[seeingthings]

School me on video surveillance.

Not looking to spend a fortune, maybe 2 or 3 cameras at most. Wireless would be easiest.

I've seen package deals at local big box stores with a few cameras, wifi and some even come with a 5 or 7" touchscreen LCD. Reviews on the web are very poor and most don't seem to be as good as they claim on the box.

Are they worth the cash? Should I build a kit piece by piece? Cameras, DVR, monitor.. etc?

newegg and u can get a 4 camera dvr for a 100-200 bucks.. and it allows u to use up to 4 cameras.. id get an 8 channel.. so if u want to upgrade to 8 cameras. ur good to go.. and u don't need a huge harddrived one.. u can buy a pc harddrive and add it after..

or if uhave an old pc.. u can by a PCI card that will allow u to hook up cameras.. and use a pc as a DVR.

[OldSSSCGuy]

Newer web cams can be easy to use and easy to network. Problem with many 'security cameras' is their resolution and frame rate can be so bad that they can be almost useless. If you are going to stream its one thing, if you want to record its a whole another thing. Like AlterEgo said an old PC can be used, but its better have some killer CPU and fast-ass drives to record more than 1 camera at a time at any resolution which has value. Takes a lot of horsepower to record good resolution from more than one feed. The higher the res, the more hosrspower needed. A single medium-almost-high res feed can eat about 20 meg a minute, maybe 20 gig a day.

Just an opinion...