UPDATE 9-8-12: After a couple of months of use, I can say this product works exceptionally well and have upgraded my review from 4 to 5 stars there is a learning curve but if you take the time to learn the "tools" on your screen, this DVR is an exceptional device and works flawlessly Customer service has been awesome as well responding to emails within hours if not minutes.ORIGINAL REVIEW:
I purchased this DVR for my vacation home security system to upgrade my storage capacity and get my recordings off my PC and onto a separate hard drive. It does have some limitations however, overall I would rate it a 4+ especially for the technical support: you call the support number and there is no recording, no que a human actually answers (and this is especially nice) THEY KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING and in literally a minute or two I'm understanding and correcting the problem and/or getting a short tutorial on how this DVR system works. And they don't even ask you when you purchased the DVR or even what model it is (I presume the OS for these, regardless of model, is all the same?)
The only reason I'm not giving this DVR a 5 star rating is due to the quality of the operational manual. It's okay, but could be better laid out and explain terminology better but given the fact you can just call the vendor and they answer the phone, even on a Saturday afternoon, that alone almost makes up for the manual's less than detailed explanations. Don't get me wrong, the manual is better than most security manuals that are worthless, just not up to speed for what it could be.
The DVR has many nice features, most of them fairly straight forward however I wish the masking feature could be more easily adjusted for motion events its sort of an all or nothing process: once you demask a section, there seems to be no way to remask it without starting over a pain. Also, when you hover over some controls they identify their function, others do not (such as the PTZ controls) but once you learn what does what (no thanks to the manual) it all becomes second nature if you use the system fairly often (I use mine daily.)
I am still trying to figure out two things and have emailed the vendor for help: 1) how to locate an RCA style microphone, or an adapter for a 9mm mic, so I can use the audio feature (this is a limited audio, for only channel 1, so that is a limitation that they really need to improve on but for me, it doesn't matter) and 2) I get a much more vivid picture when I connect the VGA monitor directly to the DVR (for local viewing) perhaps the server reduces the quality of the video for compression purposes, but I would appreciate being able to set up the quality over the Internet to my specs... and not be dumbed down.
For the capacity and features, and given I picked this up on a $189 sale price, I feel like I got exactly or perhaps a bit more (great tech support) than I paid for. For that I am thankful and feel like, after having dealt with other companies that offer little or no support, this is a refreshing company to deal with and highly recommend them. I cannot stress how important it is, when you are 350 miles away from a property you are monitoring, to be able to rely on a system AND get support when you need it. PLUS, this system can be FULLY controlled remotely, just as if you were there doesn't matter. Most DVR systems offer remote control but have limitations to what you can do remotely this one is the same, here or there. Nice!
I would not hesitate to purchase anything from this vendor they are reasonably priced, pleasant to deal with, responsive (both on line and telephone), available 6 days a week and above all, KNOWLEDGEABLE!
No comments:
Post a Comment