Rating: 7/10
Internet Cameras are very cheap these days, and using one you can have a half decent video/phone experience using broadband. Those products are fine, but what if you want something more professional for a security problem, or for a public facing video experience? Then you need to consider something almost exactly like the Intellinet Model 550710, a professional Network IP Camera.
Once I got this unit out of its box I was impressed by how substantial it is. When combined with its ball-socket wall mount this is a robust package which could be deployed anywhere that's out of the rain.
Getting it operational is very easy indeed, as it plugs directly into a 10/100 Ethernet network where it can be given a static IP address and referenced by that number. Putting the IP into a web browser allows you to log into the camera and see what it sees, along with another 100 simultaneous users. The quality isn't broadcast, but at 320x200 and 30fps it's more than adequate for most surveillance purposes. It does offer a maximum of 640x480, but only at 8 fps.
Being able to see what it sees is good, but the designers of the camera saw it as being able to do much more, and so they gave it a GPIO (General Purpose Input/Output) interface. Using this it's possible to motorise the camera, or allow it to trigger external events, like a door lock or light switch.
What the camera sees can also trigger things to happen, as it's entirely programmable to sense motion and raise an alarm, or record the activity and e-mail that, when something happens. This doesn't require a server, as the camera is entirely capable of processing its own events and can even FTP images to a computer on the Internet.
What I loved about this hardware was that I kept coming up with ideas, and then finding out that they'd already being considered. As standard the camera uses a small power adapter, to which my immediate response was 'why not power over Ethernet?' only to discover that this is an option, as are a range of lenses, powered platforms and even external waterproof mounts. And for those people with their own original ideas about how to use it there's a full-blown software development API and SDK.
This is an expensive camera when compared with some of the cheap ones that look like they fell out of a cereal packet. But if you want proper equipment that will deliver great performance and features then this is exactly what you require.
For more information, visit Micromart.co.uk