Zmodo 4 Channel SPOE NVR with 4 x 720p Cameras & 500GB

I bought this system twice. The first time I bought it, one camera did not work with poor reception and an unclear picture. The other cameras functioned great. I returned the full item at that time. Because of the reasonable cost and high picture quality, I decided to give it another try and bought the system again thinking I was just unlucky the with previous purchase. Again, one camera was defective. One - single camera does not transmit to the internet whereas the others transmit fine. I tested the cameras upon opening but did not check the internet broadcasting prior to installation. Suffice to say, after 10 hours of wiring and mounting, only 3/4 cameras work. I have changed the cameras around; 3 of the cameras work great, so the wiring is not faulty. This system would be awesome 5 stars - IF the quality control was good. --------------------------- Update, I contacted the seller and he replaced the unit and paid for shipping. The system works as advertised. Great resolution with fairly simple install. I can view it from my computer and I am working on getting it visible on my wife's iphone. I have reviewed the video recordings and at times it seem it misses 1-2 minutes randomly. I cannot decipher if it is related to my internet or a camera issue. Overall I am happy with the purchase and and camera quality and resolution. For the price you cannot beat this system at this level. The customer service via email was excellent. Pros: 1) Single wire to camera - ethernet power (important if doing a attic or a lot of wiring you can save a lot of headache not needing 2 wires) 2) Great camera viewing - 720p resolution (higher than most cameras out there) 3) zmodo support 4) Straight forward install Cons: 1) Quality control can be an issue but this is superseded by the customer support 2) only 4 camera system, some people may want 8 or the option for 8 3) Brief missed recording periods 4) VGA connection to monitor (not a big deal, I bought a dell monitor on Craigslist for 20$ and installed everything in my attic) --------------------------------------------------- Update 9/15/2014 I made some small adjustments that have helped greatly - I thought I would share 1) Use CAT6 Cables. I replaced the CAT 5 cables provided with CAT6 cables and the image resolution and night vision is about 30% better. Really clear! So you can buy cables for about 15$ on amazon and for me it was totally worth it! 2) Assign a stable IP address to cameras and NVR system. I went into my router settings and assigned the IP addresses to be stable so now I can access them consistently with my Kindle, iphone using the zmodo app. I have not tried access remotely outside of my home network because I have not had time to troubleshoot things. 3) The periods of nonrecording previously mentioned were due to my internet NOT the system. So I set it to "continuous record" and disabled the motion detect setting. So the system is constantly recording. No more gaps. Last week I saw a suspicious car outside my house, used the playback and found it was the neighbors cleaning service. Pretty cool.

Overview: The first order I received the quality control was almost non-existent. One of the cameras had all the threads that hold the case-back on completely stripped. I threw the mouse in the garbage after about 10 seconds of trying to use it; Essentially worthless. I later had to go dig in the trash for this mouse for my return. Three of the four cameras died within a week of ownership. I highly recommend setting up your system and letting it run for at least a week just plugged up on a table. I did a return on with Amazon (which is fantastically easy) and the second order I received is working adequately. I'm used to having to hack together things to make something work, so this product is just... meh. Software: The Zsight (v1.2.2.74) software sucks. Using the android app, transitioning from inside and outside of the network that the IPC's are on forces you to logout and log back in. When it works, its okay... when it doesn't work, its mildly frustrating. If this is a feature you would use constantly, I'd look elsewhere. The built-in software on the DVR (v40.0.2.7) works okay. Its very simple and functional. I'd like the option to VNC into this machine to control it. The DVR runs linux, so it might not be too hard of a challenge. An IP-KVM might also be a good alternative. The web interface on the DVR and the IPC's is solidly terrible. It flat out does not work in anything other than IE, which still doesn't work. Once logging in, you are presented with a broken interface that prompts you to log in again. If you plan on using the web interface, I'd look elsewhere. Hardware: The cameras are very simply built and have a hilariously short cord on them. You're gonna want to seal the Ethernet connection up with some dielectric grease or some sort of junction box if you plan on putting these outside for any length of time. If you live anywhere that's constantly humid or near the ocean, I'd say go ahead and silicone up the plug once you put the Ethernet cable in. The field of view on these cameras is a bit more narrow than I expected. Don't expect a super wide GoPro like FOV. If I had to put a guess, I'd say its somewhere in the mid 70 degree FOV. The cameras are actually pretty decent at night with a pretty impressive near infrared spectrum. The IR-led's are quite bright, so if you are thinking about hiding these cameras they will be easily spotted at night by looking for the red ring around the camera. Cons: Other than the quality control on my first device and the pretty terrible software, the only extreme negative I can find is that I cannot change the default password on the IPC's themselves (because their web interface is broken). Admin:111111 is the username/pass. Changing the password on the DVR is trivial. Hacking: Fun - I have read the documentation on the device and I understand that it like most devices run an embedded linux. Looks like a somewhat obvious UART pinout... someone with a scope and some time might find some fun in this device. Scary - Default setup mentions nothing about changing the password on the cameras themselves. If you can access the network that the cameras are on, it's trivially easy to get the video feed from them with the default password. If you have these pointing inside your house... someones probably watching you. All in all its a bottom of the barrel device that functions just enough to not warrant me returning it. If you live in a super-sketchy neighborhood I'd probably invest in a nicer device. That includes anyone thinking of using this in a commercial application. Update: 1/12/16 I've had this device for a while now and thought I would add some additional comments. First off, two of my camera's have died. Of the remaining two, one of them works great while the other no longer has IR functionality. Unfortunately, without IR the camera is completely useless in the dark. Furthermore, the camera never clicks over to the night time mode which rendered my additional IR illumination useless. Of the two dead camera's... One is flooded with water (was installed under an overhang) and visibly arcs inside when plugged into the DVR. The other has a charred Cat5 cable end. I've replaced the plug and it still no longer functions. Upon disassembling of the camera, I found that one of the Phillips headed screws that is intended to hold a PCB board to a brass barrel was loose in the camera body. I suspect this caused a short and ruined the camera. I've found that many times the android app will not contact my DVR, which warrants me having to go power cycle it manually. This happens maybe once a month. I have also experianced the DVR having some sort of problem with my hard drive. I placed in it a brand new Western Digital RE4 enterprise class hard drive. I am very familiar with these drives and have good experience with them. I had placed an extra cooling fan for the DVR and hard drive to keep cool air flowing over them, as I know these drive can get hot. Twice now, I have had the DVR say that it needs to format the drive. I have taken the drive to my workplace and tested it extensively with no issue. Overall I would not recommend this product. The quality control is abysmal and the features are lacking.

