Choosing Home Surveillance System – Important Things to Consider

Home surveillance is not anymore exclusively for the rich. Anyone having a home, big or small, should protect it with a topnotch surveillance system. With the abundance of such products in the market, their prices have dropped considerably too, and so, homeowners with any budget can afford to have home security equipment installed for the desired peace of mind. However, the abundance of surveillance equipment as well as technological advancements have also given rise to a great diversity in these gadgets and so, consumers have a wide choice. What should you consider while buying these protective tools for your home? Here are tips shared by the experts at AA Security Solutions who can be your first choice for HD home surveillance security systems because of their first rate products and services.

Types of Security Systems

While starting the shopping for your home surveillance systems, you better know the different types of these tools so that you won’t feel overwhelmed with the wide variety. You also need to learn various technical terms in order to not get confused and feel more confident while taking a decision.

Indoor Surveillance

Indoor surveillance appliances are for keeping an eye on whatever going on inside your house. They are typically meant for monitoring nannies and other workers in home, and even kids and pets, in your absence. Multiple rooms can be monitored with this tool or you can also choose a single particular space.

Outdoor Surveillance

Outdoor surveillance equipment is not only useful for watching over who is trying to intrude, but also for deterring the intruder with its presence. Outdoor surveillance cameras are designed to withstand elements. So, they are waterproof and even may have wipers over the lens. Owner of a small home or apartment can fit such a camera only on the front door and an owner of a bigger property can fit multiple cameras to keep an eye on the entire land.

Cameras

Next to the types of surveillance equipment, you should consider the types of cameras like hidden cameras, single cameras, whole house camera and multi-room cameras. This may not confuse you because your need dictates which camera you should choose. As their name suggests, these cameras have various uses, like single camera is meant for monitoring only a specific room or a front door, while whole house and multi-room cameras can monitor indoor as well as outdoor spaces. Hidden cameras are usually used for monitoring home workers where their activities can be discretely filmed without their knowledge.

Types of Cameras

While choosing cameras, you can buy only a camera or a full home surveillance system. Similarly you can buy camera or cameras and the equipment separately. Some of the types are:

• Box: The lenses of this camera have large range. It’s an inexpensive camera and has dual power. This camera is prone to vandalism.
• Bullet: This is a large camera meant for outdoor use but should be mounted on a height to save it from vandalism.
• Dome: A dome camera has usually a fixed field of view and its lens has limitations.
• Spy/Hidden: This should necessarily be used indoor.

You can purchase different types of cameras for different purposes if you have a large home where many workers work and which also has a potential hazard of intruders.

Which Features should You Look for?

Next to type of equipment and type of cameras, features are what you should take into consideration. With the advancement in technologies, home security equipment come with a variety of features just enough to spoil you. However, it’s recommended to choose only necessary ones rather than wasting money on unnecessary features which you will in fact never use.

Wireless or Wired

Both these systems have their own pros and cons. Wireless means a signal transmitted by the camera. This camera is more flexible and often more discrete. Users can install it easily wherever required. However, if there is an interruption in the wireless internet, signals may be affected. Even a loss of few minutes, hours or days can result from such interruptions.

On the other hand, wired cameras are more cumbersome to install and unattractive to look at; however, their transmission is guaranteed and clear. They are also suitable to new construction as wires can be set inside walls.

 

Night Vision

Outdoor surveillance cameras should definitely have this feature. They can produce high quality pictures at night.

Resolution

The higher the resolution, the higher is the quality of images. Commonly a home surveillance camera has around 350 to 400 TVL (TV Lines) of resolution.

However, if you want the best for your home, better switch to High Definition (HD) or 4K. Here we’ll take a look at both these options.

HD video surveillance consists of a camera that generates images in higher resolution than the traditional cameras. These pictures have more pixels because of which they look clearer and larger. HD surveillance cameras are available in various styles like pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) that offer remote controllable monitoring which lets you zoom and focus the lens on a particular subject, Fixed cameras pointing directly to the subject and Dome cameras that have PTZ capabilities and also smoked effects which makes people unable to know the direction of the lens.

A high definition camera is normally measured by 720p or 1080p. P here stands for progressive span and the higher the p, the clearer is the image. So, 1080p indicates full HD resolution and generates the clearest image.

4K video surveillance, on the other hand, is a still more advanced option. 4K provides four times higher resolution as that of 1080p and gives a far better image quality to identify what happened during the events more clearly. However, it has a drawback – if you fail to plan and design your storage systems and network infrastructure properly, its effectiveness is considerably hampered. But this can be easily overcome by hiring professionals like AA Security Solutions to install the 4K surveillance system.

The outstanding features like facial recognition, zoom ability and high image quality are some things homeowners cannot afford to let go, and so, HD and 4K are becoming increasingly popular and people usually prefer both these options at the same time.

Coverage Area

There is a lot of variation in the field of coverage of different cameras. While some cameras can shoot only whatever is in the straight front line of the lens, other wide-angle cameras can shoot a larger space. And pan-tilt-zoom cameras can even shoot a 360-degree field.

Storage

The recording and storing capacity of the surveillance equipment is an important feature you should consider. Instead of VHS tapes of the past, today’s cameras can digitally record high quality films on a hard drive.

DVR Recorder

DVR recording equipment enables user to store a particular length of recording on a hard drive. For example, recording of around 45 to 60 days can be stored on a 750GB hard drive. A DVR recorder allows you to access any point in the video immediately and see the footage from a distance. The quality of a DVR recording is much higher than that of a VHS tape.

IP and Analog

These two are types of access to the footage your camera has recorded. An IP camera is connected to your internet system and you can access it through the URL address of the camera. Analog system or CCTV (closed circuit television) on the other hand is less expensive and can record countless hours of footage. It transforms the analog signal in digital prior to processing the recording. This system is better for home use as it doesn’t consume internet bandwidth. However, it’s also true that IP cameras are often better for linking multiple wireless cameras.

AA Security Solutions offers the best in home automation and surveillance solutions. Some of their outstanding features are no obligation or contract, durable, weatherproof, day-and-night infrared night vision cameras with high quality 4MP resolution and above all a great peace of mind when you are away. Why wait until after something bad happens? Install a home or business surveillance system today!