remember what the ccd size was though - 35mm? I think the trouble with that particular camera is it was the latest CCD at the time and never got the economies of scale due to the pricing. Surely after all these years, there must be a viable large format CCD out there that could be used for CCTV and would gain economies of scale through being put into a mainstream reasonably priced camera. Just thinking out loud....

Well said!

 

[bigredfish]

Its fine if you use it like say @CanCuba as an overview looking say 60-100+ft away and dont expect to get a real good facial ID.
But I've got it at 20-25 ft and another at 50 ft focus distances and the closer you are to the subject (even within its narrow range) the worse it gets. (at night)

Maybe It can be dialed in better by someone else? Does anyone have examples at night, with moving humans, under say 35ft?

 

[tigerwillow1]

I guess I must have one of the lucky older 4k-x cameras. My only 2 complaints are that it doesn't see IR. and won't trigger IVS on animals. At long distances (100' to 200') it has better digital-zoomed details than my 5442s, which it should. I wonder if focal length might come into play? Mine is a 3.6.

 

[bigredfish]

Yes I have one of the older original bullets 3.6mm and its pretty decent. The two newer ones with newer fw not so much. And they wont let me downgrade fw

 

[biggen]

Well shit. I just bought a 4K-x to mount it 30’ high on a pole overlooking my business parking lot at 50’+. Noticed it had 2021 fw on it and just updated it to the latest version.

It will be providing overview with a ptz providing tracking at night on targets in the lot. I didn’t realize the 4K-x had issues. I thought it was just the 4K-t that still had DOF issues. I was going to rent a lift tomorrow to install it and the ptz on the pole.

 

[wittaj]

Well shit. I just bought a 4K-x to mount it 30’ high on a pole overlooking my business parking lot at 50’+. Noticed it had 2021 fw on it and just updated it to the latest version.

It will be providing overview with a ptz providing tracking at night on targets in the lot. I didn’t realize the 4K-x had issues. I thought it was just the 4K-t that still had DOF issues. I was going to rent a lift tomorrow to install it and the ptz on the pole.

haven't you been here long enough to know not to update for sake of updating lol.

But I think @bigredfish is referring to the new GUI (white/blue) versus the old gui (black/gold).

If you had firmware from 2021, I think that would be the old GUI? And if so that would be fine.