Router Compatibility for Internet Enabled Wireless CCTV Systems

The modern replacement for old analogue CCTV cameras is the wireless internet CCTV, also known as IP CCTV. The wireless CCTV system that is internet enabled has a great advantage over old system. You can see your property from anywhere in the world. You can see live images and video of your business property or your house, from wherever you are, just with the help of internet.

The technology has come in the market, but not many people know how to best use to. In order to get the best out of your wireless internet CCTV system, we must also look at the requirements and features that a router would need in order to be used successfully with the wireless system. There are a lot of things that goes into deciding your router for the wireless internet CCTV.

Broadband Type and Router Compatibility

You can have a broadband service that can come through either a phone line or a satellite CCTV box. In case the broadband service is through a phone line, you will require an ADSL modem/router also known as the DSL modem/router. Alternatively, if your broadband comes from your cable supplier, you would then require a cable router. This is another box that plugs in to your cable box.

The router part of your DSL modem/router or the cable router is basically the same. Manufacturers just make the DSL or cable version of the router that has the same features.

Router Features for Wireless CCTV System

• The router must be set up so that the port number, a special code, is allocated to the camera. When you type the IP address and the port number in the internet browser from any system, the router sees the port number and passes the message to the camera. Without this facility, it will not be possible to view your property through internet.
• With broadband suppliers changing your IP address at will, DDNS i.e. dynamic DNS support comes in. It helps you to use a third-party service to link a domain name you your IP address. The router’s DDNS feature makes sure that the router will tell the DDNS provider about your current IP address. Thus, even if your IP address changes, you can contact your camera with the domain name of the DDNS.
• Having your router remain connected is very important. This is important especially when you go out on a vacation. You don’t want to find that you cannot connect to your camera because your router disconnected due to power failure. In case of power cut, the DSL line or cable may drop for some time. Not many home routers are able to handle this, but with technology, new routers are able to reconnect by themselves after power cut. The router is able to sort itself out once the power is back and provides you hassle free access to your camera from anywhere in the world.

Thus, a router is an important device that enables you to monitor the security of your home and business’s wireless cctv systems from anywhere in the world.

Choosing Routers for Wireless Internet CCTV

Wireless Internet CCTV, also known as IP CCTV, is the modern replacement for old analogue CCTV cameras, and has the great advantage that you can see your property, live, from wherever you happen to be, using the internet. Now that the technology has become popular in homes and businesses, people need to know how to get the best out of it. In this article, I want to look at the minimum set of features that a router needs in order to be used successfully with wireless CCTV.

First, a quick note about types of broadband and router compatibility. Your broadband service is likely to come through your phone line or perhaps via a satellite CCTV box. If it’s through a phone line, you will need an ADSL modem/router, sometimes called a DSL modem/router. The modem part of the box is what talks to the phone line. On the other hand, if you have broadband from your cable supplier, you need a cable router. This is not the cable box itself, but another box that plugs into your cable box. The router part of a cable router or a DSL modem/router is usually the same, with many manufacturers making cable and DSL versions of what is essentially a router with the same features. Now, let’s take a look at the features you will need to get the most out of your wireless internet CCTV system:

