Apple iPad vs Amazon Kindle

This morning one IP camera prospect called to ask the differences between IQeye IQ511 and Arecont Vision AV1310.



I jokingly explained to him that it is like Apple's iPad and Amazon's Kindle.


Steve Jobs with his new toy, iPad.


Jeff Bezos with Kindle

Cloud Computing CCTV

In my 2008 posting, cloud 9, I did talk about cloud computing and its effects on CCTV.

Last evening, I went home earlier than usual and managed to catch a Taiwanese news talk show. The TV program featured the importance of Cloud Computing and it says the Taiwanese and the Chinese governments and corporates are working together ferociously to come out with their own Cloud Computing technology. With this collaboration, the two governments determine to break the monopolistic of the 5 major US Cloud Computing players namely Google, Apple, Microsoft, Cisco & Amazon.

This morning before I came to work, Martin Soong on CNBC was interviewing two corporate leaders about Cloud Computing again!




Wonder if this is a mere coincidence or Cloud Computing has finally arrived in a big way.

For the sake of argument, what if Google starts offering Cloud CCTV solution with video footage storage at their cloud server at a minuscule monthly fee?

Is our CCTV industry ready for this inevitable revolution?

Are you ready?

Vivotek - The Eyes of Mobile Robots

Based in Markham, Ontario, Canada, mobile robot development company, Dr Robot Inc., was looking for a high performance resolution wireless (802.11g) IP camera for its new series of mobile robots, i90.




VIVOTEK cameras were tested along with other suppliers from Japan and Europe. There are a few key requirement: the remote monitoring task normally requires robot and camera to operate under low illumination in some circumstance and capable of bringing the target close by optical zoom without alerting the subject; the camera has to be reliable and capable of operating on a constantly moving robot; integration to high level AI software should be flexible.

VIVOTEK PTZ camera was finally picked for integration with the i90 robot for its functions including smooth pan tilt operation, plus the 10x optical zoom, two-way audio, low light operation mode, and excellent image quality with reasonable cost.



A variety of mobile robots were then developed based on i90 platforms, and all equipped with VIVOTEK PTZ cameras as a standard feature.




i90 robots are deployed for various application including nuclear facilities, advance automotive engineering labs and university research facilities.

Children Drawing

The other day a family came to our CCTV outlet to get a surveillance system from us.

After they left, I picked up a flyer from the floor. To my surprise, it was a children drawing at the back of the flyer. It must be from the quiet little girl who's sitting at one corner of our shop for the past one and a half hours.

So people said they hate "High Tech" job because there is no "High Touch" elements in "High Tech" line. Today I proof them wrong.



It is amazing what a children drawing can do to us.

When you look at the drawing, it can calm you down, and if you look at it long enough, the drawing actually makes you laugh.

I especially like the joker face rabbit. The rabbit even has a scar across its face.

Arecont Vision - Channel Partner Certification

Congratulation to our business partner, Steve!

He had recently participated in the Arecont Vision's Channel Partner Certification program.

This program is designed to educate and certify Arecont Vision’s distributors, resellers and A&Es on Arecont Vision products and megapixel technology.

Multitasking Housewife

Nowadays CCTV customers are getting more sophisticated and demanding.

When they look for a Digital Video Recorder (DVR), they want the DVR to have every conceivable functions, can be connected to all other gear they possess and to monitor the video streams via Internet and all their mobile devices.



Sounds impossible and difficult but luckily, TANDÉR range of network standalone DVRs manages to do just that.

This range of DVRs has multiple operation control namely the front panel key buttons, USB mouse and IR remote control.

TANDÉR DVRs support SATA interface hard disk for storage with 2 backup mediums USB pen drive and DVD±RW.

TANDÉR Triplex DVRs enable its users to remote viewing, playback through IE browser and 3G mobile phone while recording.

It supports Remote Viewing with BlackBerry (BB), iphone, Windows Mobile, Symbian OS, Internet Explorer. This BB DVR is getting very popular in Indonesia

The DVRs come with 2 Video outputs, 1 S-video, 1 VGA output, 1 Audio input, 1 Audio output and Alarm in/out terminal for added flexibility in deployment.

Central Management System (CMS) software is provided free to support multiple DVRs' video streaming to be viewed on a single screen.

Last but not least, to enjoy latest TANDÉR DVR features, users can upgrade the DVR software via USB pen drive by simply download the latest software.

Young Wife Constantly Being Watched

The other day a friend of mine complained to me that he is pretty darn sure his neighbors know his wife's daily routine better than him.

He said his left, right, front and back neighbors' houses were deployed with CCTV cameras that "unintentionally" constantly monitoring his house and more importantly his young wife 24/7.



Well, what can I say... they are providing free surveillance service to my friend ain't they?

London is said to have 1 CCTV camera for every 8 people. Some people are filmed 300 times a day.

My friend's wife is to have few cameras for herself and only God knows how many times she is filmed a day. We are indeed ahead of London.

120 Black and White Surveillance Cameras to Filmed Avatar

The talk of the town during this new year holiday season, box-office film "Avatar" is well known for its technological advancements and visual triumphs.

To film the movie performers' movements from every conceivable angles, some 120 black and white surveillance cameras were deployed on the sound stage in Playa Vista and software translated those movements into computer generated skeletons. The end result is a photo realistic universe where the aliens seem to live and breathe and its 3-D effect makes viewers forget that they are watching images on a movie screen.

Now that we have been to Pandora, what next?

Sony Surveillance Roadshow @ Plaza Low Yat

Happy New Year!!!

I know I was MIA for the past few days, but hey, who wasn't during this period of holiday season?

2010... can you believe it'd been 10 years since the Y2K bug of the millennium? I remember a friend of mine even refused to travel by air during that very day.


We had a Sony iPELA ( IP camera ) Roadshow at Plaza Low Yat from 28th Dec 2009 till 3rd Jan 2010. Some CCTV installer jokingly said we'd the roadshow for 2 years.