Recommendations

[CDC Dave]

I have an indoor Foscam wireless FI9821P and have problems with night vision.
I need recommendations for a great indoor wireless camera.
Any info would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

CD Dave, Retired

 

[nayr]

Nobody makes a great camera thats also wireless.. those two features are mutually exclusive.

 

[fenderman]

nayr makes a good point, however, there are some decent wifi cameras, but they will never be 100 percent reliable...
What is the problem with your night vision now?

 

[CDC Dave]

See attached

 

[nayr]

yeah, your pointing a light at a window and getting a reflection... did you expect some other result?

no camera is going to work at night in that situation.. put the camera outside and it will work fine.

 

[CDC Dave]

I have an old Wilife/Logitech camera that has a suction cup for the inside of the window with night vision and it works.
This Foscam is listed on the box for inside.

 

[nayr]

your old logitech camera is just a low lux camera and not night vision, there is a huge difference.. for cameras to get close to the same detail as day-time they use Infrared lights that are not visible to human eye but are visible to the camera.. this is what you'd call "Night Vision".. Low lux is sensitive to very low lighting levels, and relies on ambient lighting.. they wont work in total darkness and still give pretty poor results without supplemental lighting.. Its very difficult to maintain low light capabilities as resolution increases, your old camera with standard def is likely going to perform better at night without IR lighting than any affordable HD camera you'll find on the market today.

many people have put foscrap outside and it lasted fine, but ideally an outdoor camera would be more suitable.. you can get a nice ethernet powered 1080p camera with metal housing good to -20F that produces an image many times better than that foscam for about the same price you paid.

 

[fenderman]

You should be able to disable the ir light in that camera....
This is a much better option though, that will also allow you to disable the ir..http://www.amazon.com/LaView-LV-PC902F2-W-Detection-Motion-Wireless/dp/B00PKO52B8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1436736584&sr=8-1&keywords=laview+panda
But ultimately just mount an outdoor camera properly..

 

[CDC Dave]

What manufactures' indoor night vision cameras do you guys utilize?

 

[fenderman]

What manufactures' indoor night vision cameras do you guys utilize?

the camera i linked to above by laview is a rebranded hikvision
Nellys has a similar model here http://www.nellyssecurity.com/cameras/hi-def-cameras/ip-cameras/2-mp/hikvision-2cd2420f-iw-2mp-indoor-ir-wifi-cube-camera-2-8mm.html
They will blow the foscam out of the water. Keep in mind that if you point it out the window you will need to disable the IR.

 

[nayr]

we use indoor cameras to look indoors and outdoor cameras to look outdoors, so it dont matter what camera as they all will work the way they are intended.

the only cameras that are designed to look through another window are really Dash Cameras, they come with a polarized filter that reduces reflections from the window and rely on the headlights for any decent night capability.

 

[MartyO]

nayr makes a good point, however, there are some decent wifi cameras, but they will never be 100 percent reliable...
What is the problem with your night vision now?

I think if you want highly reliable wifi (where up time trumps everything else) then you must consider two things.
1) Who makes the camera, if its a company that also makes wifi routers and has a serious product line (shows commitment to wifi cameras) then they will have most reliable WIFI.
2) you gotta tone down your resolution and frame rate ego, use settings that will be reliable.

 

[nayr]

you cant use highly reliable and wifi in the same sentence when I can knock any wifi camera off any wifi network with an app on my phone... and thats just one attack vector.

I could setup an access point with the same name as yours, then knock your cameras off your network and have them attempt to connect to mine... when they do they will gladly tell me your WiFi password so I can man in the middle your IP Cameras.. not only will I have your whole lan owned I can see all the video streams leaving the camera without any need for authentication.

WiFi is for chumps whom dont have the skill to run a lil bit of ethernet cable..

 

[MartyO]

you cant use highly reliable and wifi in the same sentence when I can knock any wifi camera off any wifi network with an app on my phone... and thats just one attack vector.

I could setup an access point with the same name as yours, then knock your cameras off your network and have them attempt to connect to mine... when they do they will gladly tell me your WiFi password so I can man in the middle your IP Cameras.. not only will I have your whole lan owned I can see all the video streams leaving the camera without any need for authentication.

WiFi is for chumps whom dont have the skill to run a lil bit of ethernet cable..

