Having been through setting up 8 cameras across two of our houses I thought I'd share my thoughts for the benefit of others:

1) DO NOT open any Hikvision camera to the WWW (port forward/uPNP) without checking this release and ensuring your fw is updated accordingly Security Notification: Privilege-Escalating Vulnerability in Certain Hikvision IP Cameras

2) Even if your fw is up to date I would strongly suggest using a VPN server for remote access (many NAS's or routers provide VPN servers for remote access). Given the lackadaisical approach to support (as mentioned by others regarding the gmail issue) and general "bugginess" of their software I have little faith there aren't other vulnerabilities in their software.

3) I'm running openvpn on my NAS. One further advantage of going this route is you can also use the VPN when on un-secure networks (public wifi) or for localisation shifting (using BBC iPlayer when abroad etc).

4) DO NOT buy a grey market Hikvision product. When I got my first Hikvision cameras they weren't readily available in the UK, as such I ordered from abroad. At the time I had no idea Hikvision would start a vendetta against its customers who bought from abroad, rather then address the issues with its supply chain. Fortunately those early cameras are R0 build so I can update the fw relatively "easily". But later customers have had real issues. And there are no exceptions for security fixes as mentioned in (1)

5) Many other options are now available. When I first opted for Hikvision, on a £ for £ basis no one came close. The gap between the competition has closed significantly since. Consider Dahua etc. If Hikvision still makes sense, do some research to ensure there aren't any show stopping issues for your requirements. As you can't be sure they will be fixed before they choose to drop support.

6) I see little reason to get a NVR, unless you have a large number of cameras. The cameras have decent onboard motion based events, can push to an SMB share, push alerts to mobile and email alerts/snapshots. Unless there is a compelling reason to buy an NVR I would suggest POE switch + NAS is a better route.

7) I have set my cameras up with 3 detection zones.

Line crossing detection sends push notifications to my mobile via IVMS4500. The lines are drawn in from my boundary to minimise false triggers, although I still get some from shadows/light changing/car lights on my drive/animals. Line triggering tends to give far less false positives. You can switch notifications on and off from the App. So I just have it on when i'm out.

Intrusion detection is set without push notifications to cover secondary areas (rest of my drive/etc). This ensures events are still captured, but means I don't get notifications for every little thing. So if someone strays on my property, breaks something, etc it will be recorded. But I won't be bombarded with alerts.

Finally I use the standard motion detection for tertiary areas. Again this is without notifications, so events will still be recorded should I discover an issue and need to go back to look at recordings retrospectively.

With this setup a 3TB serving 4 cameras (3 & 4MP @ 20fps) gives 30+ days worth of recordings.

8 ) If I was starting from scratch I'd get cameras with external alarm triggering inputs. I could then add PIR's to trigger recordings and use push notifications to mobile for those. Thus eliminating most of the false triggers (other then stray animals). I could also setup floodlights to trigger on those same PIR's to improve night recording performance and as a deterrent. This is the only reason I may consider an NVR in the future, so I can cheaply add external PIR based triggers for recording and notifications.

9) If you go the NAS route, unless you only have one camera and the NAS is dedicated to it alone, ensure it has the ability to set "user quotas". When using a network share the Hikvision cameras format it and expect to have the whole capacity to themselves. Therefore if anything else writes to the NAS reducing the capacity (including another camera), the Hikvision camera will dismount the storage and stop recording. You then have to reformat it manually. A NAS with user quotas overcomes this issue.

If anyones interested, my setup is HP Microserver running as a NAS and openvpn server. With the cameras powered by a POE switch. No ports forwarded and uPNP off at the router and cameras.

Hope that helps.

waiting on a deal on a 4k setup myself

Thanks for posting, but I need an NVR that does H.265, to work with the cheap Chinese Hikvisions I bought off Aliexpress :laughing:

Thanks for posting, but I need an NVR that does H.265, to work with the ones I liberated from the big posh house down the road two nights ago

What does this give you over say a synology station with surveillance app??? Don't really get it why someone would buy this over a Qnap or Synology station.

