Short review of Dahua NBK1000 Keyboard from EmpireTech

[Tinman]

Picked one of these up from Andy. I always wanted a joystick to control my PTZ cameras. A few years ago, I tried to use a Windows gaming joystick through BlueIris, but it just had to much lag and worked like crap. This NBK1000 connects directly to your PTZ through your network. In my case, I use BlueIris so the direct network mode is the best solution. It supports other methods as well. So currently I have it configured to run my 3 PTZ cameras and it will still support 2045 more
The responce time is zero lag and I really like it. It is a little challenging to setup, but no more than a IP camera's install. I assigned it a static IP and configured my 3 cameras in about a hour. Andy of course, supplied it with the latest firmware installed and was ready to go when it arrived. It will take some practice to master the joystick, but I have already seen a huge improvement over using BI's ptz arrows! The joystick also increases the PTZ movement speed the more you move the joystick as well. Anyway, I am happy with my purchase and Andy's service can't be beat !

Here's a couple of pictures and short video to give you a size comparison to my computer keyboard.

Dahua NBK1000 keyboard

Short clip to show lights and display. Also a size comparison to PC keyboard.

youtube.com

 

[Mark_M]

I bought one of these NKB1000 last year and it has been awesome.

On my NVR5x-I, playback and controlling the NVR is awesome.
Little things too, like being able to access the PTZ OSD and switch auxiliary lighting on with the keyboard.
My favorite feature is playing back footage through the NVR and using the joystick to switch between camera views in a snap.

 

[Flintstone61]

Sounds like a good product. Alas I have no PTZ's at this time.....

 

[Mark_M]

It works well enough for most of my use cases. I primarily use SmartPSS to view recordings/search.
At the moment I haven't got RS232 connection to my NVR working, I think my HDMI over Ethernet with RS232 passthrough is bad.

Features:

• On selecting a camera number + PTZ, it activates PTZ control and it also brings the camera full screen. Sometimes this is helpful, other times I find it annoying.
• Pressing a camera number then CAM brings up that single camera into full screen.
• Pressing a split screen number than MULT brings up that split screen, e.g. 4-MULT into 2x2 screen (limited to 1, 4, 8, 9, 16, to your NVR's max channels).
• UP/DOWN changes split screen views (1, 4, 8, 9, 16, to max ch).
• LEFT/RIGHT changes cameras or multiscreen cameras shown, e.g. in 2x2 showing ch 1-4, RIGHT changes to ch 5-8.
• In camera PTZ mode: Pressing SETUP + OTHER brings up camera OSD. Use joystick to navigate camera OSD. Pressing ESC will close camera OSD.
• 12v 1A input, you could easily use a cheap POE splitter.
• You can set the NVR/Camera/etc name. E.g. Device 1 is my NVR and the name given is 'NVR' to show on it's LCD screen.
• Pressing ENTER while no other action is taking place opens the NVR's menu. Joystick to navigate.
• If the NVR is logged out, connecting to the NVR with the Joystick will login that account. So one 6 digit passcode to login to the keyboard also logs in that user to the NVR (handy). Although this does not logout the NVR after use.

Cons:
Construction:

• The plastic quality feels very cheap. The plastic shows marks where I pressed buttons.
• Buttons on click feels bad. It seems like a standard micro switch below, not a nice press like a computer keyboard.

Software:

• You need to login every time the unit is powered on. You can set user to never log out out but this only keeps the user logged in while the unit is powered on.
• I had to change my NVR password because the max password length maximum is 16 characters.... (Yes, my password was longer than that.)
• Some features the NVR does not support the joystick and will show a message "This operation does not support in preview play". Example is AI search through IVS or Video Metadata.
• Entering a date/time to search cannot be done with the number keys (yuck, I have to use the mouse).
• Going to a custom split screen cannot be done, only standard forms like 1, 4, 8, 9, 16.
• Joystick will not show immediately if there is a network error preventing communication to your NVR. E.g. you've connected to the NVR then the link has disconnected, it will still try to perform actions.
• This device does not show a name on the network. This made it a challenge to find it's MAC ID to set a static DHCP reservation on my router.
• Backlight can be turned on/off, however there is no setting to have it light up when the keyboard is in use. E.g. backlight on for 30s since last activity.

Some of these software bugs maybe the NVR's fault.

 

[Mark_M]

Sounds like a good product. Alas I have no PTZ's at this time.....

