CCTV & Security systems from CCTV First.

CCTVFirst specialises in supplying professional CCTV and security products in a way that makes installation of any CCTV system very easy. We supply the systems as kits that have everything you need apart from a few screws and cable clips.

We have developed and have manufactured a range of purpose made CCTV cables that take the power to the camera and return the CCTV video signal to the DVR. These cables are pre moulded at the DVR end with an industry standard BNC fitting for the video signal and also an industry standard DC socket to accommodate the DC power adaptor. The camera end of the cable is terminated in a RJ11 plug which is only 11mm in diameter therefore will fit through a 13mm hole which is the maximum size a normal drill will take.

Our CCTV cameras are fitted either with a RJ11 Socket directly or come supplied with a RJ11 to BNC and DC plug adaptor so the cables can be used with any CCTV camera, even ones not purchased from ourselves.

The basis of any CCTV system is the DVR. This is the main brains of your system, its stores your recordings, the main issues when choosing which DVR to have at the centre of your CCTV system are:

1)      How long you need to store the recording for, most police forces will require at least 30 days for a CCTV system installed in business premises. Domestic systems there are no minimum time.

2)      The frame rate that the DVR can record each individual camera at. The frame rate is how many images the DVR can store per second for each individual camera. The generally accepted frame rate is 6 frames per second per camera to meet police standards.

3)      Do you need to view the live images and playback the recordings of your CCTV systems DVR remotely either or LAN networks or over WAN networks i.e. the internet.

4)      Is it likely that you will ever need to give recording from your CCTV system to the police? If so you need to be able to copy relevant sections of your recording to removable media i.e. CDs, DVDs and USB sticks. It’s important that the software required to playback the copied images can be played back directly from the media you have copied to. The police will not install software on their computers.

5)      Recorded image resolution. It’s no good having lots of fancy features on your DVR if the recorded images are rubbish. You should look for a DVR that records at D1 resolution or 720 x 576 pixels. Make sure that if the DVR specifies it can record at this resolution it can do it at an acceptable frame rate. Many DVRs exchange frame rate for resolution and vice versa. Look out for DVRs that state they are real time, but only record in CIF which is only ¼ of the resolution you require.

6)      How many CCTV cameras are you going to need in your CCTV system? Are you likely to expand your system in the future? Even if you only need 4 cameras now you maybe better off getting a 8 channel DVR at the outset, it will be significantly cheaper than exchanging a 4 channel model for an 8 channel model at a later date.

So I have decided on the type and size of DVR for my security system, what about the CCTV cameras. The main question we are asked is how far can a camera see? What people generally mean by this is at what distance from the camera will the image be usable. I.e. At what distance from the camera will I recognise someone`s face or a car registration number.

 The resolution or quality of the CCTV camera has very little affect on this. I can put 3 cameras in exactly the same place looking at a particular object; one can be a cheap and nasty CMOS camera, one a 450 line CCD camera and the other a HI res 540 line camera. Let’s say the object is 10m away from the camera and is a car registration plate. I have fitted the 540 line Hi res camera with a 3.6mm wide angle lens with an angle of view of 84 degrees. I have fitted the 450 line camera with a 6.0mm lens with a 64 degree angle of view and I have fitted a 12.0 mm lens to the cheap camera which has a 30 degree angle of view. I ask a number of people to come and view the live images and recordings of the 3 cameras and pick the best one. Everybody will choose the cheap camera with the 12.0mm lens. It’s nothing to do with the camera its just I have fitted the correct lens for viewing a car number plate at 10m. Whichever CCTV camera I had fitted the 12.0mm lens to in this scenario would have won.