Would this go well with the Hikvision DS-2CD2342WD-I 4 mm Fixed Lens IR EXIR Turret CCTV Network Cameras?

Is the above camera suitable for use on a 1930s terraced house or would 6mm ones be more suitable? Approx 100ft garden. Unsure if one camera at the front of the property and one at the rear would provide good enough coverage or whether 2 each side (one high and one lower down) would be better.

There is the 8 channel NVR for ~ £170

Assuming it is best to get WD purple drives for use with the NVR?

Thanks.

Those are the cameras I have in my wish list, only the 4mm version.

I went on youtube to see the differences in 2/4/6mm to decide whats best for me.

I'm getting a purple, https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00IMPO5MO/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=KLCVDB7D7SK2&coliid=I2ZJ8N1KQ030IX&psc=1

Also currently a good price.

I prefer the 16, 1 because its cheaper and 2 because I'd like to think its build with a bit more overhead than the 8 port model.

My advice is make sure the seller is an authorised reseller and gives a full 3yr warranty

Hdd wise wd purple or seagate skyhawks are recommended

Most amazon sales / ebay have 180 days to get a refund after which its fingers crossed territory, authorised resellers can get a reconditioned unit sent out within 1-2working days as opposed to having to wait up to 4weeks on a repair. I know this as my company is an authorised reseller *im not going to link to our site*

I've got a swann CCTV which has 720p Poe cameras, the swann box is crap, will my cameras work with this?

The main problem with grey imports is when you upgrade thd nvr sometimes the camera will refuse to operate until its firmware is up to date which would mean your cameras are no longer in english...up to now we have found Chinese cameras still work however hikvision keep saying theyre working on stopping them

1080p is ok for close cctv but no good if the suspect is 20ft away

exactly :smile:

I was going to get the 4 channel version which is cheaper...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/5fn/Hikvision-DS-7604NI-E1-4P-Embedded-Network-Video-Recorder/B0171MUWO8/

But i'm tempted by this, however I am slightly put off by the lack of POE ports, has anyone used a hikvision nvr like this one with only one port?

Could somebody be so kind as too recommend a 4 camera system? I would prefer POE .... But not essential. remote access via iPhone would be needed 1080p and cameras would need to be wall and ceiling mounted. many thanks!

This has 16 independent POE ports

http://www.hikvision.com/us/Products_1_10649_i8726.html

I don't think it does, this model is DS-7616NI-E2/A which isn't that model, it's this one:

http://www.hikvision.com/europe/Products_accessries_212_i8813.html

You'll need to choose the right model number on the tabs to see the exact specs.

If you look at this model at another retailer it shows only one physical network port:

http://www.dipolnet.com/ip_nvr_hikvision_ds-7616ni-e2-a_16ch_160mbps_2xsata_vga_hdmi_alarm_in-out__K22161.htm

Here's the data sheet for this model:

http://www.hikvision.com//uploadfile/image/10297_CUsersdingyingtingDesktopUD.6L0202G2022A01SpecofDS7600NIE2AV3.3.220150702.pdf

I have 4 of the 4mm exir turrets, 4 Ch NVR and WD purple 3TB.

Cameras are brilliant, night vision is crystal clear.
The 4mm has quite a wide field of view, I have them mounted around 3m high.

Can definitely recommend.

Thanks for this. I have a 8 bay synology which came with 4 camera license out of the box. It's a good system and with a cloud backup you can save your footage in a S3 bucket or glacier bucket. I see what you mean by HDMI output which does come in handy. I run The Surveillance station app on an old android tab glued to the wall.

Might have a look at this for my parents home. Thanks again!

