Birdhouse Spy Cam, West Linn, OR 97068US
Loud noise from the tv
There are several things that may be causing a loud hum on your television when connected to your Hawk Eye. Here are ways to reduce or eliminate the hum.
1) The volume on the TV is simply turned up too high. Try turning the volume way down. You'll be surprised at how low it can be turned down -- until the hum disappears - and you can still hear.
2) You are picking up electrical interference from nearby electronics, fluorescent lights etc. One person even picked up a nearby radio station. Although the cable is shielded, that 75+' can act as an undesirable antenna. Keep the connecting cable away from such outside electrical fields as much as possible. We have also had reports about this from areas experiencing greater than average rain fall. It seems that the long cable, when submered in supersaturated soils, will develop a frequency feedback loop. The problem goes away when the soil dries out.
3) Some TVs just don't get along with the camera. For example, I have two 13" TVs, a Magnavox and a Toshiba. Both appear to be almost identical. However, I get quite a bit of hum off the Toshiba, but none off the Magnavox.
This probably doesn't happen anymore. Afterall, who still has a VCR? But Running the camera through an outside VCR or other such device, and then into the TV may also cause this. One customer was running the camera through a Sharp VCR and had the hum. When he switched to another brand of VCR, the hum disappeared. Do you have another TV / VCR you can try?
4) The Hawk Eyes and Red Robin send out only a mono signal so the noise can come from the sound channel that's not in use. You can fix this by using an RCA y-connecter to take the output from the working sound channel and put it into both inputs on your TV or VCR.
5) A final option is to install a ground loop isolator between the camera and television/computer. We are currently testing several of these to see if they resolve the problem. Stay tuned. The official name for this is a 60-cycle ground loop. Your television or computer and Hawk Eye Cam each use various power cables that ultimately lead back to your circuit breaker panel. At your panel, 220 volts AC is split into two 110-volt legs with one common ground. Unfortuantely, in some homes, there can be differences in electrical potential from ground to ground at each outlet, It's this difference that causes that distractive ground loop hum.
