More Cameras? Specs/Settings help please

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Kenjusticejr

BIT Beta Team
May 5, 2014
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Computer Status.jpg



I have 4 cameras running on this computer...one junk camera, 2 slightly better than junk cameras, and 1 nice camera... I've dropped the frame rate down on the best of the 3 cameras, to 10 frames/sec in an attempt to lighten the load on my CPU.

I have a pretty decent processor, AMD Phenom II X6 1090T @ 3.2GHz and 16gb of ram and a 1gb graphics card on a pretty nice motherboard... The system was close to being "top of the line" a few years ago when I put it together and has done everything I've ever needed it to do until now....


I want to add about 4 more cameras to this system, but at the current rate, I don't think I can support it. Looking for advice on settings, frame rates, bit rates, motion sensitivity settings, and anything else that you think would make this run a bit smoother...

Looking at the pic, you'll see I have a crap load of stuff running on the computer currently...and without BI running at all, cpu usage is generally around 5-15%..but with BI running with these 4 cameras, it is bouncing between 65-95%....

So, I suppose my question is a pretty general one in regards to whether I can support more cameras on this computer or not by changing some settings, or tweaking cam performance.

Any input on the issue would be appreciated.
 
trying to repost this screen shot in an attempt to make it so it can be clicked on and viewed a bit better..not sure if it's working..but here it is again...

If you double click on it, then click on it again, you should be able to get a larger view to be able to see the details....
 

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You may be able to trim a few resources back by using "Direct-to-disc" recording (Camera properties, Record tab, then click File format and compression). One downside of this is that you will lose your overlays on the recordings unless they are generated on the camera end as opposed to from Blue Iris. In other words if the date and time is stamped from the camera then it will remain, if it's stamped from BI then it won't record with the overlay. You can remove the text overlay in Camera properties, Video tab, then under Text and graphic overlays, click Edit.

See if that trims back any resources.
 
I was able to make BlueIris very efficient by not recording. I have 4 3MP cameras, all 30fps on it and I barely use 2-3% CPU on an older slower machine. As Mike says, direct to disc will help, maybe about 30% from my experience.

Basically it comes down to money, do you beef up the system to support doubling the cameras or do you pay more for software that is more efficient and doesn't require a new PC? That was my dilemma and I deemed the cost of software was permanent meaning I own the license forever and can be put on any hardware but hardware has a life, so I chose software as the better investment. Figure better software like Milestone XProtect Essential for 8 cameras will set you back $390, new i7 PC, likely more. And don't get me wrong, I like BlueIris, but the total cost of ownership was not in favor of it. To give you an idea, I'm running a very old Intel i3-540 and with 10 cameras, all at full frame rate (why compromise) and most at 3MP and I have plenty of room for growth.

But that does not mean BlueIris is throwaway. As Mike can attest, having the cool weather overlays and such makes for a great webcam and the software is cheap if it was only used for that purpose. That's how I use it on one project, again, very low CPU for that use case.
 
WOW, I changed all 4 cameras to Direct to Disk record and yes, it did reduce the cpu usage by about 10-20% but now when I view the recorded video, there is ghost images and garbled video images of whatever is moving...so..that won't work...was worth a try though..changing settings back now...
 
Direct to disk won't add the overlays unless you go to export a clip, say for the cops, then you can check off a box and it will generate them, other ways to save a lot of CPU, lower frames per second, lower bitrate on the camera, that's about the only things I can think of that would really make much difference. I run 15fps and 4096 bitrate, I'm running 2 cameras on a dual core cpu at around 39% average, I do direct to disk and use the OSD from the cameras. Play with the settings I mentioned and watch the CPU, try to find a happy medium between not killing the computer and quality, anytime recording is going on due to motion detection that will eat up CPU also so you want to have some overhead, more cameras recording at once will be even more cpu usage just something to keep in mind if you ever have one cam triggering others and stuff like that.
 
It's not the steady state average CPU use that kills you, it's when say 2 cameras are recording at once because the same event triggered both and the CPU spikes and starts giving lost frames, choppy video. So you could be running fine at say 50% but the spikes to 100% when you really need it to work are what got me.
 
well, I dropped the bit rate down on the 3 decent cameras from 150 to 600 kB/s to 100-150 kB/s and that seemed to help a bit... the 4th camera, an old junk one doesn't have the settings for me to adjust the bitrate and is stuck at about 600 kB/s ... Also, I have them all dialed back to 10 fps and the cpu usage went from an average of 80-90% to 40-70% with spikes up to the 90's and dips down to the mid 30's...so, an improvement.. but loss in quality of recorded video...I guess they call that compromise...
 
networkcameracritic said:
It's not the steady state average CPU use that kills you, it's when say 2 cameras are recording at once because the same event triggered both and the CPU spikes and starts giving lost frames, choppy video. So you could be running fine at say 50% but the spikes to 100% when you really need it to work are what got me.
Click to expand...


