Compro IP540P review

Pan, tilt and zoom (PTZ) IP cameras are falling in price, but many sub-£200 models are afflicted by low resolution and lack H.264 support. The Compro IP540P is part of a new breed, with a top resolution of 1,280 x 1,024, H.264 encoding and more.

The camera uses a large 1/3in CMOS sensor with a bank of six IR emitters on each side of the lens. It supports 802.3af Power-over-Ethernet (PoE), has an SD flash memory slot, an internal microphone, and a 3.5mm jack for two-way audio.

It has motion detection, and the rear USB port supports Compro’s 802.11n Wi-Fi adapters. The lens has a good range and can spin through 100 degrees vertically and 340 degrees horizontally.

We had no problems powering it from a PoE injector or ProCurve 2424-PWR switch, and its live view is decent quality with clean focus and good colour balance. Bright sunlight stymies it, but for indoor use it’s effective, and detail at night is superior to the Y-cam Bullet HD.

The frame rate at the highest resolution is only 15fps, but we found motion was conveyed well. The top 30fps mode means a drop to 640 x 480, and you’ll also need to do this to use the digital zoom.

We tested bandwidth usage with Riverbed’s Cascade Pilot software, recording 4Mbits/sec for MPEG4 at the top resolution. H.264 dropped that to between 0.5 and 2.4Mbits/sec, depending on the amount of motion.

Three areas can be defined for motion detection and, when triggered, snapshots may be sent to email, FTP, image, HTTP or SMS servers. They can be scheduled for specific times each day and audio levels can also be used as a trigger.

Pan and tilt can be controlled by pointing and clicking in the live view, and the lens motor has a good turn of speed. Multiple pan and tilt positions can also be saved as presets, and a patrol mode used to scan through each one.

The IP540P is a fine camera. It offers many features for a low price, above average image quality for day and night operation, and it’s supplied with good recording software.