6 thousand messages on IPCT and you have not purchased a PTZ..??
What's wrong!?

 

[Flintstone61]

6 thousand messages on IPCT and you have not purchased a PTZ..??
What's wrong!?

Oh i have/had 2 but they were on my first install at a Condo job I no longer work at. 2mp " Jidetech" ( HIK OEM's) they still work fine....
The one I bought from Andy's refurb page, ended up on sombody elses house. ( after they moved and abandoned their Reo-link system) Well the house fire helped them abandon Reo-link ....
I talked him into an Amcrest 32 Ch.....and now he can't figure out how to operate it. So ......This is why their is Reolink.....any child can set it up perhaps?
Andy would be glad I didn't have this kid buy from Empiretech....

 

[bp2008]

A few years ago, I tried to use a Windows gaming joystick through BlueIris, but it just had to much lag and worked like crap. This NBK1000 connects directly to your PTZ through your network. In my case, I use BlueIris so the direct network mode is the best solution. It supports other methods as well. So currently I have it configured to run my 3 PTZ cameras and it will still support 2045 more
The responce time is zero lag and I really like it.

That is interesting. Do you find that you need to view the video through Dahua's 1st-party software too, in order to have low latency input? There is significant delay baked into most video streaming software. I believe Ken told me once that Blue Iris keeps "4 frames" buffered ahead of time, but there's probably more to it than that. At the very least, these "4 frames" of delay would be on top of whatever delay is in the camera's encoding and streaming process. Then you also get display output lag, which can be anywhere from a couple milliseconds to 60+ milliseconds depending on the display. Some TVs can even add latency over 100 milliseconds when they aren't in "game mode" and all their video processing features are turned on.

Blue Iris's PTZ controls are indeed very primitive for the most part (the emphasis is on compatibility, not performance). Blue Iris mainly uses HTTP for sending PTZ commands to a camera, and particularly on cameras with weaker CPUs, each request can take about 100 milliseconds +/- 50ms to complete (lots of inconsistency is common). Add that to the video streaming delay, and the result is that the input lag of PTZ cameras in Blue Iris is frequently in the ballpark of 500 to 1000 milliseconds. If Dahua did their jobs halfway decently, you could probably get an end-to-end latency of around 50 to 100 milliseconds or less using the joystick to control, and Dahua's first-party software to view in a low-latency mode of some kind.

There's no technical reason a PC gamepad and software could not achieve the same level of accuracy and speed for PTZ control, except that the communication protocols used by the NKB1000 are likely kept secret and it would be quite a bit of work to reverse engineer them and implement them in software.

 

[Tinman]

That is interesting. Do you find that you need to view the video through Dahua's 1st-party software too, in order to have low latency input? There is significant delay baked into most video streaming software. I believe Ken told me once that Blue Iris keeps "4 frames" buffered ahead of time, but there's probably more to it than that. At the very least, these "4 frames" of delay would be on top of whatever delay is in the camera's encoding and streaming process. Then you also get display output lag, which can be anywhere from a couple milliseconds to 60+ milliseconds depending on the display. Some TVs can even add latency over 100 milliseconds when they aren't in "game mode" and all their video processing features are turned on.

Blue Iris's PTZ controls are indeed very primitive for the most part (the emphasis is on compatibility, not performance). Blue Iris mainly uses HTTP for sending PTZ commands to a camera, and particularly on cameras with weaker CPUs, each request can take about 100 milliseconds +/- 50ms to complete (lots of inconsistency is common). Add that to the video streaming delay, and the result is that the input lag of PTZ cameras in Blue Iris is frequently in the ballpark of 500 to 1000 milliseconds. If Dahua did their jobs halfway decently, you could probably get an end-to-end latency of around 50 to 100 milliseconds or less using the joystick to control, and Dahua's first-party software to view in a low-latency mode of some kind.

There's no technical reason a PC gamepad and software could not achieve the same level of accuracy and speed for PTZ control, except that the communication protocols used by the NKB1000 are likely kept secret and it would be quite a bit of work to reverse engineer them and implement them in software.

Well I tried to show to the best of my ability the difference between BlueIris and SmartPSS. You are correct, the Blueirs has more lag, but is very acceptable compared to using the BI gui arrows on this camera. The SD5A425GA-HNR is different from my other Dahua PTZ cams. The stepping is TINY and you cannot adjust that.