Looking for a poe camera solution

[staind204]

Hello. I have recently built out my network infrastructure but now i need a NVR/Camera system. Here is what im working with..

I have a TP link unmanaged switch with a port going into a 60W ubiquiti power injector. I have a cat6 coming out the injector up to the attic powering a ubiquiti flex switch. This gives me 4 POE+ ports to run cat6 to outdoor cameras i will mount to my soffits.

I want a system where i dont have to plug directly into the nvr ports for poe power. I want to plug them into my flex switch so i wont need such long runs all the way from the basement directly to the cams in the soffit. Ideally itd be cool to find a system where i can use a mix of outdoor cams on the network via my flex switch (but not directly plugged into the nvr) and indoor cams plugged directly into the NVR. Does a solution like this exist or is it all or nothing (ex all cams must plug into nvr poe ports)?

Id like a system w local storage (cloud option would be a nice bonus). I also want decent quality w night vision and motion push alerts.

I know this is a lot of info but do any cam systems come to mind that meet my requirements? Budget is roughly $500-1000 for the nvr and cams. Thanks in advance!

 

[mat200]

Hello. I have recently built out my network infrastructure but now i need a NVR/Camera system. Here is what im working with..

I have a TP link unmanaged switch with a port going into a 60W ubiquiti power injector. I have a cat6 coming out the injector up to the attic powering a ubiquiti flex switch. This gives me 4 POE+ ports to run cat6 to outdoor cameras i will mount to my soffits.

I want a system where i dont have to plug directly into the nvr ports for poe power. I want to plug them into my flex switch so i wont need such long runs all the way from the basement directly to the cams in the soffit. Ideally itd be cool to find a system where i can use a mix of outdoor cams on the network via my flex switch (but not directly plugged into the nvr) and indoor cams plugged directly into the NVR. Does a solution like this exist or is it all or nothing (ex all cams must plug into nvr poe ports)?

Id like a system w local storage (cloud option would be a nice bonus). I also want decent quality w night vision and motion push alerts.

I know this is a lot of info but do any cam systems come to mind that meet my requirements? Budget is roughly $500-1000 for the nvr and cams. Thanks in advance!

Welcome @staind204

basically all IP PoE cameras meet the standard IP specs .. how you design the IP network is up to you, as long as it meets the IP standards .. same applies to PoE standards.

So, judging on your writeup, any IP PoE camera which properly meets IP and PoE specs should work ..

For a local NVR / VMS system many members like Blue Iris running on a used PC.

For cameras most of us prefer Dahua OEM or Hikvision OEM IP PoE cameras which have larger sensors ..

 

[wittaj]

You don't say how many cameras, but that budget is tight to a little low.

How high are the soffits? Cameras installed any higher than 7 feet or so only get tops of heads and hoodies. If it is a two-story house and you put up 2.8 or 3.6mm fixed lens cameras, you will not get IDENTIFY, but they make good overview camera locations.

You need to decide what distances you want to cover to IDENTIFY and then select the correct camera based on that distance. In some instances it may be a 2MP camera.

See this thread that demonstrates this along with recommended cameras for the particular distance to be covered. The cameras recommended are all good night performance cameras:

The Importance of Focal Length over MP in camera selection

At the urging of several folks here, I created a thread to show the importance of focal length and how focal length can be more important than megapixels (MP). I mentioned some of this in the post regarding The Hookup’s latest video demonstrating different cameras, including one sold from a...

ipcamtalk.com

 

[staind204]

Thank you for the info so far. I did read the sticky on Blue Iris. Unfortunately the "old" PC I have available is a Core 2 Duo with about 8 GB DDR2. I did see the same CPU listed on "Blue Iris Update Helper" but I believe it's less powerful than even an i3 which is the minimum CPU listed in the sticky. So I'm not sure if it will work or not. I will have to do some more research on this. Ideally I'd like to get a NVR/Camera set out of the box for simplicity sake but I understand the quality may not be as good as running a PC with Blue Iris.

As far as # of cameras, I am looking to start off with 2-3 outdoor cameras. It's a 1 story house so I guess the soffits would be around 8 ft high or so. I will read through the post you linked wittaj. Thank you.

 

[wittaj]

The problem with the all-in-one box kits like Lorex or Amcrest or any of them really is that they only provide 2.8 or 3.6mm fixed lens cameras and rarely is all fixed lens of that size the right solution. Further they are usually put on less than ideal MP/sensor ratios which make night vision problematic.

We have lots of threads and members here that started with the box kit (myself included) and then after the initial "wow I can see the whole neighborhood" wears out we start to see the limitations and then start switching out cams.

 

[staind204]

As an alternative to Blue Iris, what about one of the Hikvision NVRs? Maybe something like DS-7608NI-Q2/8P 8-Channel 4K UHD NVR. im really pushing for a premade nvr so i can just throw it in my rack and forget about it. Ideally i dont want to buy a new pc just for blue iris but depending on the limitations of the 8 channel box above, i may not have a choice. I could still get some of the nicer cams in the post shared earlier. Obviously i still have a lot of research but the info ive got here already has been great.

Thanks again for taking the time to address my questions.

 

[wittaj]

That is a budget NVR limited to 80Mbps bandwidth. As you inevitably add more cameras, you will hit up on that limit.

For the price of that you could do what most of us did and buy a refurbished computer and turn off auto updates and then you have a more powerful NVR. Buy a small form factor and it isn't much larger than an NVR.

