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    can someone advise on outdoor camera

    I am looking for recommendations for a good outdoor camera. I need it to be weather proof in New England winters, wifi, power into an electric outlet (regular 120V plug), IR night vision, and ideally compatible with HS3 and/or a QNAP NAS system I have. My goal is to monitor the front driveway, and at the very least save a couple of weeks of footage (ideally, only recording when there's motion). Better yet, I would be able to trigger HS3 actions when it detects motion. Can anyone suggest a camera that is reliable and works properly (some of the reviews I see suggest that Foscam and others drop wifi occasionally, forget their settings, lose connection, etc. etc.), and also works well with good software (not the proprietary plug-and-go stuff that comes with the cameras)?

    #2
    I can perhaps help you with the software part, having recently solved this problem myself. All seven or eight of my cameras are connected to a Blue Iris server running at my house in a virtual machine. The Blue Iris software is reasonably priced for all that it does. I have a 5TB NAS drive that I use for my storage, and that will save a HUGE amount of 720p video, especially if you only save when there is motion on the camera. You can run Blue Iris in a VM like I am, but that took some planning regarding resource consumption--especially processor-wise. If I were starting over I might just buy a dedicated cheap low-power-consumption i5 box off the shelf and use it as dedicated Blue Iris server and video storage.

    The Blue Iris plugin for Homeseer works great, and I use my cameras to trigger notifications and other events. For example, when someone comes to my front door my Homeseer speakers say "Front door motion detected" and I get an email with a picture of whatever's happening at the front door. Whenever my driveway cameras detect motion Homeseer turns on the driveway light.

    I also tried Synology Surveillance Station, which was OK--definitely better looking, but not as powerful as Blue Iris and kind of expensive. At the time, there was no Homeseer integration, which is why I switched. However, there is a new Homeseer plugin for Surveillance Station that I have not tried and that might work fine.

    Camera-wise: I went with hard-wired stuff, so perhaps different than your needs. I have several Hikvision cameras that were relatively inexpensive and that have worked great for me over the past year, both with Synology and with Blue Iris. Mine are currently powered via ethernet but can also run off AC power with a transformer. They all have infrared / night vision. I also have one cheap Amcrest indoor Wifi camera that works well. If you look at Hikvision, be sure to get the US version and not the Chinese. I bought mine from B&H Photo. They are an authorized dealer.

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      #3
      > You can run Blue Iris in a VM like I am ... If I were starting over I might just buy a dedicated cheap low-power-consumption i5 box off the shelf and use it as dedicated Blue Iris server and video storage.

      I have a small-ish Windows7 box running HS3; is it a bad idea to have Blue Iris on it as well? Is there an easy way of telling if it doesn't have enough oomph to run both?

      > The Blue Iris plugin for Homeseer works great,

      so the Blue Iris plugin in HS3 talks to the Blue Iris software running on a different machine?

      > Homeseer speakers say "Front door motion detected"

      separate question: what do you use for this - is there a dependable device with speakers that can be used to trigger sound output?

      > I also tried Synology Surveillance Station,

      any idea if this is the same thing as the QNAP Surveillance Station?


      thanks!!

      Comment


        #4
        My HS box is a dual core Dell computer. I tried running Blue Iris on it and couldn't.

        I purchased a refurbished HP Elitebook i7 laptop which I located next to my easy chair (that must show my age) and couldn't be happier. Less than $200 and wireless to my network of my HARDWIRED POE cameras. The reason I emphasize the HARDWIRED part is two fold: 1) reliability and 2) harder to hack and okay 3) power over Ethernet.

        Blue Iris works great with HS. Our front door Dahua camera, when it detects motion through pixelation changes sets the porch lights to 100% and alerts us that "Motion detected at the front door." through our AirPlay speakers.

        I went with Dahua PTZ cameras without IR because there is enough ambient light at night to still view activity. When a motion event is triggered, the lights come on. The price of each one was less than $125 and I couldn't be happier. The exception is in the garage where I have a fixed Dahua IR camera.

