This is one of AVerMedia's current revisions of their standalone systems.  I really like AVerMedia as an entry level manufacturer.  Their products are very price competitive with 'no name' Asian manufacturers and the products are a lot more intuitive.

The AVerMedia AVerDiGi EB1304NET is a standalone DVR meaning that it does not require a PC.  Once you put a standart IDE hard drive in and connect a monitor, the system is ready to go.  The system has four BNC connections which will allow you to connect four analog security cameras to the unit.  This particular model does not support network cameras, but AVerMedia has said that they are working on network camera support for future standalone units.  Currently, their DVR cards do support network cameras as long as you download the latest software at www.aver.com.  One nice thing about AVerMedia compared to a lot of other manufacturers is that they give you free software updates (which happen about every six months).  Most low end manufacturers do not update their software and the high end manufacturers typically charge for the updates.

Another feature of the EB1304NET that I really like is easy remote access ability.  You can view the streams directly from Microsoft Internet Exporer and can also download the remote client software directly from the unit.  From my experience, many standalone units of similar price come with the remote client software on CD.  This becomes a problem if you lose the CD or are travelling and would like to view the cameras abroad as many manufacturers have very poor web presence making software downloading difficult.

There are a couple of downside I would like to note as well.  The first obvious one is the inability to view archived footage remotely.  The only way to review old footage is when sitting in front of the system.  The other downside is that the system only supports one hard drive.  However, hard drives are getting pretty big, so this may not be that much of a problem.

I would recommend this system for businesses or personal users with limited coverage needs and who are on a budget.  For users who travel a lot or need more than four cameras, I would recommend AVerMedia's NV series DVR capture cards.  The one that we recommend the most is the NV5000.  Their NV series capture cards are full featured and will let you review old footage remotely, can scale to as many hard drives as your system can handle, and will accept network cameras.

Thanks for reading!

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