Sometimes WIFI is a credible choice, and some companies know how to do it. Do you ever use wifi on your mobile, if so join the chump crump crowd.

 

[nayr]

my mobile is battery powered, mobile, and able to authenticate with my WPA2-TLS wifi network (not susceptible to MiTm attacks)... they also are not required to be on the WiFi for my safety and security.

a camera is none of those things, I havent seen one that will work with WPA2-TLS, they are not mobile as they are installed at fixed locations to never move, and you have to run a wire to get power to the camera regardless.. so yeah anyone using anything as insecure and unreliable as WiFi for security cameras is a total chump.

I know how to do WiFi, my company produces more wifi hardware than anyone else.. and I will never allow anyone to put security services on the wireless.

 

[MartyO]

my mobile is battery powered, mobile, and able to authenticate with my WPA2-TLS wifi network (not susceptible to MiTm attacks)... they also are not required to be on the WiFi for my safety and security.

a camera is none of those things, I havent seen one that will work with WPA2-TLS, they are not mobile as they are installed at fixed locations to never move, and you have to run a wire to get power to the camera regardless.. so yeah anyone using anything as insecure and unreliable as WiFi for security cameras is a total chump.

I know how to do WiFi, my company produces more wifi hardware than anyone else.. and I will never allow anyone to put security services on the wireless.

Cameras can have many uses, Wifi is an excellent option for a camera. It would be stupid to eliminate the wifi option for cameras, do you disagree?

 

[MartyO]

Hey nayr, for the uses of cameras for security, I think there are many different levels of security, are you saying WIFI cameras should never be used for any level of security?

 

[nayr]

that is exactly what I am saying.. If your setting up a WEBCAM to watch your dogs while at work or your baby sleeping.. then go for it.

There is only 1 form of Wireless Authentication (WPA2-EAP-TLS) that is still standing and secure, and not a single wireless camera supports it.. and its still susceptible to RF jamming like all wireless devices.

Wireless in general has very little business securing anything.. Got a home security system with all wireless sensors? did you know I have a $30 hand held radio that is more than powerful enough to completely jam out all your sensors? and its completely legal, your system has to accept the interference by law and since I hold a license for the frequencies its operating on I can output 100x more power than any of your devices are capable of.

Now if your not serious about security and just want ineffective theatre, like what the TSA provides.. then slap up a bunch of fake cameras and dont even bother hooking wires up to em.. im sure a blinking red LED is all you need.

 

[MartyO]

that is exactly what I am saying.. If your setting up a WEBCAM to watch your dogs while at work or your baby sleeping.. then go for it.

There is only 1 form of Wireless Authentication (WPA2-EAP-TLS) that is still standing and secure, and not a single wireless camera supports it.. and its still susceptible to RF jamming like all wireless devices.

Wireless in general has very little business securing anything.. Got a home security system with all wireless sensors? did you know I have a $30 hand held radio that is more than powerful enough to completely jam out all your sensors? and its completely legal, your system has to accept the interference by law and since I hold a license for the frequencies its operating on I can output 100x more power than any of your devices are capable of.

Now if your not serious about security and just want ineffective theatre, like what the TSA provides.. then slap up a bunch of fake cameras and dont even bother hooking wires up to em.. im sure a blinking red LED is all you need.

I think there are many uses for wifi cameras, and many levels of security. sure the cameras can be jammed, cameres can be shot dead, wires can be cut ect ect , a drone could drop mud on them. All events like this are also alarms.

 

[nayr]

yeah but when your video feed goes down all the time because its on wifi and you just grow to accept that fact that it happens you'll never take an alarm seriously if someone does take out the camera..

when its wired and has 99.9999999% availability, my video feed dropping out it will trigger an alarm that I will take very seriously.

Mores Law applies to everything, if you allow a 1% window of downtime.. you will be victimized in that 1% window, safety and security is not the lottery, dont gamble or you will loose..

I've had an alert on my mailbox opening for a good while now, triggers my PTZ zoom in and get a perfect shot from dead on.. guess what? I just missed the only unauthorized access in tens of thousands of hours of runtime, because I was moving my video storage to a new computer.. was not recording for a half hour tops for the first time in over 6 months, since the last reboot of my video recorder.. the camera was still online and so was the alarm system, so I saw the guy on the monitor when the camera turned and zoomed in on the mailbox.. but the money shot was not saved.