I Have No Idea What Im Trying To Buy

[steptoe]

OK, cctv time for my own gaff,

but, Ive only ever installed these 'as supplied'

been looking at this and this

on the premise that its got everything ready to go [ I already have a 1TB HDD ] , and can upgrade/add some extra 700TVL cameras as and when,

or would I be better off getting something like this and then buying all the cables, cameras etc additionally?

I need probably 20' distance [on the longest range], and perhaps 20' width [which with 4 cameras the width is easily covered, I think? ]

sound? is this only ever on one camera at this price range?

I can live with that tbh, in fact, at this present time that is all I need,

Im thinking of putting one cam in the babies room as a baby monitor,,,,,,  :|

 

[OnOff]

Two threads before this......Slipshod was saying he has bought these cheap Chinese DVR's............

I'm in the same boat as you i.e. looking for a home system. Have very little experience other than talking to the odd subbie I meet on site who specialises in just CCTV. I do know one guy quite well but have never really had the opportunity to pick his brains (and ask what he does with the old cameras when people upgrade :innocent ). The long term plan is to have a big flatscreen in our bedroom upstairs and multiple cameras (thinking a 16ch DVR as I have a half acre plot with vulnerable outbuildings). At night, get an alarm (perimeter, break beam etc) and switch the TV on. Switchable to the main downstairs TV.

 

[batty]

Badgers the CCTV guy hasn't he been on lately?

 

[steptoe]

Two threads before this......Slipshod was saying he has bought these cheap Chinese DVR's............

thats what got me looking at ebay,,,,,,,,,,

 

[Richard-the-Ninth]

Your choice.

Let me share my opinion.

The Audio input, how will you listen to what has been recorded? there is no speaker (More cost) oh and what will you listen to anyway, and why would you want to listen to it? Cameras do not have microphones so you have to buy these and run a cable to listen to what?

For the baby monitor, buy a separate baby monitor much better, and you can hear when the baby cries.

The cameras offered in your 1st link are 420 lines, while this is better than what you have now, 420 is not really that good, and you will soon want to upgrade to 600 or even 720, so you will then be wasting money on cameras you don't want or need.

8 Channel DVR in your 2nd link, I don't like them, because in order to be able to see each picture at a decent size you need to have a big dedicated tv screen. (That said we have a 28 inch just for 4 cameras) Also with 8 cameras recording to one disc, the hard drive will not be able to record for that long.

I would suggest you get two 4 channel DVR's and two small monitors. much easier to look at and less hassle.

 

[steptoe]

Your choice.

Let me share my opinion.

The Audio input, how will you listen to what has been recorded? there is no speaker (More cost) oh and what will you listen to anyway, and why would you want to listen to it? Cameras do not have microphones so you have to buy these and run a cable to listen to what? see below,,,,

For the baby monitor, buy a separate baby monitor much better, and you can hear when the baby cries. have you seen the price of a decent baby monitor??????

The cameras offered in your 1st link are 420 lines, while this is better than what you have now, 420 is not really that good, and you will soon want to upgrade to 600 or even 720, so you will then be wasting money on cameras you don't want or need.  yes, I did add that I will get better cams when I add to the system, I dont need them all cracking quality

8 Channel DVR in your 2nd link, I don't like them, because in order to be able to see each picture at a decent size you need to have a big dedicated tv screen. (That said we have a 28 inch just for 4 cameras) Also with 8 cameras recording to one disc, the hard drive will not be able to record for that long. I dont intend watching it instead of TV [i dont watch much TV either] and 1 weeks recording is more than enough for me at a time.

I would suggest you get two 4 channel DVR's and two small monitors. much easier to look at and less hassle.

thanks for the input,

but, why would anyone in a domestic environment want to actually watch real time cctv is beyond me unless they are paranoid,

I can flick it to the monitor or tv if I suspect something,

 

[OnOff]

Your choice.

Let me share my opinion.

The Audio input, how will you listen to what has been recorded? there is no speaker (More cost) oh and what will you listen to anyway, and why would you want to listen to it? Cameras do not have microphones so you have to buy these and run a cable to listen to what?

For the baby monitor, buy a separate baby monitor much better, and you can hear when the baby cries.

The cameras offered in your 1st link are 420 lines, while this is better than what you have now, 420 is not really that good, and you will soon want to upgrade to 600 or even 720, so you will then be wasting money on cameras you don't want or need.

8 Channel DVR in your 2nd link, I don't like them, because in order to be able to see each picture at a decent size you need to have a big dedicated tv screen. (That said we have a 28 inch just for 4 cameras) Also with 8 cameras recording to one disc, the hard drive will not be able to record for that long.

I would suggest you get two 4 channel DVR's and two small monitors. much easier to look at and less hassle.