Plus with an NVR, to have the best use you would want to then match camera brands.

 

[staind204]

I missed that low bandwidth, thanks. I see an i7-6700 @ 3.40 GHZ w 8 gb ddr 4 with win 10 installed on a 1tb for under 100 on ebay. Looks to be a dell optiplex. I read through the hardware sticky which led me to that particular pc (that hardware thread is super helpful). I get the capacity varies greatly by camera but would something like the i7-6700 handle 2-3 outdoor and a few indoor cams ok? If so, i see why you recommend the PC. Even adding on the Blue Iris costs its still well under $200.

 

[DanDenver]

Get it and forget it!! That is what I did with my NVR. But what a mistake.
Quality of night time movement videos was non-existent.
And hey! No charge for all the hundreds (and over 4 years, thousands) of false alerts.
After 4 years of being very stubborn, I moved to BI and I will never repeat that mistake of holding out again.
But in my case I have notable security concerns so am happy I now have a solution that adds value to my security life, not something that just adds annoying alerts because a bunny hopped or a raccoon walked by at 2am.

I can’t count how many alerts I got in the middle of the night because a coyote walked by outside. But maybe you have zero night life and rare wind occurrences. I get both and more so I needed a better solution - though I was pretty stubborn!

 

[wittaj]

Lol people are running 50 cameras on a 4th generation CPU, so a 6th generation is more than adequate for your camera load LOL.

 

[staind204]

DanDenver great points about false alerts. Its a big reason i want a new setup. Right now i have some wireless Eufycams and id barely call them acceptable. False alerts are fairly frequent but whats worse is when they straight up miss a motion when someone comes to the door.

Does BI offer better motion alerts or is that feature/functionality all built in the cameras themselves?

Thanks for confirming wittaj. Glad i found this community as i was pretty set on a nvr/cam combo before you all enlightened me. A PC w BI for under $200 that can handle a mix of cameras sounds a lot more appealing than a crappy nvr. Wish i could rack the pc but i guess i could always install another shelf on my server rack and set it there as ive got about 6-7U free.

 

[DanDenver]

Does BI offer better motion alerts or is that feature/functionality all built in the cameras themselves?

That feature is called AI (artificial intelligence). It ‘weeds’ out the false alerts and is pretty effective.

There is no right or wrong as to whether you lean towards the AI being in the camera or in the PC.

The bottom line is that AI needs to be in your equipment chain somewhere.

For me, I choose to have the AI on the PC so I don’t have to configure each camera separately, but note I have 18 cameras.
Having a centrally located AI also allows versioning changes to be fairly straightforward.
But many prefer in camera solutions, and I read it works quite well. I just worry if todays camera platform can handle tomorrows AI improvements (Replacing 18 cameras would get pricey)

 

[Mike A.]

... Wish i could rack the pc but i guess i could always install another shelf on my server rack and set it there as ive got about 6-7U free.

Turn it on its side and you'll probably still have 3 or 4U and it will look about like an NVR would . ; )

 

[staind204]

One other point I'd like to bring up when shopping for a PC to run Blue Iris on is Windows 11 support. I'm reading a lot of the recommended PCs in the sticky will not support Win 11. So in a few years when Win 10 goes out of support, will those boxes have security vulnerabilities?

 

[wittaj]

One other point I'd like to bring up when shopping for a PC to run Blue Iris on is Windows 11 support. I'm reading a lot of the recommended PCs in the sticky will not support Win 11. So in a few years when Win 10 goes out of support, will those boxes have security vulnerabilities?

An out of support Windows computer for BI is still way more secure than a 5 year old NVR that has never been updated...Or even an NVR less than a year old LOL. NVRs rarely see firmware updates.

Keep in mind, most use the BI computer for just BI, so the risk is minimal since it isn't being used to surf the web and stuff like that. There isn't any real reason for the computer to be talking to the internet or vice versa.

You are still updating the virus protection software (which you can't do on an NVR), so it still has a level of protection.

Further, many people disable Windows updates so that it doesn't update and mess up a driver, so being out of support just makes that process easier LOL.

Folks here are still running Win7 devices for BI just fine.

 

[staind204]

An out of support Windows computer for BI is still way more secure than a 5 year old NVR that has never been updated...Or even an NVR less than a year old LOL. NVRs rarely see firmware updates.

Keep in mind, most use the BI computer for just BI, so the risk is minimal since it isn't being used to surf the web and stuff like that. There isn't any real reason for the computer to be talking to the internet or vice versa.

You are still updating the virus protection software (which you can't do on an NVR), so it still has a level of protection.

Further, many people disable Windows updates so that it doesn't update and mess up a driver, so being out of support just makes that process easier LOL.

Folks here are still running Win7 devices for BI just fine.

All excellent points, makes sense. The only thing holding me back from buying the i7-6700 i referenced earlier is it looks to be a OptiPlex 7040 SFF. From what i gather online that particular case only has room for 1 hard drive. I dont think windows would run well sharing space with the cameras on a purple drive. Ideally id like to find a pc that will hold a ssd for the OS/BI and a 3.5" bay for a purple drive.

 

[wittaj]

Many here have that unit.

That is where the magic of velcro comes in LOL.

It has three SATA ports and one M.2 socket, more than enough.

 

[looney2ns]

With a little patience, you can score an HP EliteDesk SFF I5-8500 for less than two hundred from Ebay.
I saw one yesterday that was $159, It has room for an on the board M.2 SSD, and two mechanical drives.
Runs at about 30watts.