What our experts say …
In common with most of the network cameras we have been seeing lately the Vivotek IP7151 suffers from what might be described as ‘the muddy kitchen sink syndrome’.
IP technology has opened up a Pandora’s box, with cameras sporting countless features and facilities, some of which are undoubtedly useful and will stick; others will inevitably disappear down the plughole without trace.
The challenge now is to sort the wheat from the chaff, and the first thing to say about the IP7151 is that it could have been a lot worse…
Even so, itemising the multitude of functions on this relatively modestly equipped camera would take up several pages. Even the manufacturers appear to have shied away from going into too much detail and the printed manual and promo literature glosses over or misses out on a number of significant features, though to be fair the pdf manual on the supplied CD is a lot more informative. Progressive scan has been given top billing. Compared with a conventionally interlaced analogue video image it is capable of producing sharper images when it comes to capturing scenes with a lot of movement, but in this application, where images go through the mill of digital compression, distribution over a network and display inside a small browser window, these enhancements can be difficult to spot. But before we get to the nitty-gritty of IP camera operation, let’s start at the beginning, at the business end.
The IP67151 is supplied with a CS mount 2.9 – 8.2mm IR corrected auto-iris lens. Behind that there’s a switchable IR cut filter, for day/night operation, and behind that a 1/4-inch Sony progressive scan CCD with a VGA capable (680 x 480 pixel) resolution, at up to 25 frames per second. Minimum illumination is claimed to be 1.0 lux. Images from the camera are compressed using MJPEG and MPEG4 codecs and it can output two streams simultaneously. It has switchable backlight compensation, AGC, AWB and an automatic shutter. There’s an optional date/time and text caption overlay, the image can be flipped and mirrored and it has three user definable motion detection zones and privacy masks. The motion detector can be used to trigger local event recording using on-board flash memory, send notifications and upload still images using HTTP, SMTP (email) and FTP protocols.
It has a single input and output for an external sensors or alarm device and up to 10 users can log onto the camera simultaneously; access can be controlled by passwords and IP filtering/blocking.
The camera has a built in microphone and it supports two-way audio (with a firmware upgrade) and Power over Ethernet (PoE), otherwise it can be powered from a supplied mains adaptor or a 24-volt AC supply.
Image viewing and configuration is through Internet Explorer (v6 and above). It is also supposed to work in Mozilla Firefox and we were able to get an MJPEG image to display but when viewing an MPEG4 stream the necessary QuickTime plug in stubbornly refused to initialise. The supplied setup and utility software requires Windows 2k, XP or Vista.
From the outside it looks reasonably conventional, especially when compared with some of the other rather imaginatively styled models in the Vivotek range. The camera body is an extruded alloy ‘tube’ with the front end and rear panel held together by four long bolts.
In addition to the threaded collar for the CS mount lens the front part of the housing sports a green status LED, a light sensor for day/night switching and a small hole for the built-in microphone. The auto iris lens plugs into a socket on the side of the front cover, a single PCB slides into a rail the length of the camera body.
On the back panel there’s a standard 10/100 Ethernet socket, two 3.5mm jack sockets, a slide switch for selecting internal or external microphone, the DC power socket, an 8-way spring terminal for the alarm inputs and outputs, RS485 comms and the 24 volt AC supply, plus a hole for a recessed reset button.
The standard of construction is generally good and it feels solidly built. The only small area of concern is the sockets for the LAN and DC power plugs, which do not look like they will fare very well if the cables are strained or stressed, and there’s an open hole on the back panel. This is for an antenna on the WI-Fi enabled variant of this model, but in this case it is an open invitation to dust, moisture and creepy crawlies. A simple rubber blanking plug is all that’s needed.
Setup and operation
Once the camera’s power and Ethernet cabled have been connected it is easiest to let the Installation Wizard, included on the utilities CD, take charge and find the camera. On our setup it was necessary to reconfigure the PC’s firewall and AV software, but once that’s done the camera’s address appears; double-clicking the entry opens Internet Explorer and the camera’s ‘Home’ page with the image viewer window. A the highest resolution setting (640 x 480) this occupies around a quarter of the available screen area
Beneath the main viewer window there’s a set of controls, that varies according to the browser used and the compression scheme, but it can include a zoom control, buttons for recording and playback and selecting the various audio options.