So.............if he DOES have a big screen TV to look at no problem with his 8ch DVR. As for hard drives you can get 4TB for under £100.

 

[Richard-the-Ninth]

steptoe:

To clarify a few points: If a CCTV camera had a microphone all you would hear is the general noise of the area it is in, that is why they don't have microphones, hence my question of what will you want to listen to.

You can get a baby monitor for less than £30.

If you meant something to watch a baby with you would have to sit and watch all the time, if you want to listen then look, you would have to buy a microphone and speakers and an amp then run in a cable, an audio baby monitor has no cables, and can be moved to what ever room you are in. (can't easily do that with CCTV)

You said that you don't mind upgrading at a later date as you don't want "cracking quality" from the start. I am trying to save you from wasting your money because 420 line cameras are not really worth bothering with and you would be better off buying something decent from the outset.

At this stage in time you say "

1 weeks recording is more than enough for me at a time."

That is today, what happens when you go on holiday for 2 weeks and an event happened in week 1? The more days it records the better.

why would anyone in a domestic environment want to actually watch real time cctv is beyond me unless they are paranoid,

I can flick it to the monitor or tv if I suspect something,

(Rhetorical Question). How will you "suspect something"

I am not saying you should watch your CCTV all the time, you just have it on "in the background" as soon as something changes in the picture you look at it. You can't do that if you are only have a TV and are watching it.

 

[Sharpend]

Senates are doing a four camera system, hd quality apparently intro price of £197+vat. Looks quite good.

 

[Richard-the-Ninth]

So.............if he DOES have a big screen TV to look at no problem with his 8ch DVR.

You really need a separate TV  /  Monitor for CCTV so that you can watch your TV programme and "keep an eye" on your CCTV

I am only putting forward my opinion. In all of the (domestic) places that have CCTV they all have a separate monitor.

A "friend" installed CCTV and watched it via the TV, not 2 weeks later they asked how mine works, they brought another TV  just for the CCTV.

Also, a point of note, if a DVR has 8 channels and you only have 4 cameras the monitor output will still show 8 "squares" (one for each input) so you would be wasting your time with a huge TV for 4 cameras using an 8 channel DVR

As for your comment

As for hard drives you can get 4TB for under £100.

That is as maybe, but of little use if it fails, and also it would help if the DVR can support it

Taken from the listing.

* Hard drive is NOT included

This item dose not come with a free hard disk in it, but it can suppert 3.5 inch SATA2.0 500GB,1TB or 2TB Hard Disk.

(NOTE: It is a direct copy and paste, the word "does" has been spelt as "dose" it is not my typo)

 

[steptoe]

Richard, I appreciate your input,

but a few things spring to mind,

1, me and the wife are NEVER away for 2 weeks at the same time, different interests make different holidays, and with movement detection then the save video life gets extended.

2, I have a 'spare' 37" tv if I was that way inclined, however it will be getting put on a 21" monitor, hopefully the 37" is going in my shed,  

3, the listing specifically states only 1 pic or 4 can be shown at any particular time [bTW, they were only examples to draw comments on] , so thank you for the comments.

4, I did say I had a 1TB HDD that I could use [due to losing the 'office to being a nursery Im having to use a file server and lose the spare office PC]

5, having 4x secondary lower quality cameras [equalling 8 cameras in total] is better than simply having 4 good resolution cameras [?]

6, I dont have every single socket in my house wired on its own spur with a failure indication just in case an MCB/RCBO trips [worst case scenario, do you connect all your cctv systems via 2 seperate UPS to each DVR? , the power might fail] power failures are more common than HDD failures imho

7, have you ever seen the quality from a sub £50 baby monitor? its worse than useless, even £100 ones are woefully inadequate, and why would I need to move it? camera in nursery, wife in living room, I dont live in a mansion, its a 3bed 2&1/2 bed ex-council semi.

8, how would I suspect something? preliminary/proximity/boundary buzzer goes off/alert sent to phone, = have a look at camera, how do you monitor your 28" TV when you are on holiday? same thing,! you dont watch it when you are on holiday, so why the need to watch it when you are at home,,,,? look at it when there is a reason.

as I said in the OP,

I was inviting opinions, all gratefully accepted,

I didnt say I was deffo going to buy one of those systems, so thank you for pointing out the shortfalls,

but, 2 seperate systems is NOT an option at this stage due to various reasons, but I do appreciate the advantages you point out, but, that then means 4 UPS systems etc etc, and 2x mega USB back up sticks as well, after all, if we are worried about HDD failure then we need to be paranoid about mains failure too, and the UPS might fail as well,,,,,,

 

[Gerrywan]

Ebay stuff is usually cheap chinese rubbish. Once you press play you will be able to see nothing of quality on the recordings.

Have you considered usuig SDI Cameras and DVR?