EyeLynx Pharos Rapid Deployment CCTV System Review

As IP and HD open more doors, increasingly complicated and quirky installs are popping up off the back of it. Rapidly deployable systems and the ability to transmit wirelessly are quickly becoming more and more desirable within the CCTV market, as they enable IP to operate in more applications than your standard warehouse or school. The ability to quickly install and uninstall it and the option to operate it without infrastructure becomes key.

As IP and HD have become dominant within new tenders for CCTV, the ability to transmit wirelessly and having a system that can be installed and removed quickly become extremely important factors in helping the migration to IP and keeping costs down within the current climate.

The Pharos system from EyeLynx is designed to fulfill both the rapidly deployable and wireless transmission niches.

Pharos supports WiFi allowing users to install a system without cable infrastructure. During the evaluation, we simply run our cameras back wirelessly to our main point (at the top of a pole for example) and we had a dedicated, high-speed wireless connection to provide us with real-time video feeds and PTZ control if needed.

Pharos also supports 3G and 4G (SIM cards required) and hard wire RJ45 for ADSL, enabling an operator to dial in from anywhere in the world, to monitor the system, view activity logs, or download footage. As the system is IP, every camera has its own IP address, ensuring general maintenance for the system can be done remotely.

In addition to wireless support, Pharos is also rapidly deployable and removable. Each segment of the system — the NVR unit, cameras, and others — can come packaged up and pre-configured, meaning the installer just needs to bolt the cameras to its locations and turn them on — the system is up and running in seconds!

The combination of these two features ensures Pharos can be used in a multitude of environments and is a very cost-effective solution due to the minimal time and labour required for installation and maintenance.

Pharos is built under license by Panasonic and is truly a solid piece of engineering. It is IP66-rated and operates in an extended temperature range from -10 to +55 degrees C. The main camera inside is from Panasonic — an HD720p fully functional PTZ dome with Super Dynamic low light sensitivity and optimized face detection. Pharos is available for AC mains input or a wide 9-36V DC input, allowing it to be powered with solar or wind turbine energy sources. We tested the mains version.

Multiple manufacturer support
Jay Patel, CEO of Eyelynx, confirmed that Pharos has full integration from the publicly released APIs with the following manufacturers:

• Panasonic
• Samsung
• JVC
• Sony
• Pelco
• UDP
• Xvision
• Axis
• Hikvision
• Plus the capability to integrate others with a custom URL input

This allows users to make use of potentially hundreds of other camera makes — extremely useful if your system is based around a focal PTZ with static cameras dotted around it.

Multiple camera recording
Pharos is similar to other wireless systems on the market; essentially it is designed to connect to an IP camera via WiFi or 3/4G and record it.

A number of these systems already exist, but they all have one major feature in common — they are designed to work with a single camera! This means for every camera you want to use, you need a dedicated NVR/VMS for it and a separate 3/4G connection.

However, Pharos has the unique capability to record up to five additional Full HD cameras (slaves) simultaneously within itself, so users only need to establish a single connection to manage the multi-camera system. EyeLynx has termed this as “Edge Recording Cluster,” simply allowing rapid deployment of a complete CCTV system on the edge.

Pharos is fully managed with EyeLynx’s VMS platform, SharpView Manager Professional, or via Immix from Sureview (ARC). Operators can dial into Pharos and control the main Pharos camera plus the additional slave cameras as well as connecting to other Pharos systems at the same time.

What we have here, then, is a hardware box that can record five cameras, and can be installed in a system with dozens of other five camera boxes in an edge environment or controlled from a single centralised operator.

Click here to view Figure 2.

Adjustable resolutions
Pharos allows an operator to tweak every single camera to its particular needs. This is extremely useful for installs where 3G coverage is weak and speeds are low. Most cameras support multiple streams, so Pharos can record the best stream locally while taking a second stream at a reduced resolution and/or refresh rate, specifically for external access.

Connections and compatibility
Pharos runs on an enterprise-class Linux OS, and the SharpView NVR software allows users to plug hundreds of other devices into it to create expansive systems. Among its connections are Ethernet and USB. Together these are useful as users can record cameras that are installed on infrastructure and make use of external hard drives for increased storage. Included in the cost of the system is support for RS232 serial, allowing Pharos to receive alarms from devices such as infrared sensors, access control, and Intruder systems. Pharos is then able to transmit the commands wirelessly to get a camera to do a particular action, such as a PTZ moving to a preset.

Pharos also supports video analytics (on cameras that have onboard video analytics). This allows users to have a far more reliable external solution by reducing or eliminating false alarms, and it also turns Pharos into a far more powerful solution because, unlike traditional CCTV systems, you do not need to make use of other hardware to process the analytics.

Scalable system sizes
Pharos uses EyeLynx’s SharpView NVR platform that is common to EyeLynx’s large server products, including a 36TB NVR (SharpView Corporate) option. As both products are fully compatible, users can potentially create massive systems in city centers, industrial parks, or large stadiums and campuses.

The verdict
Pharos is the most complete wireless solution on the market, due to its array of supported manufacturers, wireless connectivity (WiFi and 3G/4G), and the massive bonus that we can record more than one camera on it.

It has huge potential, thanks to support of 4G and the hardware connections such as WiFi, Gigabit Ethernet, RS232, and USB. We could run our PA and video analytics through Pharos, making it a powerful solution.

The only negative side is that Pharos does require configuration for complex multi-device applications, which can be laborious and time consuming. Although some basic pre-configuration can be done prior to shipment, there is still extensive on site configuration required — especially if PTZ cameras are used.

A quicker config tool or easy setup would be great, as well as a search tool. This would be a nice feature here. The Pharos GUI is logical, but not the best layout, and this adds time to the setup as you need to familiarise yourself with it and its options (as with all new products you are not used to).

With everything factored in, Pharos is clearly a high quality, cost-effective, and extremely powerful solution. The fact that Pharos is designed to work with the major brands, which tend to have the most reliable cameras, means Pharos also is very reliable, which is important in a critical system.