HAI DVR vs. Seperate DVR System

[cruggiero]

I'm new to the home automation arena, although I'm extremely technically savy. I'm leaning towards purchasing the HAI OmniPro System (but am open to thoughts on ElK and Homeseer).

My question is whether or not standalone DVR systems can integrate to HAI or do you have to use their DVR system? I'd like to be able to use my own dvr system, but see the cctv cameras on the HAI Touchscreens and on the TV's.

Also, in the HAI literature it mentions IP cameras. Can you use cctv cameras?

Thanks in advance!

 

[ano]

I'm new to the home automation arena, although I'm extremely technically savy. I'm leaning towards purchasing the HAI OmniPro System (but am open to thoughts on ElK and Homeseer).

My question is whether or not standalone DVR systems can integrate to HAI or do you have to use their DVR system? I'd like to be able to use my own dvr system, but see the cctv cameras on the HAI Touchscreens and on the TV's.

Also, in the HAI literature it mentions IP cameras. Can you use cctv cameras?

Thanks in advance!

It really depends what you mean by "integrate" but HAI just announced today a system to have a panel control an external device like a DRV using IR.

Also, Homeseer isn't really in the same category as ELK and HAI. HomeSeer is a software product that runs on a PC. You can connect HomeSeer to either ELK or HAI, and the feature overlap is rather small.

 

[cruggiero]

Thanks for the reply!

Yes, I know homeseer is in a different direction but since I don't have anything just yet, I'm starting from scratch and looking for recommendations. If I went the homeseer route, I would go with the hometroller.

I guess the question is: If you had to start all over again would you pick HAI, Elk or Homeseer (or perhaps another setup).

 

[Steve]

Easy - do you need an alarm panel too? If no, go Hometroller. If yes, get Elk or HAI and supplement with some software later.

 

[jharrell]

As far as I can tell the HAI DVR is just a "standard" stand alone DVR in a small form factor using a laptop drive instead of 3.5" drive. It's "integration" with an Omni system is just a set of dry contacts it will trip based on events such a motion, and you can wire those a zone on the Omni. Most standalone DVR's have these contacts though it's nothing special. The HAI DVR is designed for analog camera's and to use with touch screen's you need to simply split the analog signal and run through their touchscreen hub, no direct integration, and you could do this with any DVR.

Their WL3 for windows home server supports some IP camera's but ironically doesn't support their own DVR, nor does their DVR support IP cameras that I am aware of. The DVR looks to be using the same OS as some others I have seen such as Lorex DVR's, it's all linux and developed in China.

It's looks like a decent device, but there doesn't seem to be a clear vision from them on cctv, the ethernet based touch screen will need IP camera's making their DVR useless unless they plan on integrating with it's network abilities at some point, but I haven't heard that, it seems obvious though.

Bottom line with a Omni system, integration with cctv will take place through plain old inputs/outputs and most DVR's from anyone have theses, to integrate with IP's and the Omni you would need to write some custom software using their SDK unless you mean just having it show up on touchscreens.

I'm new to the home automation arena, although I'm extremely technically savy. I'm leaning towards purchasing the HAI OmniPro System (but am open to thoughts on ElK and Homeseer).

My question is whether or not standalone DVR systems can integrate to HAI or do you have to use their DVR system? I'd like to be able to use my own dvr system, but see the cctv cameras on the HAI Touchscreens and on the TV's.

Also, in the HAI literature it mentions IP cameras. Can you use cctv cameras?

Thanks in advance!

 

[cruggiero]

My question is whether or not standalone DVR systems can integrate to HAI or do you have to use their DVR system? I'd like to be able to use my own dvr system, but see the cctv cameras on the HAI Touchscreens and on the TV's.

Also, in the HAI literature it mentions IP cameras. Can you use cctv cameras?

Thanks in advance![/quote]
[/quote]

I am looking for security, so guess I'm back to the age old question: HAI vs. ELK. With the cctv setup, I'm looking for at least 2 events (besides normal operation):
1. On doorbell ring, pop up screen on the touchscreen with front door camera
2. On event (movement, pool disturbed, etc), pop up screen on touchscreen with respective camera

Can either of this be done with HAI or ELK? What would I need to do it if I have a standalone DVR system?

Thanks again for all your help.

 

[Brian Yokum]

The current HAI OmniTouch touchscreen displays composite video encoded by the video encoder on the HAI touchscreen hub. The encoder has video passthrough connections so that the composite cameras can connect both to the video encoder and to modulators for display on TVs. Any event that is detected by the HAI controller can be used as a trigger to display a specific camera on a touchscreen.

As previously mentioned, the HAI DVR doesn't have any special integration with the HAI controller at this time other than through contact closure inputs and outputs. It is a small form factor device that can easily mount in a structured wiring enclosure. The DVR viewing software is designed for Windows PCs. The output of the DVR is not viewable on the current HAI OmniTouch touchscreens.