For the price, it's a very good system. I have purchased and installed two of these systems at my home. So far I have been happy with their performance. That is not to say there haven't been any issues, but when I compare them with the price I paid for a HD NVR system, I really can't complain. I have listed the pros/cons below, when reading the cons,please keep in mind how inexpensive this systems is when you consider you are getting a HD quality CCTV system. Also, I highly recommend using a UPS for this unit, it does not like power failures. My first unit has been working for about a year now. Pros: Simple installation, it is basically plug and play. The video quality when viewing at home is fantastic Zmodo app for Android works well, even when away from home wifi. You can connect to more than one NVR or other Zmodo camera on the app home screen. Bonus, it automatically found a Zmodo wifi camera that I had previously purchased . Cons: When using the Zmodo app on my phone the video is time delayed and jumpy, but still viewable. One of the cameras was out of focus upon arrival, I had to take it apart and adjust/clean the lens. If you experience a power failure you have to shutdown and restart several times before remote viewing will work again. There is a 15 min delay until you can playback recorded video from your phone, from the NVR it's instant. The motion detection is a bit weak, sometimes it works, sometime it doesn't, I left mine set on the most sensitive just to be safe, I'd rather record too much than not enough. The UI is not very sophisticated, and takes some getting used to, but overall it does what it needs to do.

I managed to score this when they dropped the price at Amazon Warehouse for $149 (now $649). Best security deal ever. The cameras are sharp, cover a wide area, and have true colouring daylight. The software for IPad and IPhone works very well and is simple to install. I have our system up and running in a little over hour, all outside, and am very pleased. Further, when I requested instructions for the software, they quickly sent me copy and when one camera failed, they sent a replacement very quickly. Now, I am not a CCTV expert, but I got an excellent system for a wonderful price which also had excellent service from the company...

Está muy bien en la entrega, el producto llega completo de acuerdo con lo ofrecido por el vendedor, la instalación en tu casa es muy sencilla solo conectas y listo ya tienes imágenes de inmediato, también me gusta que solo con un cable tienes video y corriente en cada cámara, lo que no me gusta es que es muy complicado ver las cámaras fuera de tu casa porque la configuración para el teléfono, tableta o pc no está disponible en español y tienes que buscar tutoriales en internet ya que en la página del fabricante no son claras. Hay que pedir apoyo de tu proveedor de internet, etc para poder ver lo que sucede en tu casa cuando estás en el trabajo o en otro lugar lejos de ella

Buen equipo, todo funciona bien una resolución suficiente para su uso en casa. Llego en tiempo y forma, ya está en funcionamiento.

uan de las camaras me de plano a los días de conectada, empezo a fallar hasta que no registra color y solo aparece en blanco y negro ademas de que no se ve la toma de infrarrojo y hace unos días de plano otra camara de la nada dejo de funcionar, producto fácil de instalar pero con poca duración

For $300 I was buying it more as a toy and see if it works at all. I'm not disappointed. This particular unit needs a separate hard drive. They have other versions that include hard drive. Would be nice to know that there are special ones for surveillance system. Mine has been working for a couple of months with my spare hard drive. Hope the drive will last. Installation is very straight forward as only one network cable will do. No need for finding a power outlet and video cable (much thicker and less flexible). Used the QRcode to find the monitoring software to install on my Android phone. Now I can monitor my home anywhere. Video quality is pretty good. Thanks to another post suggesting not to initialize the camera in low light. I did that at first and two of the cameras didn't focus at all. Once I initialize at broad day light, the cameras function well both day and night. The most annoying thing is that the software generates alerts when switching from day to night mode. So it happens everyday at dawn and dusk for every camera. So make sure you don't wire it to your alarm system or you'll at least get alarm every day eight times at least (4 cameras 2 times a day). At one point the Android app somehow hides the recording review function. The software definitely needs some work.