        Michael
        Last edited by Rvtravlr; November 26, 2016, 11:02 PM.
        Michael

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          #5
          Hi Michael. I'm really new to HS (not yet installed). But I'm writing regarding your outdoor motion sensors and cameras. If I understand you correctly, your cameras provide motion sensing rather than dedicated motion sensors?

          Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

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            #6
            Originally posted by NetworkGuy View Post
            your cameras provide motion sensing rather than dedicated motion sensors?
            I have dedicated motion sensors inside the house. I'm looking for a camera for outside, which I don't have yet (was looking for suggestions), and on this, I would also like motion sensing so that I don't take up my whole hard drive recording identical shots of my driveway with nothing happening (which is 99% of the time).

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              #7
              Using video algorithms for motion outdoors are so so.

              Here utilized Optex motions integrated with my Optex combos which worked well.

              After hours motion detection always made outside daylight which worked best with my cameras.

              You can integrate sensors today with some CCTV NVRs. (IE: Grandstream for example).

              Have a look at some CCTV forums for getting the best camera (most features) for your buck.
              - Pete

              Auto mator
              Homeseer 3 Pro - 3.0.0.548 (Linux) - Ubuntu 18.04/W7e 64 bit Intel Haswell CPU 16Gb
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              X10, UPB, Zigbee, ZWave and Wifi MQTT automation-Tasmota-Espurna. OmniPro 2, Russound zoned audio, Alexa, Cheaper RFID, W800 and Home Assistant

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                #8
                Originally posted by mlevin77 View Post
                >
                I have a small-ish Windows7 box running HS3; is it a bad idea to have Blue Iris on it as well? Is there an easy way of telling if it doesn't have enough oomph to run both?

                so the Blue Iris plugin in HS3 talks to the Blue Iris software running on a different machine?

                separate question: what do you use for this - is there a dependable device with speakers that can be used to trigger sound output?

                > I also tried Synology Surveillance Station,
                any idea if this is the same thing as the QNAP Surveillance Station?

                thanks!!
                I run both Homeseer and Blue Iris on the same physical machine. It's a fairly powerful quad-core Xeon machine with 32 GB of RAM. It's overkill for sure, especially for Homeseer, which is a very low-resource application until you start to get hundreds of devices, after which it can lag a bit. If you install blue Iris on your Windows 7 machine running Homeseer it will probably be fine, unless you intend to run several cameras at a high resolution (720P or higher) and if you intend to do image processing using Blue Iris.

                You're correct that the Homeseer Blue Iris plugin running on the Homeseer VM talks to the Blue Iris server running on a different VM.

                For Homeseer speech, I use a Sonos device connected to my home audio receiver that is wired throughout my house. Homeseer has a great Sonos plugin and all the connectivity between Homeseer and the Sonos speaker is via IP. It works great and for my application is much cleaner than having direct audio wiring to the hardware running Homeseer.

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                  #9
                  I use both Aeotec motion sensors rate for outdoors and motion (pixelation differences) on the cameras to trigger an event.

                  Michael
                  Michael

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                    #10
                    Originally posted by Rvtravlr View Post
                    I use both Aeotec motion sensors rate for outdoors and motion (pixelation differences) on the cameras to trigger an event.

                    Michael
                    Hi Michael, originally I thought I would use dedicated outdoor motion sensors (only for turning on outdoor and indoor lights). However I keep hearing that good ones are hard to find (outdoor sensors) and are not reliable. That's why the post above about using Blue Iris controlled cameras to sense outdoor motion caught my attention.

                    Anyone have a recommendation for a functional outdoor motion sensor? And what is the correct wiring for motion sensors? I suspect the same wire would be used whether indoor or outdoor motion sensors.

                    Or would a camera that detects motion work as good or better?

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Any outdoor style PIR is better and more reliable than using video algorithms to detect motion outdoors.


                      I utilize Optex here.

                      All PIR's are wired the same. 2 wires for power and pairs of wires for the NC/NO sensors. My Optex have three pairs. One pair for night/day, case and PIR.