• Virtual Server/Port Forwarding. This just means having the ability to set up the router so that a special code known as a port number is allocated to the camera. When you open an internet browser window and type in the URL or address of the camera, you add this special port number onto the end of the camera’s address, (e.g. for port 8765, you would type “http://:8765″) and when the router sees the port number it knows the message is to be passed to the camera. Without this facility, you would not be able to see your property over the internet.
• DDNS Support. It stands for Dynamic DNS and is used where the address of your home or business on the broadband system, known as the IP address, is changed at will by the broadband supplier. Most DSL broadband services have changing IP addresses, also known as dynamic IP addresses. Say you have an IP address of 91.103.218.59 (they tend to look like this) today, with dynamic IP addressing it could be something different tomorrow. This means you would never know what address to use to access your camera over the internet, and that is where DDNS support comes in. Basically, you use a third party service to link a domain name to an IP address. This service is provided by a separate DDNS provider and can be free, e.g. dyndns.com. The router’s DDNS feature means that the router makes sure it always tells the DDNS provider what your current broadband IP address is. Therefore, even if the IP address changes, you can always contact your camera by using the same dyndns address, e.g. “http://myipcamera.dyndns.com:8765″.
• Keep alive or auto-reconnect feature. This feature is all about making sure the router stays connected. You may have a power cut, or the DSL line/ cable connection may drop for a few moments. In these scenarios, you want the router to sort itself out. Earlier models of home router did not handle this well, and even today some can still be bought that don’t reconnect after a power cut or especially a broadband fault. The last thing you want is to go on holiday and then find you cannot log into your camera because a power cut several days ago left the router disconnected, so this is important.
• Encryption. Most routers these days offer some sort of encryption, usually known as WEP or WPA. WPA is stronger and preferable. Encryption is simply encoding the messages on your wireless network so that they cannot be intercepted easily. Make sure you get a router that offers at least one type of encryption that your wireless internet CCTV cameras offer. For example, it is no good getting a router which only does WPA encryption if your cameras can only do WEP.

As always, if what you have read here leaves you dizzy and you just want an internet CCTV system to monitor your home or business without all this technical complication, my advice is to get a fully-configured wireless CCTV camera pack from a specialist supplier.

How To Setup Two or More Routers Together

One of the most common issues people encounter is when they have more than one router hooked up. Sometimes people don't realize their modem is also a router (Such as DSL) and other times people hook up an extra router to use things their router/modem doesn't have, such as wireless.

So now with 2 or more routers hooked up people start to realize port forwarding & port triggering isn't working. This is because they are only setting up the port forwarding or triggering in one router, which is what they should be doing! Now let me explain, no one wants to setup port forwarding & triggering rules in two or more routers, they should only need to do it in one, making things simple. But you may ask "If I have more than one router how can I keep it simple?" The answer: DMZ

First off DMZ is supported by nearly every router/modem out there. What DMZ does is allow you to tell the router to forward all incoming connections to a single IP address. So in this case we will setup DMZ in the first router to point to the second router. Now all incoming connections are sent to the 2nd router and thus your port forwarding & triggering will work again.

So here is a quick example. I log into router 1 and go to the DMZ settings and put the WAN IP address of the 2nd router there. Now router 1 is out of the way for port forwarding and triggering as all incoming connections are now being forwarded to router 2. Now in router 2 I can setup my port forwarding & triggering rules just like normal.

So here is a quick step by step.
Step 1. Login into your Router
Step 2. Find the status page that shows the WAN/Internet IP address and write it down. (The Gateway IP will be the IP needed to log into the first router/modem.)
Step 3. Log into the first router/modem now.
Step 4. Find the DMZ page
Step 5. Enter the IP you wrote down into the DMZ page and enable DMZ.
Step 6. Save and you’re done.

Quick Tip: You should setup a static WAN IP address for router 2. If you leave it on DHCP the IP could change thus breaking the DMZ and of course breaking the port forwarding & triggering. This doesn't happen very often, but it is always a possibility.

If you want to Setup 3 routers at home. Here is my plan to setup. Please let me know if it make sense.

1.    SMC. It is a modern with router. It locates in the first floor, Rogers cable connected to this router. It is the main router to connect outside. I turned off the wireless on the router. It has 4 ports connected to SMC all with wires. First one connect to D-615(second router) Second one connect to D-815(third router) Third one connect to WD Mybook live(NAS HHD) Fourth one connect to TV player

2.    DLink 615. It is a wireless router. It located in the first floor as well, but close to bedroom. It has 4 ports, but I only use 3 of them connected to PC. Also there are wireless device need connect to this router as well.

