DIY Simple Home Security System Help/Advice

We've been shopping around for home security with the major alarm providers like ADT or xfinity home etc...

I find them to be a bit more expensive for what I'm looking for.

All I want is to monitor my home with security camera's thru a phone app.

So most basic setup I would like is 1 camera in the living room which I can access thru my phone or computer.

Is this easy to setup or does anyone know a product out there I can buy for such a simple security system? I may want to go for door sensors later on but I want to at least start with security cameras accessed over my phone and computer.

Thanks!

 

If you just want camera ability then just get an IP cam (preferably pan and tilt). I use this both inside and outside of the house. View-able through the Internet.

In fact here is an example. This is my IP cam located on the front of the house. I'm giving you access to view but no access to pan or tilt or change parameters. You might ask why would I allow perfect strangers to have viewing access to my outside cam? Because its safer. Many of the homes in my neighborhood have outside cams. The more people that know this the less chance of burglary or theft will take place. In other words the word is out that my street is being monitored.

Use address 74.77.202.51:85

Gueast Name : Norm301 (note the upper case N)
Use password: hotmail

With this type of cam you can have three levels of usage: Administrator...controls all functions, User... has some camera control such as pan and tilt, and User... which is view only.

Most of these cameras have the ability to record, have active alarm and e-mail. Cost will run from as little as $50 to hundreds.

If you want more security at low cost then most big box stores have a do it yourself door and window alarm systems. Or you can use something like SimpliSafe at a low cost no contract monitoring system. Or use the system without SimpliSafe monitoring ability. There are others just like them.

 

I just hacked your camera Norm. Just kidding.

The password is hotmail (all lower case)

 

Thank you. I made the correction in original post.

 

If you just need a couple of cameras that can be remotely accessed; the IP security cameras that companies like Dlink makes will probably do the trick for you.

 

Thank you again everyone. This forum is terrific to get fast advice.

I went to the store and researched the dlink cam's. There was one for $40 and brought it home to test out. It simple without the swivel option. Pain to setup but once I got it working, it was decent.

The only thing I wish it did not have was a plug in to the outlet. Are there any options that run on batteries? But no major concern. I see the output is pretty poor resolution around 240p, but it's fine, I can see my room.

I may pick these up for the other rooms as well now. As for an outside cam, I will try to see if there's a way to hook that up with a better unit.


Thanks!

 

You really don't want batteries. You go poor just replacing them.

You'll like the Dlink cams. Both my son and son-in-law use those. But I think that if it can't pan and tilt, it's not worth it.

 

Video is energy intensive. Battery powered solutions go through batteries like a pig goes through corn.

Also, with video, you do generally get what you pay for. The $40 unit is a $40 picture, the more expensive ones generally have better optics and CCDs.

 

I'm going to buy a few more of the $40 cams now that I've liked the dlink. It has motion and sound sensors and will email me if it detects those. Nice. I did fix the resolution up to 480p which is still ok. They had a swivel one but it was around $120. I'd rather get 3 of these for that price for 3 rooms than 1.

Thanks for the advice about batteries. I just bought some extension cords at Walmart for 3 bucks so that solves that.

First time DLink has come thru for me.