Got this a few days ago. Very easy to configure. Had mine set up on my wireless network in minutes. Much better video quality than I expected for this price.Definitely meant to be used indoors in low light. When I point it out the window, the image just washes out and goes all white. But indoors, with normal lighting, the image is great. Night time image is very good. The built-in IR LEDs work well to about 20ft or so. Beyond that, things are pretty dark. I tried an experiment and turned on a desk lamp with a very low power fluorescent bulb and the camera had enough light to see everything in the house in full color. Really good low light performance.
The microphone is also very sensitive. Almost too sensitive. It picks up every sound in the house. I can hear the ceiling fan, air conditioner, TV in another room, people talking in other rooms etc. Has 2-way audio but haven't tried it yet. UPDATEtwo way audio works great. You need a powered, amplified speaker; I used an old computer speaker.
Super easy to operate. You don't need any special software to remotely view, just Internet Explorer. You can view with Firefox, but you lose some features. When viewing remotely over the Internet, you can click on any point in the image and the camera centers itself on that point.
Tons more options and features but, you can read about them on the manufacturers website.
If this had a true optical zoom, it would be just about perfect but, full Pan Tilt and Zoom cameras cost a lot more than this one.
I am pleasantly surprised with this camera. I've tried several 'affordable' cameras over the past few years and have been quite disappointed with them. The only really good network PTZ I've found is a nine hundred dollar Panasonic. Too expensive for me and it does not have audio.
If you need audio and full range pan ant tilt, but don't need zoom, this is probably your best choice right now for any price. Panasonic makes a nice, small, wireless camera with audio and pan and tilt but it does not have the range of motion that this camera has and this camera has much better low light image quality.
REVIEW UPDATEI've had mine now for several months and it still works great. I changed the video setting to "outdoor" and now it works perfectly in full sunlight. And it still works just as good in full dark as it did with the other video settings. I was having some problems with the camera losing it's wireless connection to my Linksys router. I would have to power cycle the camera to get it to reconnect. But then I started having other problems with the Linksys router so I replaced my old Linksys router with a newer D-Link router and the problems have gone away. The camera has not lost it's connection since I replaced the router.
Because this camera is IR sensitive and does not have a switchable mechanical IR filter, daylight images sometimes look a little fuzzy, as if the lens is dirty. This is most noticeable when viewing indoors with a lot of sunlight coming in through the windows. I have other IR sensitive cameras and they exhibit the same behavior.
Overall, I am still quite pleased with this camera and just wish Amazon would make it a Gold Box deal so I could get another one!
Amazon recently put the Panasonic BLC131A wireless network camera on sale for about 1/2 price so I got one to try. The Trendnet TV-IP422W is far superior to the Panasonic; it has much better image quality, sound quality and range of motion, and the Trendnet configuration screens seem much more intuitive to me.
If Trendnet would add a zoom lens and a mechanical IR filter, this camera would be perfect.
First off, don't expect much from the wireless feature. It's nice to have, for portability e.g. but not for reliability nor stability.
I bought 4 of these cameras, mounted them all wirelessly with (a) front door, (b) back door (c) kitchen and (d) foyer, to keep an eye on our dog. I figured I may be able to skip on pet hotel fees and get a big peace of mind at the same time. I setup my routers, sort out the remote web access and even got them to work via my iphone using the $5 eyecam app. The $25 IP PRO View app does not work with the IP422W's data stream.
When I was still home and before my first trip that truly tests out these cameras, one of the cameras would be missing from the network and never to be seen again even after a reset. Amazon promptly sent out a replacement but only after I discovered you really need to leave these cameras disconnected for more than a few minutes before it was really re-initialized.
Then we went on our vacation and after a few hours into it, 1 of 4 cameras were MIA. Still, it was fantastic to able to see our dog through the other working cameras. However, by day 2, we were left with only 2 cameras working and on our way home, only 1 camera was working. Of course, bear in mind, there's NOTHING you can do to fix it unless you get someone to go to your home, unplug and replug the camera's A/C adapter (a reboot).
The following week, we went On our 2nd and longer vacation and it was pretty much the same story. First, it teases you with much relief that it's working but then it never fails to disappoint with a non-functioning camera by day 2 or 3. On our way home from this 5 day trip, only 1 camera was working.
When we got home, I was bent on researching this further and opened two tickets with Trendnet, the 2nd one, they didn't even bothered replying. Now dizzy with the experience of being able to check on the house when we're away, I was prepared to send the Trendnets back to Amazon and swap them for far more costly Toshibas, Sonys or Axises.
But after much research, I quickly concluded that almost all of these IP cams just don't have very robust wi-fi components. Most reviews were plagued with widespread reports of losing connections, reboots and the like.
