Home Security Camera Systems

Keeping your home secure is not necessarily high on all homeowner’s lists. So many people neglect their home security and simply carry on, burying their head in the sand thinking it will never happen to them. Can you be so sure you will never get broken into and have all of your personal possession, heirlooms and family treasures stolen, lost forever? Now is the time to act – before it’s too late.

Improving your home security will give you the confidence and peace of mind that your home and family will be safe from intruders. One of the ways to significant improve your home security is by installing a home security camera system.

There are many different types of security camera for all kinds of different applications. They range from night vision to outdoor weather-proof – to remote control, fixed, dome and bullet cameras. Some have tilt and/or zoom capability so are ideal if you a constantly watching the images.

Security camera systems are so much cheaper these days and far more sophisticated. Gone are the days of recording onto video tape where playback took hours to view as and tape took up lots of room around your home. These days a DVR (Digital Video Recorder) is now a direct replacement for video based systems. So what is a DVR and what does it do?

A DVR system will digitally record the images from your home security camera system and can store them on a dedicated box that comprises of a large hard disk, much like your computer for storage of the images. A DVR can also offer simultaneous recording and access to live video feeds and playback of recorded images. The typical DVR security system requires a personal computer and some form of hard disk storage or either a RAID or high capacity storage system. Choose from a single, 2, 4, 8, 16 or 32 channel device. This is the number of cameras that can be simultaneously connected to the DVR. Most homes would only use a 2 or 4 channel DVR but if have business premises then a high multi-channel DVR will be invaluable.

The next generation home security camera is the NVR (Network Video Recorder). The main difference between a DVR and NVR is the type of signal that is received from the camera to the storage medium device. DVR use analog signals from analog cameras and decode them digitally within the DVR whereas a NVR receives signals that are already digitally encoded by the cameras. So why are NVR’s better?

The big advantage of NVR based architecture is that they can be located anywhere on a network. NVRs record and replay simultaneously, and recordings on any one machine can be remotely viewed by a number of authorized operators spread across the network simultaneously, all totally independently and without affecting each other In use their location is transparent to an operator – they simply call up the recorded video stream to be viewed and, provided that they have the necessary authorization are able to view it.