Yep, because direct to disk is not re-encoding video, but when you trigger recording, it's encoding, so every camera that is recording is encoding a stream of video and that kind of CPU usage adds up REAL fast.
 
Kenjusticejr said:
well, I dropped the bit rate down on the 3 decent cameras from 150 to 600 kB/s to 100-150 kB/s and that seemed to help a bit... the 4th camera, an old junk one doesn't have the settings for me to adjust the bitrate and is stuck at about 600 kB/s ... Also, I have them all dialed back to 10 fps and the cpu usage went from an average of 80-90% to 40-70% with spikes up to the 90's and dips down to the mid 30's...so, an improvement.. but loss in quality of recorded video...I guess they call that compromise...
Click to expand...


If I had to choose where to take the hit, I'd take it on frames per second, I use 15 and motion is still pretty fluid, but for surveillance, if people aren't moving around very fast, you can really get away with 10, or even 5. I'd try to keep my bitrate at a good place, also make sure your i-frames match your fps. Outside of that, it is what it is.
 
networkcameracritic said:
I was able to make BlueIris very efficient by not recording. I have 4 3MP cameras, all 30fps on it and I barely use 2-3% CPU on an older slower machine. As Mike says, direct to disc will help, maybe about 30% from my experience.

Basically it comes down to money, do you beef up the system to support doubling the cameras or do you pay more for software that is more efficient and doesn't require a new PC? That was my dilemma and I deemed the cost of software was permanent meaning I own the license forever and can be put on any hardware but hardware has a life, so I chose software as the better investment. Figure better software like Milestone XProtect Essential for 8 cameras will set you back $390, new i7 PC, likely more. And don't get me wrong, I like BlueIris, but the total cost of ownership was not in favor of it. To give you an idea, I'm running a very old Intel i3-540 and with 10 cameras, all at full frame rate (why compromise) and most at 3MP and I have plenty of room for growth.

But that does not mean BlueIris is throwaway. As Mike can attest, having the cool weather overlays and such makes for a great webcam and the software is cheap if it was only used for that purpose. That's how I use it on one project, again, very low CPU for that use case.
Click to expand...


regarding milestone, I downloaded the "free" version to give it a try... anything I need to know?.... BI just about pushed me to my limits with bitrate and frame rate on my home computer...not sure what the deal is, but I can get an excellent framerate in the browser, realtime, streaming...but when I look at the exact same camera in BI, I get .2 to 1 fps and can't get above 50kB/s bitrate...
 
Alright, with all of the suggestions, and some tweaking, and a restart of the computer, my cpu usage is down to less than 50% with the current 4 cameras... This tells me that i'll be able to cram some more on the system... Thanks for all the input.

Will be starting a new thread regarding specific camera settings and the effect they have on performance, video quality, network load, and so on... hopefully it will benefit more than just me...and hopefully ya'all don't get tired of me blowing up the forum with new threads...

Thanks again....
 
Like others have said the most witnessed methods for reducing overhead are lowering FPS, pushing overlay/flipping/rotating onto the cameras and using Direct to Disk. With 7 cameras on a Phenom II X4 3.2ghz @ roughly 13MP, I was able to drop from around 70% to 50% just going from 20-30fps to all at 15fps. But like also mentioned, you need to keep 30-40% free for spikes when recording events are happening because of disk read/write overhead on the cpu. Remote web access to view when you are checking the system which equates to 5% roughly per user on my system. Test the system in action so that you aren't finding out your miscalculations when you really need the system to perform. Throw everything at it and simulate movements at multiple locations. Leave task/resource manager on and check the history after the simulation.
 
another way to reduce CPU load is to minimize the BI window, and/or starting BI as a service, and/or selecting the option Camera properties > Schedule > Camera is only active when triggered, and/or deselecting the option Camera properties > Schedule > Continue to display and stream video while inactive

I re-tested it just now: full screen BI sucks 60% of my CPU, with the window minimized BI sucks 30%

I read many posts/articles where the main culprit was considered the video rendering, and more video you have to show (more cams) higher will be the CPU load

may be the video card is responsible as well
 
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