Thanks for this. Which NVR are you using?

you can only add cameras to the total numbers of POE ports ie 4port NVR means only 4 camera regardless of going via a poe switch, as i have the 8 poe port version and can only add 8x camera as cameras are connected via 24 port POE switch not the NVR but does connect via lan to my switch...hope it make sense to someone LOL

Ordered a Hikvision DS-7616NI-E2/A with the 3 year £20 Amazon warranty. Also purchased a NETGEAR GS308P-100UKS 8-Port Gigabit Switch with 4-Port PoE which is currently £49.99 on Amazon.

Now to decide whether to go for a 2TB or 4TB WD Purple HDD; sort out some CAT5e/6 cable; and order a camera.

a few points to bear in mind about Him;
they are implementing firmware updates which if you have grey clone from abroad will brick or fail
you need the firmware update as they have switched off their open hosting service and you now need to register via MAC and password on sticker on camera - or bypass entirely using open DNS (paid or annoyware service) to host.
this will affect your remote viewing potential via app etc .

also the talk about having and using high Resolution will be ok on the camera but she used on the NVR - the Hik cannot cope with high Res and multiple cam's - I have a 4 port and can only run 2 cam's at 3mp potential the additional of one more results in abnormal shutdown as the CPU can't cope (Google as known issue). my fix was to lower resolution- defeats purpose of buying high Res cameras though...

also factor in cost of POE switch , brackets to hold camera e.g. away from wall, junction box?, UTP cat 5e/6 external wiring, cover/shield for UTP, decent hard drive and microSD card 64/127gb? as you can't rely on NVR entirely.
hope this helps

hate auto correc!

Yeah i get that the number of cameras you can connect is limited by the number of channels. At the moment i don't actually need more than 3 channels, but I'm still tempted by this one incase i ever do decide to increase the number of cameras.

Another bit I'm not sure about is that 4mp is specifically not mentioned as a supported recording resolution, will that be a problem with the 4mp cameras?

The one you linked to for £124.99 only has 25Mbps incoming bandwidth. This one has 40Mbps for 4 channels, 80 for 8 and 160 for 16. Depends on what cameras you want to use as to their bandwidth requirements.

I opted for this one as it should be okay for 4MP Hikvision cameras. The other one mentions 3MP cameras. Assuming all Amazon information is correct on both product pages.

DS-7604NI-E1-4P (40MBps)

Thanks I'd missed that, I'd assumed it was the 40Mbps version.

Scrap what I said before. It states 25Mbps in the product description but at the top it states 40MBps bandwidth.

Callum84 has commented it is 40Mbps.

Amazon need to sort out correct information on listings. I've got confused from looking at all the Hikvision stuff. With some NVRs reportedly having issues with some 4MP cameras. Lack or PoE ports; bandwidth etc!

Just when I think I have sorted something out there is another curveball.

I use a WD NAS with mine - directing Hikvision IP cameras to the NAS is possible depending on your level of expertise, However Hikvision tech support is good in the UK.
The upside is you can do other things with the NAS at the same time, or save your family photos, stream, etc so I find it more
advantageous in my case.
it's raided and backed up.

It can be a bit confusing.

I bought a package from cctvkits.co.uk, they do a few hikvision packages which are all guaranteed compatible.

Might be worth a look, even if just to get an idea then buy elsewhere if price is not right.

With this one the cameras are routed through your home network, although I'm not sure if that's entirely the case if you have NVR and cameras on the same switch.

No, when cameras are connected to NVR POE ports they are on a different subnet to your home network.
My home network IP is 192.168.1.xxx
Cameras are on 192.168.0.xxx with NVR as gateway.
Data travels from camera directly to NVR.

The only time data travels on your home network is if you are viewing remotely.

You could run the NVR with no connection to your home network at all.


Edit

Sorry think you're right there, does this model have any ports?
Looks like it should have /16P in model for 16 port.

Not so good a deal if no ports

I've just cancelled my order, it is a good deal for what it is (it's still less than it would normally be). I don't need so many channels and would rather have the the poe ports so it can be run completely standalone of a network. I'm going with the one i've linked before.