3.    DLInk 815. It is a wireless router. It located in the second floor. It connected with 3 PCs and also accept wireless connection. The signal in second floor is very weak if using D-615 wireless connection.

I setup the SMC to 192.168.0.1 with DHCP, D-615 to 192.168.2.1 with DHCP and D-815 to 192.168.1.1. I cannot get rid of the second router, since SMC doesn't have enough wired port. And I need to D-815 because the signal problem. Wondering if this gonna work? Thanks.

Cable, DSL, 3G or Satellite Broadband?

If you are looking at wireless internet CCTV for the first time, you may also be faced with the decision of which type of broadband package to go for: DSL, cable, 3G or satellite? This article aims to help you choose.

If you have decided that you want to see your property from wherever you happen to be, by using CCTV over the internet, you may also be faced with trying to choose a broadband package if you don’t already have one. There are so many types of broadband on the market that it is a daunting task, but I am here to give you some information that should make this task easier.

Here are the main types of broadband available to the domestic customer:

1. DSL Broadband. (The most common form is ADSL.) This is broadband via your existing phone line.
2. Cable Broadband. This uses the line provided by a cable company.
3. 3G/Mobile Broadband. The connection is made through the mobile phone network.
4. Satellite Broadband. This comes through a satellite dish.

Items three and four are really problematic and not recommended for hosting wireless CCTV cameras. Without going too far into the technical details, these types of broadband often block the ports (the specific addresses) through which you connect to the camera from the internet. If you have no choice but to use one of these two options, be prepared for the fact that your wireless CCTV camera may not be viewable from the internet even after a long process of trial and error, reading forums and spending time on the phone to a helpdesk. For this reason alone, this article is going to focus on comparison between the most popular two types of broadband: cable and DSL.

Broadband speeds and packages are changing all the time, but companies always use the download speed as one of the headline selling points. This is unhelpful when it comes to wireless internet CCTV, because the cameras use mostly upload rather than download capacity, as almost all of a camera’s data traffic is made up of images sent up the line. So, when considering broadband for internet CCTV cameras, you need to dig deeply into the broadband provider’s website until you find the upload speed, and believe me, you will need to dig deeply because the upload speed is usually pitifully unimpressive. In home packages and most small business packages, it is often 10 or even 20 times slower than the download speed. In the next section we’re going to look at some of the numbers.

Cable broadband can in theory have a download speed of up to 30Mbps, but most packages offer something between 1 Mbps and 6 Mbps. On the upload side, cable offers between 128Kbps and 1Mbps. DSL comes in at between 2Mbps and 24Mbps on the download side and between 128Kbps and 1Mbps on the upload. Looking at the upload side of the equation which is what we’re interested in for internet CCTV, you can see that there is no difference between the ranges for cable and DSL. However, there will be a big difference in performance from a package with 128Kbps upload speed compared to one offering 1Mbps. Let’s say your camera produces a series of images that, when viewed one after another, appear as video.

If each of these images is 15Kb in size, the broadband upload speed has the following effect on the number of frames per second or fps:
Upload speed 128Kbps: 1fps
Upload speed 1Mbps: 8fps

This really makes a big difference. Viewing streaming images from an internet CCTV camera at 8fps gives a real approximation of movement, whereas 1fps certainly does not. So, whether you choose cable or DSL, be careful to get the best upload speed that you can.

Pricing for cable and DSL packages is very competitive these days, and as with upload speed, there is no clear winner. Suppliers are bundling in all sorts of other services that makes a direct comparison more complicated. All I can say is that it is definitely worth spending an hour on the internet looking at current offers and taking note of reviews, especially bearing in mind that you may have to sign up for as long as 18 months.

Overall then, for internet CCTV I would rule out 3G broadband and satellite broadband unless you have no other choice, and even then it is a gamble. As for the remaining options, either cable or satellite will work well with wireless CCTV cameras, but please get the very fastest upload speed that you can afford.