After you've purchased and installed your video surveillance system, the important steps of on-going maintenance of the system begins.

It may be tempting to assume everything is fine and won't need a lot monitoring, but we highly recommend that you follow these basic steps to keep your system healthy and performing well - it's better to prevent an outage than realize the system was down after a crime has been committed.

Daily tasks should focus on ensuring your equipment is powered up and connected:

• Checking your server's power, if you use one
• Checking the connection and feed of ALL your cameras

Weekly tasks should focus on updates and exports:

• Running Windows system updates
• Running a full virus and malware scan
• Exporting any requested videos

Monthly tasks should focus on your system's settings:

• Running firmware upgrades
• Checking all motion detection settings
• Update your system's security, including removing old users and changing passwords

Yearly tasks should focus on the health of your system's equipment:

• HHD defrag and RAM scan
• RAID health check, if you're using a RAID setup

Want to learn more about keeping your system healthy? Contact our surveillance experts today.

This blog post will walk you through installing and configuring your Ubiquiti antennas to establish a wireless link. Wireless surveillance systems are key to extending your security into areas a traditionally wired system can't go, including large campuses and remote buildings.

Before you install any wireless equipment, we recommend bench testing the connection between the Ubiquiti antennas - a mistake will result in having to un-mount the remote antenna to reconnect it locally.

Step One: Wiring the Components

The first step to setting up your wireless system is to wire the components so that all parts of the system receive power and network connectivity.

All Ubiquiti antennas require a separate power supply, and cannot work off of standard PoE devices. The power supply needs to be connected to a standard power socket, and have two ports for Ethernet cables. The ports are labeled PoE and LAN.

The PoE port will always be wired directly to the Main port on the Ubiquiti device. If the Ubiquiti device has a secondary port, do not wire the PoE to that port because it will not correctly power the device.

The LAN port on the power supply needs to be wired into your network, or to a switch powering the camera. The LAN port cannot be wired directly to a PoE camera, as it will not provide enough power for the camera to function.

Step Two: Setup Units as Broadcaster & Receiver

Once you have wired the units you need to setup one unit as a broadcaster and one unite as a receiver.

To begin, log into the Ubiquiti unit. The default IP address is 192.168.1.20. The default username is ubnt, and password is ubnt.

Once you have logged into the unit, click on the wireless tab.

In the wireless tab, you will need to change a few settings.

First, you need to select the wireless mode. Select Access Point for the unit that will act as the broadcasted, and Station for the unit that will act as the receiver.

Always check the WDS (Transparent Bridge Mode) box.

You will always need to set a SSID that will be used by both antennas to communication. The SSID has to be identical on both antennas. We recommend hiding the SSID so no other devices can see the network connection.

The last setting you'll need to change is to make the link secure, an important set to creating the link between units.

We recommend WPA2 for the security setting. Use a long, hard to guess WPA Preshared Key. If you do not secure your wireless link, anyone with a wireless device will be able to connect to your network.

Once all of these setting changes have been made, click Change at the bottom of the screen. A message will pop up saying that the configuration contains changes and asking if you want to apply these changes. Click Apply.

Step Three: Secure Your Network

Select the Network tab at the top of the screen.

On this screen, set the antennas to a static IP address that will be reachable by your network. We do not recommend setting the antennas to DHCP, as communication between the antennas can be interrupted.

Next, select the System tab. Here, you will want to change the username and password of the devices to make your wireless connection secure.

To change the password, click on the key icon next to Administrator Username. Enter in the current password, and then enter in your new password.

Once you have changed username and password, click Change at the bottom of the screen, and select Apply when prompted. Repeat steps two and three as needed for every Ubiquiti device on your network.

The devices will reset to accommodate all of the setting changes you made. Once they are back online, and both antennas have been setup, check the connection between devices. First connect the Access Point to your network, and then connect the station to the PoE side (leave the LAN side blank).

The back of the units will light up with red, yellow, and green bars if the connection is good. Once these light up, the connection is good and you can mount the Ubiquiti antennas to access your remote cameras.

This blog will walk you through adding an ONVIF-compliant PTZ camera to Milestone software. The process can take some time, so please review all the steps before beginning.

When you add a PTZ camera to Milestone, it will not automatically recognize that the camera has PTZ capabilities. To enable the PTZ controls, open up your XProtect Management Application.

Once the application is open, right click on the hardware device that you want to enable PTZ controls, and click on properties.

Once the properties screen has opened, click on the PTZ Device menu.

To enable PTZ controls you need to check the box for Connected Cameras have Pan/Tilt/Zoom capabilities.

Once that is selected, change the PTZ type on the first field, COM1, to Absolute. Then change the camera type to Movable. Click OK to save these settings. When you open your Smart Client you will be able to move the PTZ camera remotely.

Please note, however, that enabling a camera as PTZ with Milestone will not give a fixed camera PTZ capabilities, the camera must be a PTZ model.

If you have any questions, or run into problems, please call VidoeSurveillance.com technical support at 866-945-6806 or email us at support@videosurveillance.com.