A reviewer for the GS308p switch gave the following tip:

I set unique fixed internal IP addresses (eg: 10.0.1.67, 10.0.1.68 etc etc) on the cameras and the router just saw them through the switch and routed them automatically regardless of port numbers etc. It really is that simple.

Would that stop the network from being bogged down by routing the camera data to the NVR via the switch. Or should a managed POE switch be used for this NVR?

Unsure whether to cancel everything or not!

Found this info which may be useful for those with NVR with PoE ports on the back and NVR with no PoE ports:

Connect as many cameras as you wish into the PoE ports on the back of your NVR.
For the remaining cameras that you want also to power using PoE, get a new PoE switch. The more common, cheaper ones have 10/100 ports, and ideally a Gigabit uplink port. Connect the remaining cameras into the PoE ports on the PoE switch.
Now you have a choice of how to combine the NVR (which will have a gigabit LAN port) and the PoE switch (which may have a gigabit uplink port) into your network.
The traffic from the cameras on the PoE ports on the NVR will stay within the NVR (ignoring for the moment any traffic that results from using Live View or Playback via a PC), so you don't have to accommodate it on your normal LAN.

The traffic from the cameras on your new PoE switch will have to get back to the NVR.
In aggregate this will be approximately (number of cameras on the new PoE switch x around 5-8Mbps each). So if you had say 8 cameras, that's about 50Mbps, which is about as far as you should probably take a 10/100 LAN port, but fine for a gigabit uplink port.
Ideally - you'd have a gigabit core switch, into which you'd connect all the high-traffic items such as the NVR LAN port, the new PoE switch gigabit uplink port, your PC, your NAS etc.
In practice, and assuming you don't have a high-end router with gigabit ports that you'd use as the 'gigabit core' you'd just about get away with connecting the NVR LAN port into the new PoE switch, and the new PoE switch uplink port into the router. But if the new PoE switch has a gigabit uplink port, you could usefully connect that to the NVR LAN port instead, and use a spare port on the new PoE switch to connect to the router.
The weak link here would be the NVR LAN port into the PoE switch (if the uplink port is not gigabit), handling the aggregate camera traffic, but that traffic would not affect the router, which generally would only be handling your internet traffic.
Other combinations are possible.
I hope that makes sense.

Taken from:https://ipcamtalk.com/threads/hikvision-ds-7608ni-e2-8p-some-pics-and-first-impressions.3013/page-3 with the comment posted by alastairstevenson.

Hopefully someone on here with good IT knowledge can confirm if this is the solution and good advice.

I read that as... if the cameras and NVR are on the same switch, the normal traffic between the cameras and NVR shouldn't affect other devices connected to your router.

Probably the right decision.

I have that model. No setup required, plug and play.

Thanks buddy l will have a look at them.

In theory you should be able to add a POE switch, connect cameras and NVR, set NVR and camera IP on same subnet and it should route all traffic through the switch directly.
This should work as a standalone system, problems may be when you connect to your existing network to access remotely.
Problem is that if you use the same IP pool and subnet as your routers DHCP, all camera traffic will be routed through router and back to NVR.
If you use another subnet it wont be accessible directly as not on your home network.
You can bridge the network's in your routers settings but I'm not sure exactly how this is done, but think it's similar to port forwarding.
Sure someone will chime in with proper advice.

ermmm IP cameras to a NVR can go through a POE switch which can potentially be on the same network depending on how your network is set up and if you can depending on the switch types. Its the same with a NAS - it can connect to a switch upto the POE switch like mine does, through a patch panel. Hikvision CCTV cameras arent bandwidth hoggers, if you have set them up for alarming on motion etc.
If a router goes down you dont lose anything potentially if your network is set up correctly it goes through a switch :smiley:

I have 6 Hikvision cameras, 5 going to the POE and one a PTZ which doesn't and CPU from the switch which is 1GB is 15%
TL-SG2210P is the POE switch I use.

