Buying Dahua 4MP cams

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hwj77

n3wb
May 20, 2015
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Hi all,

I was initially planning on buying Hik 2032's, but since I had to delay my IP cam purchase for a few months I now see that there are some nice new options on the market.

I'm now planning to get DH-IPC-HDBW4421R's, is this a good option?

How are the Dahua nvr's, are they comparable to hikvision? Is the DH-NVR4208 the best nvr to buy as a consumer?

Finally I noticed the 'R' at the end was changed to an 'E' on the official Dahua website (IPC-HDBW4421E), I assume these are the same cams but one's a retail version or something like that?


Thanks for the help! :)
 
The Hikvision 2032 I had only lasted a few months, it died during winter. The Chinese Hikvision have H265 but don't seem to have the 0.01Lux and 120db WDR. I went with the Dahua 4421 this time.

The E may be for "Eco Savvy".
The Chinese page has the 4421R: http://www.dahuatech.com/product_list-1138.html

Instead of a NVR, depending on your requirements, a Synology NAS DS215J with Surveillance Station app would also work and could be used for other purposes.
 
Keep in mind that the dahua domes appear to be two axis and cannot be wall mounted without a mount. The new hikvision 4mp cameras should be considered, they have improved low light and night vision l look at the turret design. Synology charges 50 dollars per camera after the first two. The DS215J can also only do a total of 60fps (all cameras combined) at 3mp and 30fps at 5mp..not sure how that translates to 4mp but it will limit the total amount of cameras you can use.
 
hal9000 said:
The Hikvision 2032 I had only lasted a few months, it died during winter. The Chinese Hikvision have H265 but don't seem to have the 0.01Lux and 120db WDR. I went with the Dahua 4421 this time.

The E may be for "Eco Savvy".
The Chinese page has the 4421R: http://www.dahuatech.com/product_list-1138.html

Instead of a NVR, depending on your requirements, a Synology NAS DS215J with Surveillance Station app would also work and could be used for other purposes.
Click to expand...
Thanks the info. Have you received your 4421 yet?


fenderman said:
Keep in mind that the dahua domes appear to be two axis and cannot be wall mounted without a mount. The new hikvision 4mp cameras should be considered, they have improved low light and night vision l look at the turret design. Synology charges 50 dollars per camera after the first two. The DS215J can also only do a total of 60fps (all cameras combined) at 3mp and 30fps at 5mp..not sure how that translates to 4mp but it will limit the total amount of cameras you can use.
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I'll be hanging them from a ceiling so the axis shouldn't be an issue. I did notice that the new 4mp hikvisions are significantly more expensive than the 4mp dahua's which is the main reason I'm leaning towards Dahua atm. I can barely find any reviews or feedback about the new 4mp's from both brands which is why I just wanted to get some input before making a decision. Thanks for the info about the NAS as well, I guess an nvr will be a better option for me.
 
Thanks for the details! The Dahua 4MP also have 0.01Lux and 120db WDR like the new US version of the 4MP Hikvision. It will be interesting to see how they compare to the Hikvision. About the DS215J, it depends on the requirements and if the other features of a NAS like backup would be interesting. For someone with up to 2 or maybe 3 cameras at most, who doesn't necessarily plan to run the cameras at 4MP or need high fps, it could work. If it's 60fps at 3MP and 30fps at 5MP maybe it's about 45fps at 4MP? That would be 15fps each for 3 cameras at 4MP or 15fps each for 4 cameras at 3MP, not too bad.
 
hal9000 said:
Thanks for the details! The Dahua 4MP also have 0.01Lux and 120db WDR like the new US version of the 4MP Hikvision. It will be interesting to see how they compare to the Hikvision. About the DS215J, it depends on the requirements and if the other features of a NAS like backup would be interesting. For someone with up to 2 or maybe 3 cameras at most, who doesn't necessarily plan to run the cameras at 4MP or need high fps, it could work. If it's 60fps at 3MP and 30fps at 5MP maybe it's about 45fps at 4MP? That would be 15fps each for 3 cameras at 4MP or 15fps each for 4 cameras at 3MP, not too bad.
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I have not seen video of the new dahua 4mp....take the lux rating with a huge grain of salt...you can use them to compare cameras of the same brand but not to compare two different brands as they have different testing methods. For example this dahua 3mp http://www.dahuasecurity.com/products/ipc-hdw4300c-620.html
camera is rated at 0.01 lux but is not very good in low light conditions (where there are no reflective surfaces for the IR to bounce off of. This is true of all specs...you cannot take them literally.
As far as synology, its ok for a couple of cams..the biggest downside for me is the lack of real time monitoring..you need to use another device to stream video.
 
