Watch Your Home While You're on Vacation Over the Internet

Have you ever wanted to check your home to be sure it was safe while you were on vacation? Ever get that niggling feeling while you were gone on vacation that made you think your house was being robbed? Even assuming such a feeling were all in your head, it is a fact that burglars do pay attention to when people go on vacation, and homes are deadly silent and dark for several days in a row. They are excellent at scoping out such opportunities in fact, and it is the uninformed person who believes their home security system alone is all they need to protect their home while they are on vacation.

With the wonders of technology you can actually "see" your home while you are on vacation. In fact there are two different routes that you can take to keep an eye on your home while you are away on vacation. One is easier than the other, but both will be mentioned here so that you can make an informed decision about which one you want to use. These days such systems have become quite affordable, although the first route is more expensive than the second route as it requires more hardware, making surveillance of your home from your vacation location no matter how far away quite accessible.

In order to put into play either of these routes to keeping an eye on your home from a distance you will need a laptop you can take with you, or access to a computer while you are on vacation. A high-speed internet connection on your home computer is imperative rather than dial-up as dial-up is very slow with processing video.

The first route for watching your home while you are away on vacation requires your home computer and a number of surveillance cameras posted around your home. These cameras are connected together and then connected to a system that then surveys and records everything the cameras see around your home. The cameras will record either by a set rate per second, or by movement, and it depends on which surveillance system you choose as to which one it is, and both have their advantages and disadvantages. With some systems you will be able to adjust the system for whether or not it is the set rate per second or movement scenario the system uses, but keep in mind not all of them allow this. With this system the video will play back using the monitor and then record the video to the hard drive of your computer. Then all you have to do is login to your computer with your security coded username and password and you can view any of the images of your home that the camera has taken, thus giving you peace of mind while you are away on your vacation.

The second route is a little different and one of its disadvantages is that it only uses one surveillance camera tied into your home computer. To go this route you will need to set up one camera to be attached to your home computer using your Internet Protocol address. The truly nice thing about this particular route, and the one which makes it easier than the first route is that all you have to do to check on your home is directly link to your IP from the laptop you took with you, or a computer you have access to while on vacation. This will allow you to view live footage from the one surveillance camera. One of the problems with this route though is that the one camera can only shoot a certain area of your home, rather than your whole home, so it's possible that something could be going on in the areas the one camera cannot see.

No matter which route you choose, you will also want to consider if you system is going to be covert or overt. An overt system is one where you do not try and hide your cameras, instead they are visible. There are some advantages to this in that it may deter burglars from breaking into your home, but a disadvantage is that burglars in order to burglarize your home could damage or destroy the cameras they can see.

A covert system is one where you hide the cameras from view. Like the overt option this option has its advantages and disadvantages as well. A covert system can be good if you want to keep an eye on your nanny, housekeeper, or you are trying to catch someone doing something they shouldn't be doing. A downside to it is that if you don't tell your family where the cameras are just that they are there, it may make them uncomfortable to be in their own home.

Regardless of whether you choose an overt or covert system, both routes mentioned allow you to watch your home from a distance while you are on vacation. While the second route is cheaper hardware wise, it does not give you quite the same security that the first route does where you can set up different cameras around different parts of your home thereby allowing you to see nearly everything rather than just one area as with the second route and the one camera. Personally if it were me, I'd want to go with the first system so that I could ensure that I was seeing everything. To me the extra cost would be worth it. Also I would choose an overt system, as my experience has been that this deters burglars more than not.