I forgot how to configure Alerts for motion

johndball

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Hey y'all, I guess old age is setting in and my CRS is getting worse. That's not a good sign for mid-30's! :(

I upgraded BI a few weeks ago and noticed that my Alerts, which previously kept a 10 second pre-buffer for motion, is now nearly empty with no new alerts. This is a useful feature because it would capture foxes and other "creatures of the night" stalking our livestock, etc. How do I go about getting the Alerts configured to capture motion with a buffer per camera?
 

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wittaj

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Your CPU is showing maxed out - that could be part of the problem.

Approximately which version did you update from and then to? What CPU do you have (i number and CPU number)

There are lots of threads here about recent updates breaking things like alerts for some people. Fixes have ranged from simply rolling back in BI to an older version; going into each camera and hitting the find/inspect again; going into the motion settings and ensuring that there is a Zone A selected for motion detection and then adding A into the zone for motion, etc.

Unless you updated to take advantage of some new features in BI, the recommendation would be to rollback to a previous version that was working as intended.

I would look at why your machine is maxing out CPU regardless.

Do EVERY optimization in the wiki and you will see a major drop in the CPU. Substreams are a must, especially once you get over 4MP cameras. Direct to Disk is a must as well.

A member here runs 50 cameras on a 4th generation CPU at 30%, so I am sure for 3 cameras on a 7th generation you will be fine.

And by EVERY, I mean EVERY. Too many people come here complaining of high CPU usage and claim they have done every optimization in the wiki and once they post screenshots, we see they are not using the substreams and that is probably one of the biggest CPU savers. Do not skip one because you think it isn't important or won't make that big of a deal. Even dropping frame rate a few FPS can make a big difference. No reason to run more than 15FPS, and many us have cams running at 10 to 12 FPS. Movies for the big screen are shot at 24FPS, so I do not think we need 30FPS for these cameras LOL. The goal is to get a clean image, not smooth motion.

If you do not understand what something does in BI, then ask. Too many people also change a setting not realizing what it does and actually makes their performance worse. Your statement "I have learned a few ways to help that" has me concerned LOL as there are settings one can change to bring CPU down initially, but it will explode later.

Please post a screenshot of your BI camera status page that shows FPS, MP/s, etc.

 

johndball

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Thanks for the reply. I found it while optimizing settings. It is under Alerts - Fire when Triggered under the camera settings. As far as 100% CPU, it is mainly because I am running this on a VM and I haven't moved back to a dedicated hardware CCTV platform when the first one died a few years ago. It is on my "to-do" list but I'm sure you know how life priorities get in the way. It is something I can deal with for now as the main thing I am looking for is post-incident video or viewing items on my phone. I rarely live stream the video and, when I do, that is what spikes the CPU.

I'll get around to getting another dedicated box for BI. All it takes is time and money. :p
 

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johndball

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I went through the guide and reconfigured EVERY camera. Enabling sub-streams and configuring them appropriately. TBH I've never seen my BI instance on the VMware setup run anything under 95% CPU load. I'm in the 70's now with sub-streams enabled. That, combined with reconfiguring the alerts with 10 second buffer, and it is running to my liking (and faster). Thanks!
 

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