Back to the Configuration menu, and this is where the action is. There are 14 headings, leading to sub menu pages packed to the gunwales with settings and adjustments. There are far too many to deal with in any detail but here are the highlights. The System menu covers time and date settings, enabling automatic adjustment via an Internet time-server and configuring the digital alarm input and output. Security covers passwords for root and user-level access; Network deals with manually changing the IP address, WINS server, PPPoe and HTTP, audio port and Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP) setup. DDNS handles Dynamic Domain Name Service setup and the Access List is used to specify allowed and denied IP addresses.
Now we get to the big ones. The Audio and Video menu is concerned with camera title, colour or b/w operation, image orientation, white balance, shutter speed, compression mode, resolution, frame rate and quality for the two streams, audio input gain, output, audio compression and bit rate. Three buttons lead to sub menus for adjusting brightness, contrast and saturation, privacy mask, and exposure, AGC, backlight compensation and day/night switching functions. The Motion Detection menu lets the user specify three resizable target windows, each with their own sensitivity and ‘percentage’ settings. Camera Control is for systems that use a PTZ mount, in which case an on-screen joystick will be displayed in the browser window. Application is for setting up what happens when the motion detector or alarm input is triggered. Recording is used to set up a recording schedule, and specify how and where it will be saved. System log records all significant changes to the camera’s status and configuration. View Parameters is a snapshot of the camera’s setup, and Maintenance has options for rebooting the camera, restoring it to its factory defaults, uploading time and configuration data and upgrading the camera’s firmware. The menus are all fairly well laid out and relatively easy to understand, though it pays to keep the pdf manual on disk close to hand, as there is no onscreen help. So unless you carry a glossary of networking and digital image processing terms around in your head you will almost certainly need to refer to it from time to time to explain some of the camera’s more obscure features and settings.
Performance
Assessing network camera performance can be a tricky business, with so many variables to contend with, but we can make some general comparisons with what has gone before, and the IP7151 is definitely up there with the best of them. The most difficult job is getting the right balance between frame rate and image quality and matching this with the capability of the network and the type of images and lighting conditions it can expect to encounter. Suffice it to say there are sufficient configuration options and it should be possible to find a happy medium. Under those elusive ideal conditions, and in good natural light, it can produce a sharp and detailed looking image with lifelike colours. Network operation starts to take its toll when light levels fall and the image quickly becomes grainy. There is some temporary respite when B&W night mode kicks in but it has to be said that this camera’s low light performance is nothing to write home about, and the image rapidly descends into a noisy blur, especially if there’s any movement in the scene area. Of course this has to be taken in context of the image being a component of a web browser window, displayed on a computer monitor, so direct comparisons with an image from an analogue camera on a video monitor may be misleading, but compared with other IP cameras we’ve seen recently, it does a pretty good job!
Mechanical stability is also commendable and our test sample didn’t flinch when it was repeatedly introduced to the blunt end of the SI rubber mallet.
What the manufacturer says …
The Vivotek IP7151/IP7152, equipped with a progressive-scan CCD sensor, delivers superior-quality, crystal-clear video for professional surveillance applications. The progressive-scan CCD sensor effectively offers an excellent solution for shooting a high-speed scene. It can clearly capture images of moving objects that traditional interlaced-scan techniques could not achieve. Furthermore, working in combination with the progressive-scan CCD sensor on the Vivotek IP7151/IP7152 is a removable IR-cut filter that can deliver high-quality images in both bright and dark areas. It can be applied in various surveillance environments such as offices, banks, airports, parking lots, etc.
With self-developed Vivotek VVTK-1000 SoC, this network camera provides dual compression formats in VGA resolution for remote monitoring. It is capable of simultaneously delivering dual streams with different resolutions and quality upon separate multimedia devices for real-time monitoring. The camera supports 802.3af compliant Power over Ethernet (IP7151) and 802.11b/g WLAN connection (IP7152), which make it easy to install and reduces the costs for installation and cabling. It also comes with many useful features that deliver more flexibilities to users such as multi-lingual user interface, appropriate lens selection with CS mount, two-way audio by SIP protocol, and digital I/O for external sensor and alarm.
Overall assessment
There is very little to say against the IP7151, but it doesn’t break any new ground, and any benefits progressive scan might bring to the party are for the most part lost under the weight of network operation.
It’s probably not the first choice for poorly lit locations either, but otherwise it ably demonstrates many of the advantages of IP camera technology, not least the highly flexible alarm, motion detection and event notification facilities, remote configuration, local and network viewing and recording, and in this case, refreshingly straightforward installation and setup.
See attached graphic (left) for product assessement.
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