Upgrade from a Lorex LNR6108

[KLB]

Hey everyone. I've lurked around here for years, and now I need some help. I bought one of the Costco Lorex systems a few years ago. It has a LNR6108 NVR and six LNB8005-C 4K cameras. My wife has decided she wants to add 6+ cameras to our network, some wireless and some wired.

I'd like to be able to keep using the six cameras I have with an upgraded system and add new cameras where needed. Is there a path where this is possible?

 

[wittaj]

Yep, you could upgrade to a Dahua OEM NVR as Lorex is Dahua OEM, so they will work.

Suggest you reach out to our trusted vendor @EMPIRETECANDY and maybe today to take part in the last day of his sale:

2022 EmpireTech Chirstmas Sales

Hey Guys After the 2022 thanksgiving day and the black Friday sales, we are very pleased to do the sales and the lottery for fun and win some cameras. Cameras for security and fun bring us together here, make the ipcamtalk community more and more popular. So before Christmas, we will do a...

ipcamtalk.com

We would strongly recommend staying away from wifi cameras - they will fail you when you need them. They need power anyway, so either run the POE cable or use a powerline adapter to run the data over the electric lines.

 

[RavenDave]

I was in the same boat for a different reason. I had the same Lorex system. NVR died (bonus - NVR had a 2TB WD Purple drive in it). I wanted to keep the cameras, so I installed Blue Iris on an old laptop. 3 cameras were too much for the little processor. So, following guidance from this site, I bought a used HP desktop, put the 2TB purple drive in it. I added 8GB ram to 16GB. I have 4 cameras running now with single digit CPU usage (vs. 80% on laptop). (Cost= less that $200)

BTW, I am no expert at this and still have tweeks to do to the system, but it is running great so far. Folks here have been a great help.

 

[wittaj]

Yep, Blue Iris would make a great alternative as well. In fact, you could still run the existing NVR and feed the video into the BI computer and have a redundant storage component. Many here run both.

 

[KLB]

I was in the same boat for a different reason. I had the same Lorex system. NVR died (bonus - NVR had a 2TB WD Purple drive in it). I wanted to keep the cameras, so I installed Blue Iris on an old laptop. 3 cameras were too much for the little processor. So, following guidance from this site, I bought a used HP desktop, put the 2TB purple drive in it. I added 8GB ram to 16GB. I have 4 cameras running now with single digit CPU usage (vs. 80% on laptop). (Cost= less that $200)

BTW, I am no expert at this and still have tweeks to do to the system, but it is running great so far. Folks here have been a great help.

Did you have to change the image on the cameras for that to work?

 

[RavenDave]

Did you have to change the image on the cameras for that to work?

When adding the cameras to BlueIris had to code (within BlueIris) the main and substreams to work. See this link: Install on a laptop with expected results

 

[KLB]

We would strongly recommend staying away from wifi cameras - they will fail you when you need them. They need power anyway, so either run the POE cable or use a powerline adapter to run the data over the electric lines.

I know. There just isn't a good way to get Ethernet to this location. In a nutshell, I have a 80' barn. 50' beyond the barn is a shed. The wife wants cameras there to monitor her horses when they are out.

I have a circuit that runs to the outside of the shed, but I have no where on that circuit to connect a Ethernet convertor. To get an Ethernet cable out there, I would have to dig a new trench.

Since it is only for the horses, and they are only out during the day I am going to try wireless and see if it is good enough.

 

[KLB]

Yep, you could upgrade to a Dahua OEM NVR as Lorex is Dahua OEM, so they will work.

Suggest you reach out to our trusted vendor @EMPIRETECANDY and maybe today to take part in the last day of his sale:

2022 EmpireTech Chirstmas Sales

Hey Guys After the 2022 thanksgiving day and the black Friday sales, we are very pleased to do the sales and the lottery for fun and win some cameras. Cameras for security and fun bring us together here, make the ipcamtalk community more and more popular. So before Christmas, we will do a...

ipcamtalk.com

I sent an email to Andy as well.

 

[wittaj]

So there is no electrical outlet in the shed? That is what the powerline adapter connects to.

The problem with wifi at distance is that it will slow your home wifi down tremendously.

Either have an old wifi router that is not connected to the internet and the rest of your LAN just for the wifi camera or get a ubiquity nanostation to send the data by a dedicated radio frequency.

 

[KLB]

So there is no electrical outlet in the shed? That is what the powerline adapter connects to.

The problem with wifi at distance is that it will slow your home wifi down tremendously.

Either have an old wifi router that is not connected to the internet and the rest of your LAN just for the wifi camera or get a ubiquity nanostation to send the data by a dedicated radio frequency.

It is right outside, so as good as in it. My understanding was that the adapters had to connect to the same circuit. Am I wrong on that count?

 

[wittaj]

It is right outside, so as good as in it. My understanding was that the adapters had to connect to the same circuit. Am I wrong on that count?

