Best Wireless Weather Cam

[akasonny]

Hi all,
I've been bitten by the wireless weathercam bug and I'm going to purchase, install and link a cam to my weather site. Though I haven't gotten any of the specifics figured out, its mostly because it depends on the camera I end up with. I'm currently "scraping" cam data from another site for Cumulus but I really don't like doing that.

Soooo...what I'm hoping to do is solicit comments here on what you have or what you prefer or what you like in the way of makes and models. If you have an opinion, please share it with me. There are so many out there (some with zoom, pan, tilt, infared, lux, color or b&w and etc.) that its become almost impossible for me to sift through them.

Appreciate your input.

[akasonny]

Sheesh...24 of you read my inquiry, nobody has an opinion.

Hmmmmm.

[Bruiser]

I am a big fan of the following camera:

http://murphymac.com/king-of-wireless-w ... -bl-c131a/

It is pricey (I bought it for $260) but I am very pleased with it. The Web interface is clean and all the functions of the camera work nicely. Decent picture quality also.

[akasonny]

Thanks Bruiser.

Thanks to you, I did the research on it. I'm impressed EXCEPT for the fact that its an indoor cam...and I was rather hoping to find something for outdoors. We don't get alot of rain but when it happens, it comes down in buckets...and I need something that can tolerate excessive heat (over 40 degrees C).

Appreciate your opinion tho!

[Bruiser]

No problem....I think Panasonic has an outdoor model though it is quite pricey...$500+...

Maybe that would be useful.

Good luck....

[DeepSpin]

It's not a waterproof cam either but I've just bought a Hawking Tech HNC290 from Maplin here in Ireland for just over €100. A little frustrated as it turns out the supplied output for a web site only works with IExplorer and as have several Linux machines and use all kinds of browsers this just will NOT DO.

A little detective work found me on a modding/hacking site for this kind of cam and they have some stuff figured out http://ic1500.wikispaces.com

I'm new to all this so I have only just started getting it all set up

I would like to put my camera in a waterproof case/box and try and put a solar charger on/in it and mount the whole thing on a pole with my weather station. I'll see how it goes and post details here if there is any progress.

All the best From Ireland http://geohash.org/gc0vg2x6uw5t

Dave

[akasonny]

Thanks for the reply, Dave.

I gave up on the outdoor option because of ridiculous pricing for the bit of weatherproofing they provide.

I've pretty much decided on the TRENDnet - TV-IP400 from BUY.COM for about 86 pounds. It has zoom, pan and tilt for fun. They make an outdoor dome enclosure for it...complete with heater and fan...but it, alone, runs about 175 pounds (I'm doing the currency conversion in my head so...its pretty close). Seems these manufacturers mostly cater to the business crowd based on their prices.

My problem now is that the maximum operating temperature is 40C and it can easily hit 44-45C here so trying to find a way to mount it outdoors is even more of a problem. Sheesh!

When the cam arrives, I think I'll pour a measure of Guinness and think about this some more.

Steven