Review on 📷 XMARTO Wireless Security Camera System: 8CH 1080p NVR, 8pcs 1.3MP Wireless IP Cameras, 1TB HDD, Night Vision, Audio Microphone Support by Choice Maynard

I learned a lot about this product that was not covered in any reviews I have read. Below I will try to share the goodies I found after purchasing this product: 1. Overall I would buy it again - it works as expected. However, there are quirks (see below).2. My system didn't have a hard drive. I saw another reviewer say this. I thought it was a mistake when I read the other review, but now I'm not so sure. Be sure to check yours. I emailed them and they asked for photos of the labels, quickly sent me the hard drive and apologized.3. If you are familiar with setting up your router, setting up a static IP address, setting up port forwarding and updating the firmware, you will have no trouble setting it up. If none of this means anything to you, don't try to set it up yourself (especially if you want remote viewing).4. Update the firmware on your computer before doing anything else. Older firmware requires downloading the file and updating from a copy of the flash drive, but newer firmware supports checking for new firmware online and updating online without downloading files or copying them to a flash drive. The latest firmware on the XMartO downloads page was not the latest available firmware, so search online for the latest firmware and update using this path (in the UI they call it "network" not "internet"). 5. Update the camera firmware after the computer has been flashed. With newer computer firmware, you can also update the camera firmware over the Internet. Just plug in and connect all the cameras, then just select them all and press the button. It takes several minutes for each camera.6. All of these systems in this price range use the same small motherboard/chipset/software. As far as I know this is a Hi3620 system on a chip.7. Although the cameras are 960p, they are limited to a maximum bitrate of 2 megapixels for video compression (I saw the setting but couldn't change it). So if you put your camera outdoors where there's a lot of small movement (like wind and shadows) the overall video quality will be a bit washed out and you're better off with a cheaper 720p camera. Definitely don't bother with 1080p unless the video compression bitrate limit is higher. For an indoor or really quiet environment, the video is pretty sharp at this peak bitrate. Night vision is good and works as advertised. I can probably see at least 60 feet. The cameras do a good job of transitioning from day to night, even in between.9. The default resolution (for me) when the computer boots is very low. Make sure you go into the system settings and set 1080p or the maximum resolution of your monitor/tv. If you don't do this, everything will be blurry and look really bad.10. The "Dream Liner" interface in the software (daisy-chaining WiFi from one camera to another) is buggy and crashes from time to time. This definitely fails if you have an IP camera on your network that is not one of the cameras provided by XMart0. Yes, the software recognizes and can use almost any IP camera on your network (at least one IP camera I had was recognized and working before I disabled and deleted it). Aside from being buggy, it was easy to use and seemed to work well, but I ended up not using it. Although this is a cool feature.11. The motion detection of the cameras is bad. You can easily choose which part of the frame you want to disable or enable for motion detection, but even the highest sensitivity settings will miss a person walking across the screen if they're more than 20 feet or so from the camera. . I definitely recommend recording 24/7 if you don't want to miss anything; I don't trust any motion detection software.12. The computer has a built-in HTTP server that you can use a web browser to connect to, log in, and then view your cameras. It uses Flash, so forget about using it on your phone. The computer only has an Ethernet port to connect to your LAN - no WiFi for LAN.13. The iPhone app works great. I don't have an Android phone to test. I have DNS service through my router, but that's not necessary as the computer has a UID and registers its IP address and you can connect to it directly with that UID or IP address. The iPhone app consumes a lot of power and bandwidth. Don't expect to use it on battery or LTE data for very long. When using LTE it's best to display one camera at a time rather than multiple cameras as it doesn't seem to compress small images and uses 8x the bandwidth to display all 8 cameras (even tiny ones) at once compared to 1. Full resolution camera.14. They sent me 4 4mm cameras and 4 6mm cameras. 6mm has a narrower field of view and is better suited to areas where you need more detail at a distance (small zoom). 4mm is better for rooms where a wider field of view is required. So keep this in mind when deciding where to place each camera.15. A 10 foot cable is probably not enough to accommodate most cameras. I just connected it with a slightly smaller wire (larger diameter). This is significantly cheaper than buying a new adapter with a longer cable. I hid the wires in casings or wraps to make them look better and this hides the connections.