Still, I pushed forward, upgraded the router's firmware to DD-WRT, bumped up its transmitter range, added another router in as a repeater, relocated the routers to higher ground e.g. I even tried swapping the antennae on the furthest camera with a longer antennae that came off an older Linksys router. By now, there is probably sufficient signal strength in my house to service the neigboring five streets!!
But of course, one camera or another will still continue to drop out, never to be heard from again until they are rebooted. I supposed it would have been great if they will self re-connected again sometime later but they never did, not even once.
The geek in me then went into innovation mode, perhaps I can set up a script, reboot them every two days, use X10 power modules and restart them remotely. Then my wife gently reminds me we just spent a grand on cameras that have questionable functionality.
At this point, I bid kudos to those who have written about this same topic, about futile attempts to troubleshoot wi-fi problems, about even with the router next to the camera, it STILL loses connections. The optimist in me finally agreed, my wi-fi network is not the problem, THESE CAMERAS DON'T WORK WELL WITH WI-FI. Not that the wi-fi don't work at all, it's just that they don't work consistently.
So finally, I bit the bullet and reluctantly HARD-WIRED ethernet connections to all the cameras. I had explored using POE and possibly Homeplug to ease the installation pain but they added more point-of-failures and cost quite a bit more as well. I eventually opted to punch holes into the wall, fishing e.g. and did the hard-wired routine.
It's been a week since my wiring/stucco/drywall/painting work has just completed and the cameras have been live 24x7 without a hiccup.
All in all, the IP422W is great, has a good enough picture, decent IR, great low-light capabilities to 15 feet, unmatched panning angles and more importantly, good value for the money. Just don't expect an optical zoom or a continuously functioning wi-fi.We bought this camera to keep track of our kids at home in their playroom, and to keep an eye on our daughter, who occasionally has seizures at night that are hard to detect just by listening. This system is a little bit of overkill for that purpose, but the following are some things that made us settle on this camera instead of a more generic baby monitoring video system:
* It's encrypted, so people can't spy on what's going on inside our house.
* It's digital, so it works with all the wifi internet connections in our neighborhood instead of interfering with and being interfered by them.
* It's online, so I can check in on the kids and feel like I'm part of the family when I'm at the office.
The camera uses a regular wifi internet connection, and you open up the camera's web page to view the video. There are controls on the side of the web page that allow you to move the camera around, turn the sound on and off, and things like that. There are 8 presets you can label that will instantly move the camera to spots you select, which is a great feature. There is a button to cycle through all 8 presets once and then return to where it was looking before. You can set up guest users who don't have access to the controls, but can just view the video stream.
Despite having quite a few options, configuration was relatively easy, with all the options available on a separate setup web page. They did a good job of laying out the menu heirarchy to make things easy to find, although there were enough configuration options that I missed some the first time through.
Some of the drawbacks are:
* Some things only work on Internet Explorer using ActiveX controls. That's not a problem for almost everyone unless you happen to use Mac or Linux, like me. The basic functionality is all there, except for sound. I was able to work around that, but it seems odd to take the effort to support other browsers and operating systems with a java applet, then stop short of full functionality.
* The full manual is only on the CD-ROM, the only printed manual is a quick installation guide.
* The camera doesn't tilt down very far, which creates annoying blind spots when you set it on a shelf or something. However, there is a mounting bracket that we used to mount it upside-down, which gave us the full range of motion we needed. There is a configuration option to flip the image back upright.
* I wish it had a zoom, but the wide angle lens is a good choice if you have to have a fixed lens.
* The camera occasionally needs to be rebooted after experiencing a heavy load.
* The infrared illuminator doesn't come on automatically when it gets too dark, which is strange because the camera adjusts pretty well for brightness otherwise. There is a night mode button on the web page.
* Some of the configuration defaults are frustrating, like a 1 degree increment for pan and tilt. That would be fine if you could just hold down the button, but the web page doesn't allow you to do that, and pops up an annoying message to "Please wait" whenever you click the buttons too fast. The increment can only be changed on the setup page, but it's not a big deal because once the presets are set up, we hardly ever use the pan and tilt buttons.
* I wish it had a feature to disable guest access during certain hours. It would be nice to give access to the kids' grandparents out of state, but it would feel icky in the evening when we are all in pajamas to have people looking at us. I think I can set up a schedule on my router firewall, though, and it does have a schedule and motion detection I could use to upload still images to the family blog.
* It would be nice if the lights on the front indicated when someone was watching the video, not just if a link is established.
However, the drawbacks are nothing that can't be worked around, and overall the camera exceeded our expectations.Overall a decent camera at a great price point. There are some minor glitches but none of those are deal breakers for me.
Pros
Feature packed (Pan/Tilt, 2 way audio, night vision, wireless with WPA2 support, stream to IE/Firefox/3G phone, recording to NAS, just to name a few)
For $ including shipping, it's definitely the best bang for the buck at this point
Easy to install
Everything works for the most part once it's set up
Cons
Build quality: The first one I got from Amazon has very loud grinding noise when it starts up. The second one came without any problem though.
