The infrastructure cost was $644.46 + each camera @ $89.99
Using Synology's built-in Surveillance Station software I can combine any various of IP camera and it has some awesome commercial-grade features. I choose this configuration because of the flexibility of using any camera, the simplicity of the setup and the dual-purpose of the Synology... it's also my onsite PC backup which syncs to BackBlaze B2 for dirt cheap offsite backup.
If you're super-concerned about centralized storage or lines getting cut, I would recommend a non-PoE camera with a built-in SD card connected to a small UPS. This way the intruder could cut power to your house, cut the ethernet lines to your cameras and steal your recording device and you'd still get a picture of them. However, if they're this smart, they likely stole the cameras too...
Another thing that would be worth the investment to add to the security, longevity, of your equipment is a UPS
A small UPS like this will power your PoE injector, and computer in the event of a power failure (for a short time) and will keep everything working damage free during brownouts and other anomalies that happen with the power grid.
I had a couple of these that the batteries had died in years ago and the UPS replaced with a newer higher capacity units...
I bought new batteries for $15 each and put one back in service providing power for the switch and cameras out in the barn....the other is powering a computer in the same building that is used for network/web access.
I'd use the screws I linked and tie the cables tightly together with cable ties, that way you can use one of the cable mounts every few feet/meters and the cable ties will hold the bundle tightly together....if you follow me.
Just buy a good quality cable, obviously if it is exposed to direct sunlight UV might be important, but if shaded it won't really matter....IMHO
No....you can mix Trendnet and Hikvision and the software will let you access and view the feeds from both, I haven't tried other cameras (well a couple cheap Chinese cameras a friend of mine bought...didn't work on ZM or on the trendnet software)
So I'd say other cameras might or might not work, of course the software is designed for Trendnet cameras, but like I said some trendnet and hikvision are the same cameras with different branding/firmware.
As for the resolution...it's a matter of choice, of course the better the camera the better the image quality which might be important, but in the monitoring side of things yes 720p is just fine, if you had to blow the image up to see like the face of the thief then yea the higher quality the larger you can make the image, most of mine are 1.3mp and my monitor viewing is normally a montage view of all the cameras where each is in about a 2x3" box, so just about anything is overkill in that type of viewing, but you need the resolution so if there is a problem you can blow the image up without a lot of pixelization.
One thing we haven't discussed is that most IP cameras have two data streams a low quality for monitoring (low overhead) and a high quality for recording, normally you will be viewing the low quality stream and if triggered it will be recording the full hd stream...
So in the line above I can change the last parameter from a 1 to a 2 depending on the camera type and the number of the data stream I want to monitor, the syntax is correct if I had a IP camera at 255 and the user name was admin and the password was password...lol
Edit: for some reason I have a hard time remembering that it is RTSP which is Real Time Streaming Protocol and not RSTP which is Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol, I almost every time type RSTP in the path and go WOW what a idiot when it doesn't work...lol
Under the soffit it should never see direct sunlight for very long, it's the egress out of your house up to the soffit that I'd be concern about, nothing under the soffit should be a issue it will be protected basically from everything but the birds and spiders...lol