Thanks for clearing that up :smirk:

Word of warning with Hikvision - if using an smtp server such as google make sure the NVR is compatible.
Google introduced secure smtp last year and a lot of Hikvision boxes stopped sending emails. Hikvision support did not want to know about it and said an NVR over 1 year old should not expect firmware updates as they have to many new products to look after...

I think you're getting a little confused between layer 2 and layer 3 switching.

If the cameras and NVR/NAS are on the same switch and same subnet all traffic will remain on the switch. Unless you have an ancient switch, it will be able to handle line speed switching at layer 2. Therefore there are no concerns about bandwidth. The only reason you'd need to be concerned about bandwidth at layer 2 is if the cameras sit on one switch and the NVR/NAS on another, then there would likely be either a 100MB or 1GB connection between the switches, which again should be more then sufficient.

Remember this link between the switches only services traffic between devices on the two switches. Equipment on the same switch will switch at line speed (i.e. two devices pushing 1GB/s between them on a switch won't impact the other devices on the same switch). So even in this scenario, you'd need a lot of devices sitting on separate switches talking to each other, to worry about saturating layer two uplink between the switches.

Moreover, in terms of redundancy/fault tolerance its far less likely the switch will fail, rather then the NVR/Camera (remember the NVR will also have an embedded switch that could fail aswell as the NVR itself).

In my case I really don't see the point in running an NVR (unless its in place of a POE switch). I have a decent POE switch and run the onboard NVR with storage on NAS, which is quite capable on my Hikvision cameras (motion detection, intrusion detection, line crossing detection, pushes to NAS).

I picked up a 4MP/20FPS Hikvision (UK) for £90 to complete my install. They aren't actually that expensive these days.

Moreover, for residential use its advisable to go higher resolution then frame rate. For commercial use, where you may want to watch a cash register or shoplifting, frame rate is important. However, for residential (or even commercial boundary monitoring) frame rate is a secondary concern. You don't need to see every step a person takes, if they step on your property or damage something (unless they are the flash) you will capture enough at even 10fps. What is far more important is capturing a very good image of their face/license plate/etc.

Hence go MP over Frame rate. And if storage is a concern, drop the Frame rate rather then resolution to save on storage.

Another mistake people make is sticking the cameras up near the roof. An image of someones head isn't much use unfortunately. Such positions are good for general intrusion monitoring. But you also want some lower cameras (just above reach) so you can get a good image of an intruder or a car and its license plate.

Hope that helps.

My Dowshu license is due to expire, need to find something cheaper to view 64+ cameras!

Having been through setting up 8 cameras across two of our houses I thought I'd share my thoughts for the benefit of others:

1) DO NOT open any Hikvision camera to the WWW (port forward/uPNP) without checking this release and ensuring your fw is updated accordingly Security Notification: Privilege-Escalating Vulnerability in Certain Hikvision IP Cameras

2) Even if your fw is up to date I would strongly suggest using a VPN server for remote access (many NAS's or routers provide VPN servers for remote access). Given the lackadaisical approach to support (as mentioned by others regarding the gmail issue) and general "bugginess" of their software I have little faith there aren't other vulnerabilities in their software.

3) I'm running openvpn on my NAS. One further advantage of going this route is you can also use the VPN when on un-secure networks (public wifi) or for localisation shifting (using BBC iPlayer when abroad etc).

4) DO NOT buy a grey market Hikvision product. When I got my first Hikvision cameras they weren't readily available in the UK, as such I ordered from abroad. At the time I had no idea Hikvision would start a vendetta against its customers who bought from abroad, rather then address the issues with its supply chain. Fortunately those early cameras are R0 build so I can update the fw relatively "easily". But later customers have had real issues. And there are no exceptions for security fixes as mentioned in (1)

5) Many other options are now available. When I first opted for Hikvision, on a £ for £ basis no one came close. The gap between the competition has closed significantly since. Consider Dahua etc. If Hikvision still makes sense, do some research to ensure there aren't any show stopping issues for your requirements. As you can't be sure they will be fixed before they choose to drop support.

