Fakes made in China
The cards are fakes and made in china. The software supplied only works with Win98 and screws up Audio in WinXP ...Yikes I did find the download for Pico2000 Win2000/WinXP which is from the original manufactures site. They are aware that this is going on and are trying to help those that got duped, but there is a cost 40.00 ...Makes me sick that I have to pay more. Thinking I may just trash this one and buy a different one. Geo looks good. I would probably have stuck with this card and paid the 40.00 but the site says if you upgrade your computer or move the card to another computer the Key they give you is tracked and will not work anymore..grrrr Anyhow, Im done venting and Thank You again for the speedy reply. Sincerely, Brandie
The Pirated DVR Cards
With most of the pirated DVR Cards, features that are advertised no longer function, remote viewing does not work, and even causes system failures in windows.
- Avoid systems that are coming directly from China (Often these cards are sold for $0.99 - $40.00 on Ebay and other venues
- Ask for the version and Brand of the software - Most companies selling you pirated cards will not list the actual brand of the software, or list the software as FREE
Brands to watch out for:
- PICO 2000
- DICO
- Peaqe
- GeoVision (There are some real cards - but you will need to check with actual Manufacturer for correct license numbers/card designs)
- AnyKeeper
- Magic Radar
Look at the picture...When the picture for the card shows a blank recordable CD-R - The software is obviously pirated...run the other way!
Look at the price - Due to the volumes in the Surveillance Industry, a Legitimate DVR Card and software is NEVER $0.99 - $40.00! That does not even cover the cost of good DVR Card hardware, let alone the development time for the software! Cheaper is not better!
Hong Kong Huawei International Electronic Co.,Ltd
Our company is an industry leader in the design, development and production of high quality security systems and components.Our products are including DVR card,digital video recorder,video capture card, camera lenses, CCD and some other surveillance system products.Also we supply Kodicom,Pico2000,WDT,Avermedia and OEM service.If these are not interesting you,we can produce products according to you special requirement. Hope we can cooperate!
contact person:Cristy
website:www.hkhuawei.net
E-mail:sales01@hkhuawei.net
Tel: 86-755-83756095
FAX: 86-755-83755169
MSN: yishidvr04@hotmail.com
www.hkhuawei.net
Linux
PICO2000 DVR card
The cheapest DVR card. With all 4 channels capturing you'll get around 2 fps. Available under lots of different brand names, like "Star Imavision Video Capture", etc... Generally stated as "Pico2000 compatible"
Configuration
in /etc/modprobe.conf
For one card:
options bttv card=77 tuner=4 radio=0 triton1=0 vsfx=0 autoload=0
For two cards:
options bttv card=77,77 tuner=4,4 radio=0,0 triton1=0 vsfx=0 autoload=0
And so on...
Also, if during bootup your system hangs for 5 minutes or more at "Setting clock (utc)": add this before options bttv
options i2c-algo-bit bit_test=1
DICO800
Uninstall the existing drivers for the video capture card & the Pico2000 Peaque software aswell.
Download the Dico800 software & manual from the links below & install the drivers from the DICO drivers folder for you capture card. then do the auto run setup in the dico800 software you downloaded.
The TE104 4 Channel Capture Card aka The "Pico 2000" Card
This capture card is a 4 channel multiplexed card (25fps PAL and 30fps NTSC) which means that the 25/30 fps is split up between the 4 channels i.e. you get 30 fps TOTAL for all 4 video inputs.
These cards usually ship with Windows software called Pico 2000 or Peaqe which is identical to Pico2000 except for the name. The Pico 2000 software is reasonably functional but is terribly unreliable and as it was ripped off from Canadian company Novex there will be no fixes or updates to it. The streaming over the web also relies on active-X so is Windows only.
Linux: Under Linux the card works fine with the standard bttv drivers, I have card type set to 77 which works fine. (I'm using insmod option "radio=0 card=77 tuner=-1")
If you find the bttv driver takes a long time to load (a few minutes) add this option in your modules.conf file for loading the i2c-algo-bit module: options i2c-algo-bit bit_test=1
- Motion (open source) - Absolutely rock solid and does everything. This is the one I am currently using. You can see some screenshots of my web interface to Motion here.
- Zoneminder (open source) - Also looks to be a very good package, must get round to testing this.
Windows: If you are not using Pico 2000/Peaqe then first of all you will need to install the Open Source BT878 WDM drivers. The card works on the "Generic Brooktree Card with four Composite Inputs" setting.
- SupervisionCam (free download, 25USD registration)
I found that SupervisionCam did crash occasionally and the GUI isn't the best but it does offer a lot of features like running external programs and sending emails on motion detection. The motion detection isn't a patch on that in the Linux based Motion though.
- Video Site Monitor (free download, 39USD for full 4CH version) - not tested
- Gotcha! (free download, 379USD for full multicam version) - not tested
- Crime Catcher (free download, 49USD for full 4 cam version) - not tested
- Active Webcam (free download, 29USD for full version) - not tested