Wireless Security Camera System,Firstrend 5MP Security System Wireless with 4 CCTV Cameras Ultra HD Two Way Audio 8CH NVR 2TB Hard Drive Night Vision Motion Alarm APP for Home Indoor Outdoor

This review applies to Firstrend Wireless NVR Kit Model # FTUS-W843M1TA-XM, which includes a wireless NVR unit, (4) 3MP wireless bullet cameras (resolution: 2288x1288), 5 power cables, a mini mouse, drill templates, a short ethernet cable and a user manual. This was my first purchase with a CCTV solution and it was an easy learning curve. Unboxing was straight forward, no issues there. The NVR itself is housed in a metal chassis with a 1 TB hard drive, the outer ports are (1) VGA, (1) HDMI port, (1) Ethernet port, (2) USB ports, (1) power port, and 2 wifi antennas. The unit does not come with an HDMI or VGA cable, so you must supply yourself if you want to setup the unit through the onboard setup. Once you connect the unit to power, and you can see a picture on the TV/monitor, the NVR will run through a setup wizard that is self explanatory. You cannot type in this interface, or hook up a keyboard, but the on screen menu will let you use a virtual keyboard where you can click the letters to setup a password for the system. The cameras come pre configured and paired from the factory. All you need to do is supply power. If for some reason your camera isn’t paired, you can run through the menus and pair them by using the supplied ethernet cable. Each camera comes with an antenna, an adjustable ball socket that will clamp down, a mounting bracket with (3) screw holes, and a pair of wires that hold an ethernet jack and a power dongle. Placing them is relatively easy, and there are packs of drywall mounting screws if you need that. I tested this system for 30 days. What I liked: Easy setup: I was able to get it running in about 20 minutes, unboxing to NVR setup. Wireless connection is very strong. It runs the cameras on its own wireless network using an MKK protocol by default. Silent: the unit isn’t noisy at all. Interface: the onboard interface can be clunky, but once you’ve been in the menus, everything is just a right click away. Storage: the entire 30 days I was recording, I managed to fill up about 600GB of the 1 TB storage. This is 24/7 footage with motion alert clips. Backup: you can backup your clips to an external storage. My 5 TB drive wasn’t recognized, but a 2TB drive worked just fine. Voice: each clip was also accompanied with audio. Playback: I could see all of my clips through the interface by using a quick search. Support: their technical support is top notch. They will usually respond to emails in a day or so, and their phone tech support is amazing. RTSP support: it is not explicitly mentioned anywhere, but after trying varying combinations of rtp:// urls I was able to get a feed from the different cameras to stream to YouTube or Twitch. For those interested it is rtsp://[username]:[password]@[ipaddress]:[port]/channel=[camera number]&stream=[0 or 1].sdp? Remote login: You can setup your router to port forward 3 different ports to login and view the clips or live feed. Phone app: XMEye Pro is what is recommended for this NVR. It connected flawlessly and I was able to manage the cameras and NVR easily. What I disliked: Power setup: each camera needs to be individually plugged in. Be prepared to use extension cords. Backup: to backup your clips, you must use the onboard software or the VMS software. You can only backup 1024 records or files at a time, and each backup of 1024 records takes on average about an hour. I had about 14,000 records. Customer service said they would fix this in a future update. Backup format: you can choose between three different formats to backup in: .h264, .avi, .mp4. The .h264 standard this NVR system uses is a proprietary version, so if you want to somehow view them on your computer, they won’t play unless you use the included video codec executable the backup software writes to the backup directory. If you want avi and mp4 backups, be prepared for clips that are sped up too fast. I think it has something to do with the conversion trying to force a 30fps framerate on a 6-7 (average) fps clip. Also, sometimes the mp4/avi clips will drop entire chunks of video (20 seconds at a time). Windows software: You can also control this NVR through a windows application that is not included with the package nor available on their website. You need to contact customer service to get it. Once you have it, the interface is intuitive, and you can reach most settings for the NVR. The camera live feed is nice, but if you click on another tab of the program, it will sometimes bug out and not be able to load the feed. Restarting the software fixes this. Hard drive: As mentioned before, you need to use the software to get your clips. If you physically take the hard drive out to backup your clips, the drive is not recognized in any OS – Linux and Windows (didn’t have a Mac). This is for security reasons I’m sure, but it’s annoying when I just want to copy the raw data. Wireless positioning: The wireless signal is strong, but you will need to find a place somewhere in the middle of your cameras if you want the sweet spot without having to piggyback one camera off another. The piggyback solution uses one of your cameras as a repeater of sorts to connect a far away camera to a camera that’s closer to your NVR. I tried doing this to one of my cameras, and it fixed that cameras connection, but left the repeating camera’s connection slower. Inconsistent clips: The cameras come with a resolution of 2288x1288 max, but sometimes they will record in 1280x720, 1920x1080 and the framerate will vary wildly from as low as 4 fps to 25fps. I know this cuts down on size, but it’s annoying when I want to use the clip elsewhere.

We’ve had the cameras up for about 4 weeks and use them constantly (presently having problems with a rouge third reich HOA president). The good: Pictures are great, very high quality and the mobile app and controls thru the app are good. Occasionally it takes 3-4 second to reload an image, but once loaded it manages all 4 cameras quite well. Setup was easier than our first system (Zmodo, cloud based). Initial login left me confused, no indication as to what the default password is (it’s null. As in nothing, leave it blank) and had me calling support. I figured it out before they returned my call, but they did return my call within a hour even though they promised 24 hours. They then called again within 12 and followed up with multiple text messages. So, service is great! Even if an extra line in the instructions would have made it moot. What could be better; The power cords. The ‘wall wort’ is big. Surely way bigger than it needs to be, and since I stuffed them into an extension box attached under floodlights it was a very not easy. The line off the camera also has a plug for an Ethernet connection. Which might be nice, but generally it just means that routing the line thru anything small is impossible. Fortunately I live in a very dry environment so for the 2 lines I had long runs with I carefully cut the Ethernet connection off and heatshrinked those wires airtight. So while I brought up the negatives, note that I still gave them 5 stars. Awesome, clear pictures, mostly simple setup, phenomenal service, and great value for the money. And you don’t have to worry about your security footage being maintained on a cloud (cloud just means someone else’s computer - do you really want people you don’t know watching you?).

I have had these cameras for almost 3 years and they are still working great. In addition, they have great tech-support as I was able to contact them and they not only emailed me but also called me several times to go over an issue I had with my programming. I had purchased these for my office and I am going to purchase some for my home.

Likes: -- Camera's were simple to setup. The unit comes preconfigured with the 4 camera's and the wifi sets up a non routed network for them in the 172.x.x.x network. -- The system was able to use other recent ONVIF cameras with the monitor only, they don't work with the PC software. The 4 you get with the system do work well with both the phone app and the pc software. -- The tech support people were nice and were able to help me. They do call back on their time which was 11pm EST my time. Dislikes -- The NVR works well but plan on adding a new drive if your going to up the camera count or add PoE camera's that have a higher FPS video output. -- The PC software doesn't display other camera types on the software. It shows them on but no images are being transmitted. -- The Phone App doesn't take settings from the NVR for camera devices. -- RTSP protocol for other cameras doesn't appear to work even though it will say connected. -- It will not work with older camera's with older versions of ONVIF protocols. Overall: Its not a bad set for the price point. If you take your time, test the camera's out of the box. Keep in mind putting in new camera's so they look nice takes time, you can do a lot with the system. I'm happy with the system. Side Note: You should think about what you will need to hide wires and have power at each location before doing any physical changes to the walls.