Re: What Brand / Model DVRs ??

["Bob La Londe" <none@xxxxxxxxxx>]

"E DAWSON" <raymond@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:704b1$558894ad$adbb407e$7313@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> "Bob La Londe" <none@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:mm9vr6$vr3$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>I was a hard corp Dedicated Micros fan for a long time.  Many years.
>>Unfortunately they have priced themselves out of the market.  In general I
>>had pretty good luck with their units, but the price was just too high.
>>When they came out with their ECO units I thought that was a nice answer.
>>Slimmed down feature set at only a little over the average price for other
>>name brand units being installed.  Sadly they had issues.  I had to send
>>units in for repair in relatively short life spans.  Some I sent in more
>>than once, because they came back unfixed.  (I know Moore's in a separate
>>company, but they are the official repair center for DM.)
>>
>> I decided to give Digital Watchdog a try.  For the first couple years
>> they were great.  Competitive price, decent feature set, and seemed to
>> just work. Lately I've had multiple problems with very low usage.  A
>> couple months to a year.  When I called tech support today I was hung up
>> on three times.  I said please, and thank you and I never raised my
>> voice.  I know. Seems unusual for me.  They seemed to have a chip on
>> their shoulder from the moment they answered the phone.  Then they
>> proceeded to lecture me on my lack of professionalism even when I asked,
>> can we please just address the problem.  A DVR with no video output on
>> the HDMI ouput.  Last week video failed.  I had to hard power cycle the
>> unit to get video back.  It dropped HDMI video out again on Saturday.
>> They finally on the third (or maybe it was the 4th) call gave me a list
>> of things to try.  All of which I tried when I was there on Friday.
>>
>> So, I am off to the customer site to repeat the things I did on Friday,
>> and then call them back and say , "ok I tried them again."
>>
>> When I get back I plan to start shopping.  Any suggestions?
>
> Hi Bob,

> The only time I have seen faulty equipment was due to surges coming in on
> the system either because there was no UPS power supply protecting the
> dvr, hard drives, or cameras; or, the building was prone to close
> lightning strikes and there was no surge protection installed because the
> customer did not want to pay for it up front.

New surge suppressor installed with the system.  No storms (unless you count
weeks of 115F highs) and no lightning.  Monitor works perfectly as tested
with a DVD player using multiple output resolutions, and autodetect worked
within a second on each res change.  DVR also tested with second brand new
monitor and second brand new HDMI cable.  The DVR was not putting out video
on the HDMI port.  Power cycling the DVR caused the unit to start putting
out video.  It stopped putting out video a second time.  Repeating all
testing a few days later produced identical results.

I may not have your experience with video systems, but I have experienced
that sometimes things just fail.

I would note that the DVR HDMI port was putting out a signal.  It was BLANK.
The monitor instantly detected the BLANK signal and showed a blank screen
instead of the NO SIGNAL screen when the HDMI cable was connected.

The monitor could have been bumped since it is mounted on an articulating
arm for the customer's convenience, but the odds of the DVR being bumped are
slim since it is inside a locked (well vented) cabinet bolted to shelf
brackets, bolted to the wall.  A bump hard enough to do something to the DVR
would be unlikely to not show signs of other damage.  I detected no issue at
anytime though with the monitor or cable.

> With HDMI output problems, sometimes it's just the cable. Sometimes the
> customer jammed the crap out of the dvr against the wall and the input on
> the dvr has been compromised also. They just don't go blink, "I am going
> to stop working now".

I used to think that about some product models.  They just always work.
Until I would run across one that didn't.

> Of course, the customer is not going to say anything, nor his employees.
> The tv monitor that is showing the HDMI output of the cams may have been
> plugged just straight into the wall without a UPS protection.

The monitor works perfectly and is plugged into the UPS.

> I remember a new system of 10 cams a few years ago that had problems with
> 3 cams and the tv monitor just a few months after installation. I ask a
> lot of questions to first investigate how this might have happened. The
> customer finally says, "Oh yeah, the electrician was doing work on our
> main panel right at that time and he shorted something ..." He bought
> himself a new tv and he paid for new cameras, end of story. Rarely do I
> find that equipment just blinks out all by itself.

About 20 years ago I had an electrician drop 220 across several 110 circuits
frying all the camera transformers.  Then they replaced all the fried 24VAC
transformers with 16VAC transformers.  I am sure the double voltage or the
under voltage killed the cameras, but they were certainly dead.  The
electrician didn't like it much when he tried to say that the cameras
probably just died on their own and I said, "You are f'in kidding right?!"

> If you want some leads about where to go for quality affordable equipment,
> you will have to contact me directly. I will not post publicly this
> information.

I would and I will.  That being said, I've seen a lot of stuff lately
installed by others that has failed with no name, no model, no anything on
the unit. Not even inside on the circuit boards.  They wind up calling me
when they can't get a hold of the guy who installed it.

> Hope this helps you somehow.

It does.  Thank you.


--
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Bob La Londe
The Security Consultant
License ROC103044 CR67

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