CWK4 2-Heavy Duty Wired Colour Camera CCTV Kit

The product mention the HHD being 160gb. Mine came with 500gb. The O/S is linux and the internal Firmware Update cannot be improved or updated according to Friedland via Honeywell. otherwise no problem at all. If you have phono plugs fitted to your own CCTV cameras this kit inside is supplied with BNC adapters and a single BNC to Phono plug for tv or monitors. The two supplied cameras are ideal for starters as the lens angle covers 50% angle with a myriad of ir leds for night vision with a range of 15 meters. Daylight viewing and night time can be a little wash looking but still legible for purpose this might be due to non variable adapter lens. If you have a variable lens type of camera external type your in luck but if you rely on the software then this DVR Software doesn't have it. Read the instruction first for setting up the system as the p/s mouse saves a lot hassle pushing front buttons so plug this in first before switching on. The mini Linux O/S will begin the simple tasks needed but you need to format the HDD second then followed cameras adjustments. *SO READ THE INSTRUCTION FIRST* You can have upto four CCTV cameras working and including a Wireless version if need on any port. But stress the wireless being dependant on range limits and interference issues ensure where the range is important for use. The DVR itself is very solid being metal covering buttons on the front are simple to use and two lights indicating Power and HHD in use are visible enough. A security keys are supplied for the HDD access draw for the change to a larger version if needed but with 500gb supplied in mine by the manufacture this is more than enough for my purpose. A software mini disk for PCs is in the package but on the website you can download the latest version for which works happily on Windows 10. For transferring recorded files you must use a USB Stick formatted to FAT32 to save and move over to the PC. Fan noise level is medium if near but if you have a dedicated spot/room for recording and monitoring then no problem. I guess with the age of the product and reason for the updates being unavailable now this Starter kit is not really for professional bods but general home security types or people on a limited budget this Kit is perfect. If anyone interested for a start the price may reflect the age but the equipment is good enough for me and the supplier was excellent in postage service. *Warning note for anyone buying CCTV cameras are visible to public and public automatically have rights, so given that a couple of small warning CCTV stickers are inside, best buy a larger version to give fair warning and even better deterrent to illiterate would be burglars and wary neighbours*. Regards John Manchester England. P.S. ***WORTH A PUNT***

Bought the CWK4 kit primarily to bring a halt to repeated keying etc. of our cars, as well as for general security. The idea was I would put one camera on the front of our terrace house and the other on the back. Let me say first of all that the images are very good, a little overexposed in daylight maybe but excellent at night. Somewhat disappointingly, though, I have had to put both cameras on the front, pointing different ways, because one camera alone is incapable of seeing the two cars at once. Car 1 is by the kerb directly outside the house. Its far side is 10 metres from our front door. Seen through the camera it fills the screen, with a circle of about one and a half metres of road around it. 5 metres from the back end of this car is the back end of Car 2 which is on hard standing in the garden, and all the camera sees of this one is its rear half and a bit of pavement. The cameras are fitted to one side of a top opening window upstairs, where I can reach out to adjust them without getting a ladder out. Apart from taking advantage of an air vent to feed the wires through (the wires are meant to come out of the rear of the bracket and through the wall; I enlarged a hole in the bottom of the bracket and brought the wires out that way) it was the best place to avoid a camera pointing towards anyone's windows. If I fitted the camera lower down, so it would be looking out more, rather than down at an angle, there would be blind spots behind the cars. (There was a former occasion when I looked out of the window and saw someone crouching down behind a car which I found in the morning to be damaged; the police were unable to do anything because from where I was I couldn't actually see him physically doing it.) There would also be a great chance of the camera being interfered with. Anyway, two cameras would still be needed to see both cars. Wide angle lenses are the norm on modern digital cameras, so you get used to seeing a lot at once through the viewfinder or on the lcd screen. Unfortunately these cctv cameras are nothing like that. UPDATE: My verdict after 19 months of use: If you want cctv for the same purpose as I did, don't waste your money on something like this. I have just spent some time viewing 18 hours of recordings trying to find who knocked off my folded-in door mirror. All I can say is it could have been any one of about 150 cars and vans, because you can't see what's happening on the far side of the car. Even if I had seen which one did it, their registration number wouldn't be visible. It's been the same when looking to see who's flytipped outside - because of the small field of vision, people are in and out of the frame in a flash. Even though I'm Windows savvy the controls for this kit are fiddly to use and the instructioins not easy to understand, while the mouse is fast and jerky and cannot be slowed. You sit with cursor poised over Pause and finger ready on the mouse button, but then the onscreen controls fade out after 5 seconds, so you have to bring them up again. To rewind, it goes back at double speed so you overshoot and have to come back again. All in all, I'm sorry I bought this kit, I think a dummy camera would have been cheaper and about as useful.

easy to fit, and set up

I would not recommend this product. When I received it and connected it to a TV, the picture was really blurry. After a good few hours trying to figure out what was wrong, including trying it on 3 other TVs, I concluded that the recorder box was faulty and it had to be returned. Despite it's price, the main recorder box has a rather cheap appearance, and has very "clunky" menus.

It had taken me about one hour to get it to work off a night shift. I set the cameras up at my windows and spent the next few days getting To know the system before fixing it out side. Once you download it to a memory stick and view on the computer The picture is crystal clear. I have now got 4 cameras on the go and have no problems apart From a spider that likes one of the cameras but I can reach it to give it a wipe Out of my window. I would recommend this kit.