Going beyond Dahua and Hikvision for vehicles on residential streets at night. $1000 to $10,000 range?

[wombsganz]

Hi, I've been in this hobby for over a decade now, and I'm at a stage where law enforcement regularly contact me for video footage.

I run 1/1.8" low-MP Dahua cams in all the prime crime areas with multiple angles, B/W + Color, manual gain, shutter, and minimal 3D NR, to get the best possible DORI values.

At this stage I have gotten the absolute most I can out of the Dahua sensors. While they are great, I can actually justify spending more having seen how much they have contributed to catching criminals. Where would you go from here? If you were willing to spend in the $1,000 to $10,000 range, are there better sensors out there beyond Dahua's 1/1.8" and 1/1.2" options, or is it mostly marketing?

 

[wittaj]

Sadly, it is mostly marketing. The iphone and DJI drones and dashcams typically have better sensors than what are in these cams, but see how long they last outside in 24/7 conditions LOL. For a variety of reasons, the tech used in surveillance cams lags many generations behind other markets.

Axis would be the next brand to look at.

Axis is a great brand and if you want to spend the money, go for it.

smiticans is our resident Axis expert and has shown great quality with them. He sums it up best in this post (excerpt copied below):

"The price of Axis cameras aren't just for the image quality. You're also paying for 10 years of firmware updates to stay up to date with features and cybersecurity. They meet NDAA, TAA, FIPS 140-2 or 3 compliance, support zero trust networking and have support for signed video (adds cryptographic signatures to recorded video to verify the video is authentic and hasn't been tampered with). They also have additional cybersecurity features such as Edge Vault etc. They support integration to access control systems, perimeter detection systems that include radar units, thermal imaging sensors, speakers, sirens/strobes and relay units. They support MQTT, VAPIX commands, ACAP (Axis Camera Application Platform) where apps can be developed and run directly on the camera itself. The higher end ones also have DLPU (Deep Learning Processing Units) for analytics. The Zipstream technology and compression allow these cameras to use less bitrate while maintaining image quality. My Axis cameras use about half of the storage/bitrate when compared to my Dahua cameras without sacrificing image quality.

If you're trying to keep your install on a lower budget, Dahua is the way to go. If you don't care about budget, and are interested in the Axis features I listed above, it might make more sense for you to use Axis.

Just keep in mind, this forum leans heavily towards BI and Dahua cameras. You will get a lot of support here if you purchase Dahua cameras. You won't get lot of support if you purchase Axis cameras."