A major benefit of IP surveillance systems in the flexibility you have to add new cameras as your security needs change. But if you've added new cameras to your system, you will need to update your Milestone license to accommodate the new cameras.

The easiest way to update your account is to activate your license online. To being, open the Milestone XProtect Management Application. Click on the File menu.

Select the Activate License Online option.

A screen will pop up, prompting you to enter your Milestone user name and password.

After you have entered this information and logged into your system, click the Activate button. Your account will automatically be updated with the new camera licenses you purchased.

If you have any questions, or run into problems, please call VidoeSurveillance.com technical support at 866-945-6806 or email us at support@videosurveillance.com.

This is the last of three posts that will walk you throught the process of setting up port forwarding with Milestone software.

Go back to Step One.

Go back to Step Two.

To access your router, enter the IP address into your web browser of choice. If you do not know the IP address you can find it by opening your start menu and searching for "cmd" to open the command prompt menu.

Once the command prompt opens, enter the command "ipconfig" and hit enter. The information for your router will be listed under Default Gateway.

Now that you have your IP address, enter it into your preferred web browser. This will pull up your router, which will ask you for the username and password.

If you do not know your username and password, it is sometimes printed on the bottom of your router. Otherwise you will need to contact your internet service provided.

After you have logged in, go the section of your router's menu that has the port forwarding information. The following example uses a Netgear Genie router. If your router is different, try the Firewall menu, Advanced menu, or Applications and Gaming section.

In this example, we want the Advanced menu.

Once in the menu, click on Advanced Setup, then Port Forwarding/Port Triggering.

In the Port Forwarding menu, click the button to Add Custom Service.

We are opening the ports that Milestone is already using--80 internal, 8080 external for Smart Client access, and 8081/8082 for mobile access. Most port forwarding sections have the following information, and you will just add the correct information in the boxes to enable port forwarding.

The service name can be anything you want but we recommend keeping it simple, such as Smart Client when setting up the 8080, Mobile for 8081, and Secure Mobile for 8082.

You want to always select TCP/UDP for the Service Type, unless this is specifically noted in the device you are trying to port forward.

For External Starting and Ending Port, you will need to set up three separate rules, one for each external port. This means a rule for the 8080 port where the external starting and ending port are set to 8080. Repeat this for ports 8081 and 8082.

When setting up the rule for the 8080 port, make sure to uncheck the box for "Use the same port range for internal port." For the 8081 and 8082 rules, you should leave this box checked.

For the 8080 rule, you will want to manually enter the internal starting and ending port. Both should be 80.

Last, you need to enter the Internal IP Address of your Milestone server.

If you do not know this information, it can be found using the same "ipconfig" command you ran earlier.

Once you have all the fields filled out, you need to apply the rule. Once all three rules are set and applied, your port forwarding should be working.

This is the second of three posts that will walk you throught the process of setting up port forwarding with Milestone software.

Go back to Step One.

Go to Step Three.

To check on your mobile devices, you will need to open the Windows System Tray located in the bottom right-hand corner of your screen. Right click on the icon highlighted here:

This will open a new menu. Click on the Show/Edit Port Numbers option.

By default the port numbers will be 80801 (port) and 80802 (secured port). If this is correct, click OK and continue to the next step. If not, change them to the correct port numbers.

Next, you need to change the settings in your router to allow the data through--by default your router will not allow this data to be sent, for security purposes.

This is the first of three posts that will walk you throught the process of setting up port forwarding with Milestone software.

Go to Step Two.

Go to Step Three.

First, open your Milestone Management Client. Once it is open, click on the Server Access menu on the left-hand side of the screen.

This will open a new menu. The first field is in this menu is Sever Name. This can be anything you want--if you choose to leave it as Server, this will not impact your remote access.

The second field is Location Port. By default this is 80, and we strongly recommend leaving this at port 80.

The third field is Internet Access. This box needs to be checked if you want to remotely access your system.

The fourth field is Internet Address. This is your remote IP address. To find that, you can go to http://www.whatsmyip.org/ and the number displayed at the top of the page will be your internet address.

The fifth field is Internet Port. We recommend using 8080, as this will fit sequentially with the other ports that need to be forwarded.

The sixth field is Maximum Number of Clients. This is the maximum number of outside connections that can simultaneously be opened to your server. For Milestone Essential, this number is capped at five.

Once you have set each of these fields up, your Milestone server is configured to send out data to remote Smart Clients.

Will your new video surveillance system include complicated or large-scale components? If you need help configuring or installing the system, our System Integration Services can help.

System integration services from VideoSurveillance.com include configuring your NVR, video management software, and IP cameras to work together and with other security systems you may have. While most of the integration and configuration steps can be done our lab prior to shipping, or remotely once installed at your site, local integration partners are available as needed if you experience problems.

In addition, our system integration experts have experience with CCTV to IP migration, mobile and remote viewing and system management, wireless system design, and more.

Learn more about System Integration, or contact an expert today.