UK Advice Appreciated for New Home (CCTV)

[Smokey]

Hi all,

I am eagerly awaiting the purchase of our new house and wondered if any experts could lend their ear for some advice on CCTV?

As this will be our first detached I am taking the precaution of installing an alarm and are also very interested in the possibilities of a CCTV system. Having read very little on the subject I have been swayed by products like the Arlo Pro for its ease of setup etc, however I understand from my experience in other areas these “off the shelf” solutions can have a lot of compromises so I thought I would ask what you would do?

I am having the house mostly re-wired in a couple of weeks, however would ideally like a system that is “idiot proof” so both my wife and I can understand what we are doing. Ideally it would be wireless as in particular we have a very long garden and I would like to install a camera at the end for now and it has no power down there at present. Obviously if you advise wired is the only way to go then so it shall be but I would be interested in hearing your thoughts as I would have thought with technology the way it is now some decent wireless options would be available.

Anyhoo, I have listed below the ideal options but await some expert advice and would appreciate any input:

Budget; up to £1000

Use; Security and the monitor kids in long garden

Wired/Wireless; ideally wireless but open to guidance

Cameras; Front drive, rear door, side gate, garden (probably 4 in total)

DVR an option but RE the wireless preference is there a cloud option?

 

[Tara Brown]

Hi, thank you for your enquiry.

Our best selling brand is HikVision who offer a wide range of options for users, at good value for money, hence their popularity.

The first thing to address is that there are very few wireless options and they are not truly wireless as they will need to be connected to a power source and as IP cameras can use Ethernet cable to transfer both power and data, many people do not use the wireless functionality. In addition, there are no outdoor wireless cameras available from HikVision. You can run cable up to 100m and some of the outdoor cameras available can see 30m+ in the dark thanks to built-in infra-red LED's.

Our best selling camera and most popular choice for outdoor applications is the turret camera.
Why we love turret cameras:
1. Flat faced dome - fewer problems due to rain with flat glass (you can also sometimes experience slight distortion from a camera looking through a dome cover)
2. Two windows - the camera/lens and the infra-red LEDs are behind separate windows, so there is no danger of internal IR LED reflection, which is often a problem within domes
3. Because the IR LEDs are behind a separate window they are able to use stronger IR (EXIR) LEDs to see further in the dark
4. The full range of fixed lenses are available in the turret body style; 2.8mm (90° horizontal field of view), 4mm (60°), 6mm (45°), and 12mm (30°)
5. No problems with spiders; the warm IR LEDs are behind a separate window from the camera/lens; there is no lip above the camera/lens for them to attach their web
6. Compact size - good aesthetics for mounting on your property
7. Good adjustability - to view where you need to
8. Bracket options that allow you to fix it on a ready-made base or a wall-mount arm (which can be further adapted for pole or corner-mounting) - the bracket options are shown in the Frequently Bought Together section on each product's web page
9. POE-ready, with an option to use a 12V DC PSU if you prefer
10. IP66 rated (fully weatherproof)
All of which make it our GoTo camera for applications where you are not overly concerned about tampering and don't need to see further than 30m in the dark

We have a demo video on our YouTube.

If you are not going to add any more than 4 cameras to the system then you would be able to choose a 4 channel NVR, however if there is the possibility that you may add additional cameras in the future then you would want to future proof your system and choose a larger one, as you cannot add more cameras than channels to an NVR. HikVision offer 4, 8, 16, 32+ channel options.

We recommend the DS-7604NI-K1/4P for 4 channel systems. For more information on why, please see this forum post.

As for ease of use, we sell HikVision every day and in comparison to sales we get very few customers return for help. However we do have a thorough guide on our forum called the Megathread which is designed to help new users with the entire setup process. And of course we are here to support all of our customers with any post sale enquires and technical support.

Hope this is helpful! Do let us know if we can help with anything further.

 

[Daniel92]

Hi,

I have tried something new to what I was used to. A small wireless camera which does the job (for me). I have brought 4 and so far so good, it sends live feed to my mobile phone aswell as storages footage on the sd card.

Anyway, here is where I was able to get mine. Good price and the quality is pretty decent for such a small device.

Wireless Mini Security Camera With Night Vision Motion Detection™

◎Mini Hidden Camera: This mini camera is portable and pocket hidden, which makes it perfect as a wireless home security camera or a housekeeper/nanny camera/baby monitor with camera for recording both snapshot picture and videos without attracting any attention.

bit.ly

 

[macman]

@Smokey, I have a couple of wireless cameras in non-critical situations and I like them for their flexibility and ease of use, especially in awkward locations. But I wouldn't recommend wireless for any serious monitoring - eg of burglars, children hurting themselves, etc - because there's always a time lag of 2-3 seconds between the event happening and you receiving the notification, and in many cases that's too long. Wi-fi is also a variable signal which can sometimes drop out/disconnect, which you definitely don't want when your children's wellbeing could be at stake.

I would bite the bullet and run some outdoor POE cable into the garden, either in a trench or tacked to a fence. POE cameras are more complicated to set up than wi-fi ones but once set up, they are easy to use, much more reliable and should cut your lag to under a second.

And if you want to continuously monitor the children in the garden, wireless cameras aren't really an option because their batteries are set to terminate the live feed after a few minutes and they have to be re-activated. A POE feed can play all day long in whichever rooms you choose.