Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

**** EDITED 2/9/17 ***** I'm putting my edit first in my review so anyone reading this might see it a little easier. I've had this system a little over 3 months and the system is still very glitchy as described in the following review. Along with the other problems I had, now one of my cameras has lost its 2-way communication ability. The audio is still available coming to the receiver, but when the button is pushed to communicate for someone in the cameras view, there is no audible sound whatsoever. Not that I'd ever use it, but it would be nice for the cameras features to last more than 3 months. I'm not too confident in the system's longevity at this point. I'll post more updates as needed... ----------------------------------------------------- Let me start out by saying I REALLY wanted to like this system. I know it's not a high dollar, crystal clear, flawless system and I was willing to overlook this just so I could have something in place at my house to help defend against the crackhead thievery that's been plaguing my neighborhood for the last several months. There is generally someone always home, so I wasn't going to have to rely solely on the system to help protect my property. In short, it was basically going to be used as a secondary form of defense. The combination audio, video, and motion detection was great, but when you throw in the recording capabilities this system offered, I figured it would be a great weapon in my arsenal to spite the known video quality (or lack thereof). I'm not so sure now. I've had this system for 8 days and my issues started on day 1... SETUP: The cameras arrived paired with the monitor from the factory, so it was literally plug and play. The cameras were easy to mount and had more than enough power cord for my application. The adjustments for the cameras and recording were accessed from the 7" display monitor and were extremely easy to figure out without even looking at the directions and would have been, even for someone that may not be very tech savvy. In my opinion, setup (minus camera mounting) was so easy a child could do it. DISTANCE: My cameras are mounted in areas no greater than 30' from the receiver and I haven't had a minutes issue with reception, regardless of the fact the camera signal is traveling through brick exterior walls as well as interior walls. No issues there. VIDEO: The video resolution is 640x480. I knew this, not an issue. During daylight hours, it's actually crisp enough to make out faces of people caught in the recordings, but license plates at a distance of more than 20' aren't 100% legible depending on angle. The make/model of vehicles can be easily figured out though. During night vision mode, it isn't quite the case, which I expected. The resolution during infrared illumination is quite fuzzy and there isn't a chance of making out faces, license plates, or make and model of vehicles at ANY distance. Basically, if you have a night time prowler, all the video from this dystem is going to do is let you verify somebody took your stuff. At close proximity to the cameras it's worse. Any subjects in view are completely washed out by the infrared illumination to the point they're nothing but a white blob on the screen. I wasn't really expecting this, but it's still not an issue due to the fact this was a secondary means of security for me. Still not a deal breaker, BUT... MOTION DETECTION: THIS herein is where I start having issues with this system. It's completely unreliable, which makes this system all but useless unless you want to sit in front of a 7" screen to monitor your property the rest of your life. Whether the motion detection is going to pick up movement is completely hit and miss on the cameras I received. I don't know if it's a common problem or if I have a defective system, but either way, it's unacceptable. During setup, you have a recording option which allows you to set the record time for detections. For example, you have the option of 15, 30, and 60 second record times once motion is detected. I have mine set on 60 seconds. Of course as long as the camera senses movement the recording continues, which is a great feature, but it seems sensing movement is the issue with mine. Recording times are an issue as well, I might add. I'll check the recordings saved to the SD card at the end of the day and find some of my known daily activities are completely missing, some have been recorded for only 7 seconds, and some were recorded for 10 minutes AFTER all movement has left the proximity (i.e. when I go back into the house). I have adjusted detection sensitivity so many times I could literally navigate to that menu with my eyes closed, so I know for a fact it's properly set. I'm not sure what the malfunction is, but it's not something I'm willing to overlook as the cost of settling for substandard performance from a security system is just too great. I'll give them a few more days,but if it doesn't improve, this system is going back to Amazon for a refund. Looking long term, I just can't take the chance with malfunctioning cameras. I'm giving this system 2 stars only because everything other than motion detection and infrared recording is completely acceptable. The motion detection issues are the deal breaker for me. Hope my review helps in your decision. Troy/47/TX