6) I see little reason to get a NVR, unless you have a large number of cameras. The cameras have decent onboard motion based events, can push to an SMB share, push alerts to mobile and email alerts/snapshots. Unless there is a compelling reason to buy an NVR I would suggest POE switch + NAS is a better route.

7) I have set my cameras up with 3 detection zones.

Line crossing detection sends push notifications to my mobile via IVMS4500. The lines are drawn in from my boundary to minimise false triggers, although I still get some from shadows/light changing/car lights on my drive/animals. Line triggering tends to give far less false positives. You can switch notifications on and off from the App. So I just have it on when i'm out.

Intrusion detection is set without push notifications to cover secondary areas (rest of my drive/etc). This ensures events are still captured, but means I don't get notifications for every little thing. So if someone strays on my property, breaks something, etc it will be recorded. But I won't be bombarded with alerts.

Finally I use the standard motion detection for tertiary areas. Again this is without notifications, so events will still be recorded should I discover an issue and need to go back to look at recordings retrospectively.

With this setup a 3TB serving 4 cameras (3 & 4MP @ 20fps) gives 30+ days worth of recordings.

8 ) If I was starting from scratch I'd get cameras with external alarm triggering inputs. I could then add PIR's to trigger recordings and use push notifications to mobile for those. Thus eliminating most of the false triggers (other then stray animals). I could also setup floodlights to trigger on those same PIR's to improve night recording performance and as a deterrent. This is the only reason I may consider an NVR in the future, so I can cheaply add external PIR based triggers for recording and notifications.

9) If you go the NAS route, unless you only have one camera and the NAS is dedicated to it alone, ensure it has the ability to set "user quotas". When using a network share the Hikvision cameras format it and expect to have the whole capacity to themselves. Therefore if anything else writes to the NAS reducing the capacity (including another camera), the Hikvision camera will dismount the storage and stop recording. You then have to reformat it manually. A NAS with user quotas overcomes this issue.

If anyones interested, my setup is HP Microserver running as a NAS and openvpn server. With the cameras powered by a POE switch. No ports forwarded and uPNP off at the router and cameras.

Hope that helps.

I've a really dumb question - in what use cases would one use a DVR? Isn't the first thing the potential thief is going to do is follow the wires to the NAS (particularly if its POE) So I can see benefit from an external camera perspective where that is indoors but for internals is it not a matter of getting your snapshots / video onto an external provider ASAP (which then sorts out the external use case.) I guess you can put it up in the loft to make it difficult to get to?

What would be your choice over 20'?

If you don't mind i'll convert that to metric as I find it easier to deal with, so ~6m. And to provide an example to help people visualise that's likely the length of a typical front garden (a typical family saloon would be ~4-5m).

Lets assume all else is equal, i.e. quality of lens, lighting, quality of camera CCD, etc. Also lets assume the camera is mounted just above arms reach, so distance to target head is perhaps 7m.

Now there is one other important factor to consider, the FOV (Field of View). I'll list the typical lens types you will come across and approximate FOV:

2.8mm = ~130 deg
3.6mm = ~90 deg
8.0mm = ~60 Deg

A 1080p camera is ~2mp, in other words 2million pixels make up each frame.

So lets say you have a camera with an 8.0mm lens. At 7m (line of sight distance) the subjects head is still likely to cover a significant portion of the frame. Which in turn means their head is covered by a significant portion of those 2m pixels, which in turn means you'll get a reasonable level of detail of their face and have a good chance of being able to identify them from the footage.

However, 60 deg will likely not cover much of your boundary. So you may need two or three cameras to get even reasonable coverage and still lose peripheral areas (i.e. you may want to cover your car if its parked on the road).