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I guess I'll delay my purchase for another 3-4 weeks until the Dahua and Hikvision 4MP's can be compared. Any idea whether the Hikvision 4MP price will drop in the coming weeks? Maybe they're in short supply which is driving up the price.
 
hwj77 said:
I guess I'll delay my purchase for another 3-4 weeks until the Dahua and Hikvision 4MP's can be compared. Any idea whether the Hikvision 4MP price will drop in the coming weeks? Maybe they're in short supply which is driving up the price.
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The us versions of the 4mp hikvisions are available for 140-150 with three year warranties. That is very reasonable for what it is. The images in the 4mp hikvision thread show that the low light and night vision has improved with the 4mp...You can get the dahuas for about 100 via ali, but no warranty. You can buy one of each and test them..
 
I live in Europe, and in EU shops I've seen prices for the hikvision 4mp bullet cams start at 250$+, which way more than the cam is worth imo.

On ali the hik domes sell for around 130$ which is reasonable, but the Dahua 4mp's sell for around 90$ which is quite a difference when you're ordering 8 camera's or something. On the other hand if the hikvision's are significantly better I wouldn't mind paying the extra $$ but I just want to have all my cams from the same brand.

I guess the best course of action would be to wait a couple weeks until the two can be compared.
 
A semi-unrelated question: I was looking at the Hikvision DS-2CD2142FWD-I and noticed that it had an SD-card slot. Can the SD-card be used to backup the footage before it gets sent to the NVR? Or do you have to choose between NVR or SD-card
 
hwj77 said:
A semi-unrelated question: I was looking at the Hikvision DS-2CD2142FWD-I and noticed that it had an SD-card slot. Can the SD-card be used to backup the footage before it gets sent to the NVR? Or do you have to choose between NVR or SD-card
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They can be used simultaneously....many dahua cameras have this feature as well..its a shame that the hikvision turrets do not have an sd card slot as they are superior to the domes and bullets.
 
That's a pretty great feature, I've been thinking of solutions to burglars simply taking the nvr HDD with them and this would be a great solution.

4mp @ around 20-25 fps good quality triggered by motion detection (outdoors so probably triggered often), would you recommend 16GB or 32GB sd-card? It would only need a few days of backup since this is for a worst case scenario.
 
hwj77 said:
That's a pretty great feature, I've been thinking of solutions to burglars simply taking the nvr HDD with them and this would be a great solution.

4mp @ around 20-25 fps good quality triggered by motion detection (outdoors so probably triggered often), would you recommend 16GB or 32GB sd-card? It would only need a few days of backup since this is for a worst case scenario.
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SD cards are cheap so you might as well get the largest the cameras supports...i think its 64gb but maybe 128...check the specs..The larger cards should in theory last longer as well since its overwritten less often.
The storage capacity is not dependent on megapixel count or fps...the only thing that affects storage is the recording bitrate. 32 should be sufficient for a few days of motion detection with average settings and an average environment.
Note a similar effect can be accomplished by hiding an NVR somewhere else on the network.
 
You're right, I didn't realize how cheap SD cards got.

So I guess I'm leaning toward the Hikvisions in this case. Thanks a lot for your help!
 
fenderman said:
I have not seen video of the new dahua 4mp....take the lux rating with a huge grain of salt...you can use them to compare cameras of the same brand but not to compare two different brands as they have different testing methods. For example this dahua 3mp http://www.dahuasecurity.com/products/ipc-hdw4300c-620.html
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Hopefully the 4MP have a different sensor, the 4300 is a bit older and didn't have the 120db WDR, I hope the 0.01 is real this time, or at least in the same league as the new 4MP Hiks.

hwj77: There's a version of the Dahua 4MP you were looking at with a SD card slot: 4Mp IPC-HDBW4421R-AS, but maybe that's already the one you were looking at.

I went with Dahua now because I wanted to replace the camera but if the 4MP Hik turn out to be better in low light I'll sure get one. An advantage of the NAS is that it's not limited to one brand of camera.
 
Thanks for that hal9000, I completely missed that one. I hope that the price of the Hikvisions will drop in the coming month since the 4mp Dahua seems like quite a bargain at 90$ compared to 140$ for a 4MP hikvision on ali, even if it's slightly inferior.
 
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