I use Hikvision - 8 x 1080p cams with a NVR containing 2 8gb drives (need to check size if interested). About 30 days of full time recording. All cams are PoE.
The bullet cams are great, domes not so great. I can grab stills into indigo with a refreshing URL.
The phone app is poor at best, and the software on the NVR a little clunky. No filters for motion, other than line crossing and blocking out areas.
Have been running for 18 months with about 5 reboots (only b/c the web server providing the images to indigo crashes, but the box still records - I've not investigated the problem).
Image quality is perfect daytime, the domes need extra IR at night, but the bullets function well.
There are two outputs on the NVR - HDMI is fed into a modulator so visible on all TV's, the other is fed into a local monitor.
Whole system cost around £1,500 (say $2,250) so not cheap but solid.
I use indigo for monitoring when away with a refresh every 5 seconds.
There are a few niggles, but generally impressed. Police were also impressed with quality - night time footage used to confirm suspect had driven past a night on his way to kill a young lad.