Surveillance System Bake Off

[heycraig]

I bought another DVR that is a well-known brand that offers better res cameras at a lower price. I noticed in the user manual that the new system appears to use almost exactly the same firmware. So I am planning a bit of a bake off to see which system (Amcrest or Brand B) performs better.

My theory is that Brand B has more pull with whomever wrote the firmware, and thus will have a more refined implementation.

I figured since the retailer that I purchased my Amcrest from has a 90-day return policy that I should at least try something else while waiting for our elusive firmware update to arrive.

[linflas]

There is a firmware update for Amcrest that went live a week ago, they did not change the name on the firmware page, just the date released, so very confusing. But it is an update, not really anything I can tell has been really fixed though.

[heycraig]

Yes. I did install the latest firmware available on the site. However, it included only minor changes and none of the motion fixes that I was hoping for.

[linflas]

Let us know your results, be quite interested to know, if the Dahua licensed/locked (They own the IP/Patent) for HDCVI changes through their vendor channel. I assumed they were just releasing firmware upgrades across the spectrum of their vendors, adding licensing logo's etc, depending on their vendor.

[heycraig]

As promised, here are the results of my comparison of the Amcrest and "Brand B"...

I installed the Brand B DVR and one camera and turned it on. Right away I had an issue Brand B not being compatible with my KVM solution (Lantronix Spider). It simply would not display via the KVM no matter what resolution I used. I am guessing that their is a hard coded refresh rate on the DVR that my KVM could not display. I am sure if I wanted to hook up a serial cable to change this, I could have.

I am a Mac user. I was not able to get Brand B's web interface to work with Safari or other browser for the Mac. Support told me it was no longer supported and I that I should just use the software provided to manage the DVR on my Mac. The web interface worked fine with IE on Windows 7.

I configured the DVR for continuous recording with motion detected snapshots to be emailed to me. I WAS NOT able to get this DVR to send me an email based on motion detection. The email test worked, but never motion related emails.

The "1080p" cameras bundled with Brand B did not impress, and seemed to be on par with what the Amcrest 720p cameras offered. The camera bases and bodies were polycarbonate, and did not seem like they would hold up as well as the beefier Amcrest cameras.

So, I have returned Brand B and am now content to wait for upcoming improvements to the Amcrest system.

Score:
Amcrest: 1
Brand B: 0

[linflas]

Well, that...is underwhelming. I will be testing Blue Iris Software using the DVR as a passthrough coming up. Will let you know

[heycraig]

Great! I have a feeling that some day I will be a Blue Iris user.

[seth21]

I think the comparison should be interesting. My brother bought a samsung system 4 CH 720 system and I have the amcrest 4 CH 720 system. From our discussions over the phone, the amcrest seems better. It was easier to set up due to the support videos and the user interface is better. He is still having a hard time with playback and he says he has to select an hour segment of video and then look through the video. He also can't figure out how to get a clip off the dvr and I haven't done it yet but have seen the button where you can make a clip.

[Raheel]

Very interesting information here, always appreciate a little competition

We've sent off a large list of issues provided by many users to our R&D team and are awaiting some feedback to see what we can get done in the next firmware.

I'd personally like to see this thread continue with other competitor products so we can be kept on our toes!

[heycraig]

The Amcrest system is one of 4 similarly priced systems that I've tried. Amcrest has edged out all of the competition.

I am done shopping for home surveillance systems. However, I am HIGHLY anticipating improvements.