That's why people may opt for one 2.8mm camera to cover the main boundary (usually the front). You get good coverage, but that same subject at 7m will cover far less of the frame and therefore far fewer pixels will make up their face. If you take a 2mp picture and then try to zoom in to see a person in the background you'll see their face is quite fuzzy (purely in terms of resolution not focus) and you likely couldn't use the image for identification.

I have a 4mp 2.8mm camera and thats about the minimum level you need to be able to identify someone at 7m with that FOV.

Now at the beginning I mentioned the presumption all else is equal. Unfortunately there's one other factor that complicates the otherwise simple calculation. Quality of CCD/Lens. Not all Camera's/Lenses are equal so don't just follow the numbers. For example squeezing 4 million pixels on a small CCD may actually result in worse results then 2mp. The comparison between a phone camera and DSLR is a good one to illustrate this point. You'll see phones advertise 10mp+/etc yet when you look at the images a DSLR with a huge sensor but only half the MP will outshine them.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the detailed write up. I've got a HP microserver sitting around doing nothing.

I didn't realise I could use it for a surveillance system.

Any links or recommendations you may have, would be appreciated

NP, hopefully it will save others the head scratching and searching I had to go through :smiley:

I'm running xpenology on my micro servers (one N54L and one Gen 8 ):

http://xpenology.com/forum/

However, i'm just using it as a NAS/VPN Server (Open VPN) for remote access. I don't use surveillance station as my cams have built in DVR functionality and just need somewhere to store recordings. I'm not sure the Micro servers would be powerful enough to run 4 cameras anyway. Plus I believe the surveillance station licenses are quite expensive and not sure about legality of that part of using synology on third party hardware (core firmware is available through open source license of code they built on).

I'll take a look in to it, thanks!

Are you still able to watch the live streams when you're out and about? I've got motioneye set up on a couple of raspberry pis currently, but want something more robust

Yes I use VPN for remote access:

iOS (OpenVPN Connect) (OpenVPN Server) Microserver/Synology Cameras

In laymen terms it's like being at home on my WIF once I connect the VPN. I could port forward the cameras for remote access, but as per my previous post I don't trust them to be open to the web (there have been a few exploits revealed).

The added advantage of the VPN is I can also access other devices on my home network. And when I'm travelling I can use it to shift my localisation (eg. so I can watch iPlayer from Spain).

One point to make clear as I'm not sure its got across. I don't need to run any surveillance software, such as motion eye, as the cameras themselves have it on board. So they do the motion tracking, recording based on my settings, push notifications to my mobile, etc. They only use the NAS (Microserver) to store recordings. I connect directly to the cameras (using IVMS 4500 app) for live view and playing back recordings.

Last question(s), I promise!

What cameras are you using? And who do you use for your VPN?

NP :smiley:

I'm using HIKVision dome cameras. I've got some of varying ages, so different model numbers, but as an example one is the DS-2CD2142FWD.

If picking them up today there are likely better options so worth doing some research. But in my case since I already had HIKVision cameras i've stuck with them. Also i'd highly recommend getting cameras with external alarm triggering, so you can add a PIR. That would really eliminate false triggers and therefore allow you to leave push notifications on 24/7. In my case the older cameras don't have external alarm triggering inputs, so I'm using smart motion detection (line crossing/intrusion rather then simple grid detection). Its ok, but the false triggers are too often to leave it on 24/7, instead I turn push notifications on when no ones home and leave it off most of the time.

I think you've misunderstood the VPN. I'm not using any provider. I'm running the VPN server on the Microserver, so the connection is direct between my devices and the Microserver. i.e. Where you would put the VPN providers IP address in the client, I put my home IP address.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

I'll do some reading, and start looking for cameras - seems to be hundreds of different cameras to choose from!

I can do the work on the MicroServe. The http://xpenology.com/forum/ looks a little date, but I don't think that will be an issue.