                      Or would a camera that detects motion work as good or better?

                      No unless a PIR is integrated with the camera. There are cameras today with external connectivity for PIRs (power and switch terminals are on the camera).
                      - Pete

                      Auto mator
                      Homeseer 3 Pro - 3.0.0.548 (Linux) - Ubuntu 18.04/W7e 64 bit Intel Haswell CPU 16Gb
                      Homeseer Zee2 (Lite) - 3.0.0.548 (Linux) - Ubuntu 18.04/W7e - CherryTrail x5-Z8350 BeeLink 4Gb BT3 Pro
                      HS4 Lite - Ubuntu 22.04 / Lenovo Tiny M900 / 32Gb Ram

                      HS4 Pro - V4.1.18.1 - Ubuntu 22.04 / Lenova Tiny M900 / 32Gb Ram
                      HSTouch on Intel tabletop tablets (Jogglers) - Asus AIO - Windows 11

                      X10, UPB, Zigbee, ZWave and Wifi MQTT automation-Tasmota-Espurna. OmniPro 2, Russound zoned audio, Alexa, Cheaper RFID, W800 and Home Assistant

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Originally posted by NetworkGuy View Post
                        Hi Michael, originally I thought I would use dedicated outdoor motion sensors (only for turning on outdoor and indoor lights). However I keep hearing that good ones are hard to find (outdoor sensors) and are not reliable. That's why the post above about using Blue Iris controlled cameras to sense outdoor motion caught my attention.

                        Anyone have a recommendation for a functional outdoor motion sensor? And what is the correct wiring for motion sensors? I suspect the same wire would be used whether indoor or outdoor motion sensors.

                        Or would a camera that detects motion work as good or better?
                        I use the Aeon Labs Multisensor that is rated for outdoors:

                        https://www.amazon.com/Aeon-Labs-Aeo...sensor+outdoor

                        I do have to say, though, that the Dahua camera detection with Blue Iris is just as fast as the motion sensor.
                        Michael

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                          #13
                          Outdoors here have utilized more than PIR's to trigger CCTV events. IE: have wired sensors under driveway, aft and fore cameras, RFID, et al - driveway video is three cameras - all cams here faced other cams. (tinkering mostly with it).
                          - Pete

                          Auto mator
                          Homeseer 3 Pro - 3.0.0.548 (Linux) - Ubuntu 18.04/W7e 64 bit Intel Haswell CPU 16Gb
                          Homeseer Zee2 (Lite) - 3.0.0.548 (Linux) - Ubuntu 18.04/W7e - CherryTrail x5-Z8350 BeeLink 4Gb BT3 Pro
                          HS4 Lite - Ubuntu 22.04 / Lenovo Tiny M900 / 32Gb Ram

                          HS4 Pro - V4.1.18.1 - Ubuntu 22.04 / Lenova Tiny M900 / 32Gb Ram
                          HSTouch on Intel tabletop tablets (Jogglers) - Asus AIO - Windows 11

                          X10, UPB, Zigbee, ZWave and Wifi MQTT automation-Tasmota-Espurna. OmniPro 2, Russound zoned audio, Alexa, Cheaper RFID, W800 and Home Assistant

                          Comment


                            #14
                            Originally posted by Rvtravlr View Post
                            I use the Aeon Labs Multisensor that is rated for outdoors:

                            https://www.amazon.com/Aeon-Labs-Aeo...sensor+outdoor

                            I do have to say, though, that the Dahua camera detection with Blue Iris is just as fast as the motion sensor.
                            Any recommendation for a WIRED motion sensor (PIR)? I'm imagining all the batteries I would be replacing.

                            Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Originally posted by Pete View Post
                              All PIR's are wired the same. 2 wires for power and pairs of wires for the NC/NO sensors. My Optex have three pairs. One pair for night/day, case and PIR.
                              Unless I'm reading this wrong, I need 6 wires (3 pairs) to each PIR? I thought only 2-pair was required - 1 pair for power and 1 pair for "sensing" (NO or NC circuit).


                              Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

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