Stability: Whenever you restart or power down the camera, there is a possibility that you won't be able to connect to it after it comes back. I have seen the same problem on both cameras (with the latest firmware build 71). Usually the problem goes away after a few reboots, but it's quite annoying.
Constant background noise: This is a confirmed issue caused by an over-sensitive microphone. Apparently Trendnet is working on a fix for this.
Even though the camera has a built-in microphone, you can only capture video (not audio) when you try to schedule any recording to a network storage device.
Lousy tech support. They are not responsive, don't not know much about the product beyond the superficial stuff, and sometimes have difficulty to understand what I am trying to say (and vice versa)
Other things I wish it has:
Support https so it's more secure when streaming over the Internet
Support authentication over RTSP. At this point, anyone with a 3G phone and the right URL can view your camera if you enable RTSP (Yikes!)
A privacy button to temporally disable the camera, or some scheduling capability to turn on/off the camera
Multiple profiles for motion detect so you can monitor different parts of the room depending on the time of the day
More intuitive event configurationI've spoken to customer service so many times to get this camera working that I've put them on speed dial!
The good news is that they answer quickly and have a good data base to solve problems. It would, of course, have been helpful if that info were on the web site.
I am not going to repeat much of the features discussion here but rather, deal with installation other issues that I've learned and that may be useful:
-Install both the IP Setup and the Secureview software.
-Give the camera a Static IP address even if your router has a DHCP (not fixed) address.
-Follow the installation instructions carefully, The first task is to have your router recognize the camera's fixed IP address using IP Setup.
-Make sure the camera is wired to the router; the router is hooked to your modem; everything is powered on.
-Somewhere along the way, the program will ask you to install an active x control perhaps more than once. Make sure that you click on the appropate strip on the top of the page.
-If the camera's IP address appears in the IP Setup window and you click it but can't get a picture, try Secureview. If that works, then there is a problem with IE.
-Especially if you have IE 8 or Windows 7, be prepared to download and install the newest software (you may have to connect the camera directly to your computer and follow instructions carefully). You might also try Tools Compatibility View on IE.
-Once you get a picture, note that the camera has a manual focus on the lens. Watch the picture on your computer and slowly turn the lens from the edge with one finger without blocking the picture.
If you plan to go wireless within your network:
-Make sure that you have the IP address of your router (192.168.0.1, for example look it up by brand on the web). Also, any router user name and password you set up (default is probably admin.admin). Also the encription key you put in. If you need any of this and don't have it, you may have to reset the router and run the router set up again.
-From Setup-Network-Wireless. Check Enable. Click on Site Survey, highlight your own home network, make sure the name appears in the box, set up the same encription and key that you set for other items that access your router. Click all the appropriate boxes.
-Remember to disconnect the camera from the router, power it down and then up again.
If wireless works and you want remote access, then note the following:
-It will be necessary, especially if other items (TIVO, printer) are connected to the network, to change the port (Settings Network Network). Your IP may also block port 80. I went to 8001 to avoid problems.
-You will need to go to dyndns to get a dynamic address. Access the site from the computer you are using to install the camera so that dyndns has a starting IP. You will create a user name and password and select a dyndns account name.
-Log into your router and follow the router instructions to Port Forward 8001 or whatever you selected in the camera setup. Once port forwarding is activated, you probably do not have to enter the dyndns information in your router. You may not have to put in the DDNS settings in the camera network setup page either.
-When you access your camera remotely, remember to start the address with http and end with :8001 (or your forward port). It should look like: h t t p: / / (username) . dyndns . org: 8001 (no spaces).
-There are issues setting up email and ftp forwarding. The camera will not deal with encripted email servers nor will it change the smtp port from 25. I have been unable to configure it to send email.
-If you use FTP, note that the host address should be in the form of 00.00.00.00, not (ftp or h__p).
On balance, this camera works more or less as advertised. The picture is reasonable in good light; somewhat grainy in poor light. The lens needs to be properly focused. Digital zoom does not give a sharp picture. The panning range is impressive. I wish that the software were more up to date; that it could send encripted email through a different port and that the instructions were better.
Still, this may be the best available for the price at this time.
UPDATE 9/10. FTP UPLOADS.
As noted, it is possible to use the camera's motion detect features to take photos and upload them to an FTP site than can be accessed through the internet.
Research shows that some FTP sites have a monthly maintance fee. I have been using a site called: transferum . com that provides limited but adequate FTP storage. There is a one-time $1.00 fee (paypal) to join but no continuing fee, and members set a unique username and password. The site can be accessed using an http command; specific FTP software is not required. Pictures remain on the site until deleted by the user. Note again that the when setting the camera, the FTP site must be referenced using its 00.00.00.00 address form.
Save 32% Off
No comments:
Post a Comment