Swann PC DVR 4 Net by Swann
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Our Price: $249.85 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $90.00 (click here) Category: Digital Camera See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of Swann PC DVR 4 Net
Digital camera Review: Software is impressive.. Glitches with Vista
Summary: 3 Stars
I've installed two of these cards in two of the exact same machines. I contacted Swann and asked which of the three support drivers would work best for a Vista 32bit application. In both cases I was referred to the latest 5.4 (I beleive) driver update. Upon trying this, I received misc errors. I then tried the oldest driver, and presto. These things have worked like a charm.
I'm still working on figuring out the remote viewing and local viewing portion of the device, but so far it has lived up to what it says.
Once I get these port forwarding glitches and the firmware correct, I should be good to go. Also this card allows you to recycle the destination folder for your motion recordings, and keeps your hard drive from filling up with squirrels running through your yard, or leaves blowing in the wind.
Overall with a little work, I give it three stars. If their Australian support team was a little more helpful, I probably would have gave it four.
Digital camera Review: Turns your PC into a security DVR - documentation sketchy
Summary: 4 Stars
Bought one of these a couple of months ago to pipe some security cameras into for monitoring the front of my house. Pretty simple to install if you've done a PC upgrade before. Comes with a roughly 100-page manual that was written by someone for whom English is a second language. (Or they didn't proof it very well.) Documentation is pretty bare bones.
As far as function, the maximum frame rate is 15 fps, and it uses MPEG-4 compression. You can set up timer based recordings, motion detection based recordings and so forth. I've worked with the motion based recordings, and it allows you to set the portion of the frame you use for motion detection. The user interface for playback cries out for a 10x fast forward, which this card doesn't allow. (as far as I can tell) There is a slider bar above the play button that gets you up to 2x or 3x, but if you want to look at 8 or 10 hours, its pretty brutal at 3x. If you use motion detection, there is a button that jumps to the next "event" (where the motion detection was tripped). That works pretty well and its how I have mine setup.
If I could give it 3.5 stars, I'd do that. Since this one is pretty cheap as capture cards go, I'll bump it to 4 stars.
Digital camera Review: VERY INCOMPATIBLE, TECH SUPPORT LANGUAGE BARRIER.
Summary: 1 Stars
PURCHASED THIS CARD TO MONITOR OUR STOREFRONT. ERROR MESSAGES ON INSTALL 15 SECONDS INTO IT. WAITED ON HOLD FOR SUPPORT UPWARDS OF 40 MINUTES, THEY WERE NO HELP. THEIR REMEDY WAS TO REFORMAT. CALLED 2 DAYS LATER, TALKED TO A DIFFERENT PERSON, HE WAS VERY HARD TO UNDERSTAND. WE WENT THROUGH 45 MINUTES OF INSTALL THIS, DOWNLOAD THAT, MOVE THIS, REINSTALL THIS, THAT, THIS, NOTHING WORKED. I AM VERY DISAPPOINTED.Digital camera Review: Vey Good Card
Summary: 4 Stars
Very Good Card. Has all the features you need for Surveillance Camera.
Easy to install and clarity is very good.
Digital camera Review: WORKED RIGHT AWAY
Summary: 5 Stars
I emailed a request asking if this worked with VISTA. They emailed me a link to dowload the VISTA driver. My security camera works really great with this card and the included software. I will purchase security cameras two and three in a few weeks.