Hello all,
I have been promising to upgrade our camera system for a while. And by
"upgrade" I mean "replace" because our current setup has approximately
the resolution of a game boy color and the software sophistication of
drywall. So, in light of our third vehicle break-in in as many years, I
figured it's about a week past time for me to get off my ass and do it.
After some discussion with one of our newest members (whose name I am
once again blanking on) I purchased a $40 IP camera to test and it
appears that it will fulfill all of our requirements. By my count we
will need 10 cameras: Eight to replace our current cameras (3 in the
main room, 1 in the fablab, 2 on the front of the building, 1 on the
dock, 1 in the hallway) and adding two new cameras (in the annex and the
metal room). The lounge will, as always, remain camera free. We already
have more than sufficient file server space to store the video and there
is plenty of free and open source software to manage the cameras so I
will simply be disposing of the dedicated DVR rather than replacing it.
It should cost about $400 for the cameras, I am asking for $500 to have
a bit of wiggle room for any unforeseen additional supplies that might
be needed (likely unnecessary; most of the mounting hardware is included
and we should have plenty of network cables).
Regards,
Ian B.
CTO