That is what is recommended, but I have tested on different circuits, different sides of the panel, and two different panels and it worked.

Obviously there will always be exceptions but it is worth a try over wifi.

 

[KLB]

That is what is recommended, but I have tested on different circuits, different sides of the panel, and two different panels and it worked.

Obviously there will always be exceptions but it is worth a try over wifi.

Cool. I'll have to try that before I buy those cameras.

I used this as an excuse to update my wireless network, so it should be OK if I have to do that. I'd still rather not use wireless though. My preference would be to put a small POE switch out there and connect the cameras through that.

 

[wittaj]

Hopefully the powerline adapter works for your case!

In addition to slowing down the network, you will find that putting cameras on your wifi internet router will open you up to being hacked. And they are not hacking to see your video feed - they could care less about that. They use your internet for DDoS attacks and to get into your system to steal your bank account info. We have a couple of threads just this month where people are seeing connections or attempted connections due to this.

Further, you will start to notice things slowing down. Cameras connected to Wifi routers (whether wifi cameras or hard-wired) are problematic for surveillance cameras because they are always streaming and passing data. And the data demands go up with motion and then you lose signal. A lost packet and it has to resend. It can bring the whole network down if trying to send cameras through a wifi router. At the very least it can slow down your entire system.

Unlike Netflix and other streaming services that buffer a movie, these cameras do not buffer up part of the video, so drop outs are frequent, especially once you start adding distance. You would be amazed how much streaming services buffer - don't believe me, start watching something and unplug your router and watch how much longer you can watch NetFlix before it freezes - mine goes 45 seconds. Now do the same with a camera connected to a router and it is fairly instantaneous (within the latency of the stream itself)...

The same issue applies even with the hard-wired cameras trying to send all this non-buffer video stream through a router. Most consumer grade wifi routers are not designed to pass the constant video stream data of cameras, and since they do not buffer, you get these issues. The consumer routers are just not designed for this kind of traffic, even a GB speed router.

Using an old wifi router not connected to the internet or your LAN; using a powerline adapter, or the ubiquity nanostation are much better options than a camera thru your main router.

 

[mat200]

Hey everyone. I've lurked around here for years, and now I need some help. I bought one of the Costco Lorex systems a few years ago. It has a LNR6108 NVR and six LNB8005-C 4K cameras. My wife has decided she wants to add 6+ cameras to our network, some wireless and some wired.

I'd like to be able to keep using the six cameras I have with an upgraded system and add new cameras where needed. Is there a path where this is possible?

It has a LNR6108 NVR and six LNB8005-C 4K cameras



FYI - those are Dahua OEM cameras so you have a few options:

1) Dahua OEM NVR ..
2) Dahua OEM VMS software on a PC ( SmartPSS ) + PoE switch
3) 3rd party VMS like Blue Iris on a PC + PoE switch

note: you will want to note your ip addresses of the cameras as well as user / passwords

also, when adding new cameras - do look for newer models which have larger sensors. When this camera came out it was a good deal for a decent kit at Costco .. newer cameras will do better now.
( i'd move these cameras to locations where you do not need as good low light image capture and replace with 1/1.8" 4MP or 1/1.2" 8MP cameras for the key low light areas you need to watch over )

 

[TonyR]

@KLB ,
What is your geographic location?
I ask because of lightning.....

 

[looney2ns]

This is a better option.
Buy two of these, if you have clear line of sight.

https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-CPE210-300Mbps-dual-polarized-directional/dp/B00N2RO63U/ref=sr_1_8?crid=2I1UNDJFJ428U&keywords=tp%2Blink%2Baccess%2Bpoint&qid=1669755436&sprefix=tp%2Blink%2B%2Caps%2C119&sr=8-8&th=1

 

[KLB]

@KLB ,
What is your geographic location?
I ask because of lightning.....

NW Indiana.

 

[TonyR]

NW Indiana.

@looney2ns is from Evansville, In and says lightning there can be pretty fierce. I'd shy away from running CAT-5e/6 between buildings and go with a Ubiquiti Layer 2 Transparent Bridge (quick, $$$), fiber (the ultimate, $$ and takes longer) or PLA (Power Line Adapter) if there's already power run to the remote building (VERY quick, $) .

 

[looney2ns]

The Ubiquiti stuff seems to be MIA last I looked.

 

[KLB]

@looney2ns is from Evansville, In and says lightning there can be pretty fierce. I'd shy away from running CAT-5e/6 between buildings and go with a Ubiquiti Layer 2 Transparent Bridge (quick, $$$), fiber (the ultimate, $$ and takes longer) or PLA (Power Line Adapter) if there's already power run to the remote building (VERY quick, $) .

View attachment 146872

I'm going to try the PLA. I have on on the way from Amazon. If it will work, I can put a POE switch onto it and run cameras off of that