What is a Spot Monitor?
A spot monitor is a monitor that allows you to view your security camera feeds at a secondary location. It can be used for lots of different things, but it's really for when you need to view your cameras away from your NVR. This could be for customer monitoring in a retail setting, a personal monitor in a boss's office to watch cameras, or in a hospital to check different areas. It's a way to give access to the live video, without having your NVR publicly accessible.
There are two ways you can get this setup. The easy way, or the hard way. If you don't have an IPCamPower POE Spot Monitor, then you've already chosen the hard way.
Setting up a spot monitor typically requires you to run an HDMI or VGA cable from your NVR to your monitor. In most cases, this means that your NVR will need to be near the spot monitor, as you'll start to see video degradation with longer HDMI cable runs. You could also buy another secondary NVR and another monitor that is in addition to your main NVR for the sole purpose of using it as a spot monitor, but that can be expensive, convoluted, and messy!
You'll also need to have a nearby power source for both your NVR and spot monitor, which depending on your setup, may require you to hire an electrician to run power to your monitor's location. Ultimately, this setup is not always feasible and may leave your NVR vulnerable if it's publicly accessible near the spot monitor. That's where IPCamPower's PoE powered spot monitor comes into play!
The IPCamPower POE Spot Monitor has its' own integrated 8-channel video decoder built directly into the monitor. It's preconfigured, so all you have to do is plug in your monitor and turn it on. Navigate to the menu, add up to 8 security cameras on the same local network as the monitor, and you have an all-in-one camera viewing solution using only one Ethernet cable. The built-in decoder will work with most all professional brand IP Cameras.