Dahua high power consumption?

[KeithH]

Hello

I'm new to this forum - hope someone can help.

I have a Dahua 8 way 3tb NVR and 6 x 5mp Dahua cameras. 3 of these cameras are wired directly to the NVR and 3 come through switch boxes as they are on an outbuilding.

The system has been installed a couple of years and my primary need has been to be able to view my property when I am away. Other than one glitch with ip addresses, it has worked well and does what I need it to do.

I shut the system down when I am at home as I did notice when it was installed the measured power consumption was around 200 watts which is a significant power requirement. I am now wondering if this is:

a) correct

b) if it is then can I reduce this in any way

My need is still for live viewing rather than recording.

Any help and advice welcomed.

Thanks

 

[bigredfish]

I’m no electrical engineer so I could be way off, but the avg NVR is using 10-20 watts per specs and the cameras say 6-10 watts each. So 200 watts sounds excessive…

 

[CCTVCam]

POE Switches will use power as well.

A power measuring plug such as this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B085S7Q1T4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&th=1

...might be a good way to get an accurate measurment although it depends if parts of your system have been hard wired which might make measurement by plug impossible. eg on mine, both my BI PC (obviously) and switch supplying the cameras with power are on plugs so it's relatively easy to unplug them, inset the measuring plug, get a reading after they've settled and then repeat for other components to build up the picture of the true consumption. (note you my have to re-initialise some parts of the system settings after a power cut).

For the NVR whilst you can also measure it, for a quick and dirty estimate, just look up the specification sheet on the maufacturers website. Beware though depending on how they measure it, the Hard drive(s) might no be inlcuded in the power consumption figures as each drive is different and usually you select your own so the manufacturer doesn't know whjat the drive consumption is.

 

[tigerwillow1]

The power specs I've noticed on the NVR spec sheets do not include the disk. Plus I wonder if that might be a light load measurement that ramps up when the bits come in fast? I need to measure mine someday.

 

[f1restarter]

I can read the power consumption for individual ports on my managed poe switch. All my Dahua OEM cameras stays around 2-3 watts when no IR is on. With IR lights on, they usually go up to about 5 watts, exept my 5241-z12e that has very powerful IR light. That one draws just above 10 watts.

 

[CCTVCam]

I'd still use a power plug. The switch itself will use power and you don't know how accurate the switch reporting is.

Also, don't underestimate how much devices might use. My BI pc which is only an i5-11400 with no gaphics card uses 50-60w with Windows 11 in normal mode and around 40w in power saving mode. Modern cpu's are power hungary. An NV should use a lot less as they probably use lower powered chips such as ARM but don't discount everything until you've measured it. Also there may be peaks when triggers are being processed. Using a plug for individual components will also help identify where the problem lies should there be something with excess consumption.