Hello from Australia

[Mobius2011]

Hi

Seems like a place with a wealth of knowledge and expertise. I work in IT and Ive just recently started teaching myself ip cams and messed around with various cams and software and installed some at various customer sites.

Tried so far Foscam , Hikvision , Dlink and Dahua cams. At the moment, Im leaning more towards foscam, as the prices seem great and the quality is fine with the clients. I tried inbuilt software until I found this site and have since started using blue iris software, which is great.

I would say Im still very noob at configuring blue iris, but Ive got the basics down, which is profiles, scheduling, different recording modes, activity alerts, but Ive got a way to go to perfect it, so here to pick the brains of the pros

Only thing I'd say about blue iris is, maybe Im missing something, but with NVR and cam packages, you can get 4 cams and an NVR for like $500-$600 USD. Whereas with blue iris, you need a pc/laptop, then the software and just this cost alone puts it past $600 and thats without the cams. Is there a cheaper/better way of using blue iris, or you pretty much just buy a pc and blue iris for every location?

 

[gwminor48]

Welcome to the forum, you'll find some fellow Australians here too. You'll find people who prefer nvr's and others who prefer Blue Iris or other pc software. I don't have an nvr but I think you may be limited by what cameras will work with each brand of nvr. Blue Iris allows use of different brands of cameras but it does require a good cpu if you have several HD cameras working on it. My puny pc was ok with 2 or 3 1.3mp Foscams but since I upgraded to HD cameras it is struggling. I'm waiting on a sale at Dell outlet where I can hopefully get a suitable pc for 300-400 U.S. dollars. I'm sure other will chime in here and give you better info about nvr's.

 

[Mobius2011]

Welcome to the forum, you'll find some fellow Australians here too. You'll find people who prefer nvr's and others who prefer Blue Iris or other pc software. I don't have an nvr but I think you may be limited by what cameras will work with each brand of nvr. Blue Iris allows use of different brands of cameras but it does require a good cpu if you have several HD cameras working on it. My puny pc was ok with 2 or 3 1.3mp Foscams but since I upgraded to HD cameras it is struggling. I'm waiting on a sale at Dell outlet where I can hopefully get a suitable pc for 300-400 U.S. dollars. I'm sure other will chime in here and give you better info about nvr's.

Hi, yes I know what you mean about CPU. I was in LA in Feb and set up a site with 10 Foscam standard cams, with default settings on an i5 CPU and it doesnt hit even 30% CPU. Back in OZ recently I tried another one, this time with dahua HD cams and just 2 of them maxed out my i3 CPU with default settings. I had to back fps , resolution and other settings way down just to get it below 70%.