I have been running a similar setup for about 3 years now. I have 5 servers running blue iris with a total of 116 cameras. I just recently included a NAS with 180TB of storage. I also have a sixth server with blue iris that does not record. I set it as a "streaming server" which only streams camera groups from the other servers.
94 Camera Blue Iris install
- Thread starter By the Book Networking
- Start date
Thanks for sharing! I was thinking about deploying BI solution in the scenario where the client will have over 120 IP cams(mostly 2MP and some 4MP) and for the same reason - IP cam license. Have you tried to integrate any POS devices with BI by any chance?
fenderman
Staff member
- Mar 9, 2014
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This is just a terrible idea. Blue iris is not designed for this type of scenario. You'll be paying more for the hardware and it will never run properly. Look at Network optix NX witness sold in North America as DW ipvms it's $70 per license with lifetime software upgrades. You can likely reduce it further with a volume purchase like yours.
Fenderman I am not arguing with you since you are obviously way more knowledgeable in BI then I am. And I am not installing the system yet. At the moment client has a mixed system of analog and IP devices. IP Cameras running on NUUO VMS which is running flawlessly with the support of POS devices. In case of upgrade we will most likely go with another NUUO build since the client already owns 64 licenses. I just want to understand cons and pros of BI. I hear you say it's a terrible idea to run BI for a large camera deployment so can you list some reasons why BI may fail in such a scenario. Thank you.
Since the last deployment in January they have been operating 103 IP cams, 90 6mp Dahua (currently set at 2MP) and 13 Geovison 360 IP cameras with no issues.
One server has the odd hiccup, but I have a suspicion its the raid controller. The Dell Poweredge R720XD pushes through 64 cameras with only 67%CPU usage, that's with 15 users streaming live!
But overall the client has been super satisfied with the installation, prior to the installation I presented Digital Watchdog, Avigilon and BI. The client wanted BI since another location was deployed using that VMS. That being said I made sure the client was fully aware that Blue Iris was not designed to handle this sort of deployment.
DW would not drop the cost of their licencing below $80 CAD, so $80 X 103 + our 13% tax in Ontario = one empty checkbook.
DW claimed they would give is "a deal" on licensing is we purchased there cameras......... turns out only varifocal cams include licenses.
Overall Blue Iris satisfies all there needs, with great support and upgrades it was hard not to choose.
Also how intuitive the UI3 is, People love it!!!
This has been my 20th Blue Iris integration and not one person has been disappointed.
Sure it's not "Recommended" But if your not afraid to tinker and experiment, BI can be very rewarding
One server has the odd hiccup, but I have a suspicion its the raid controller. The Dell Poweredge R720XD pushes through 64 cameras with only 67%CPU usage, that's with 15 users streaming live!
But overall the client has been super satisfied with the installation, prior to the installation I presented Digital Watchdog, Avigilon and BI. The client wanted BI since another location was deployed using that VMS. That being said I made sure the client was fully aware that Blue Iris was not designed to handle this sort of deployment.
DW would not drop the cost of their licencing below $80 CAD, so $80 X 103 + our 13% tax in Ontario = one empty checkbook.
DW claimed they would give is "a deal" on licensing is we purchased there cameras......... turns out only varifocal cams include licenses.
Overall Blue Iris satisfies all there needs, with great support and upgrades it was hard not to choose.
Also how intuitive the UI3 is, People love it!!!
This has been my 20th Blue Iris integration and not one person has been disappointed.
Sure it's not "Recommended" But if your not afraid to tinker and experiment, BI can be very rewarding
fenderman
Staff member
- Mar 9, 2014
- 36,892
- 21,407
The cost to purchase and to run that spaceheater of a server negates any license savings over time.Since the last deployment in January they have been operating 103 IP cams, 90 6mp Dahua (currently set at 2MP) and 13 Geovison 360 IP cameras with no issues.
One server has the odd hiccup, but I have a suspicion its the raid controller. The Dell Poweredge R720XD pushes through 64 cameras with only 67%CPU usage, that's with 15 users streaming live!
But overall the client has been super satisfied with the installation, prior to the installation I presented Digital Watchdog, Avigilon and BI. The client wanted BI since another location was deployed using that VMS. That being said I made sure the client was fully aware that Blue Iris was not designed to handle this sort of deployment.
DW would not drop the cost of their licencing below $80 CAD, so $80 X 103 + our 13% tax in Ontario = one empty checkbook.
DW claimed they would give is "a deal" on licensing is we purchased there cameras......... turns out only varifocal cams include licenses.
Overall Blue Iris satisfies all there needs, with great support and upgrades it was hard not to choose.
Also how intuitive the UI3 is, People love it!!!
This has been my 20th Blue Iris integration and not one person has been disappointed.
Sure it's not "Recommended" But if your not afraid to tinker and experiment, BI can be very rewarding
Also note that cpu would increase dramatically if you used a 1080p monitor.
They lose the more advanced features like failover. Makes no sense.
Of course!
DW has incredible features with missing object detection, Failover, High encoding efficiency, ad much more but at the end of the day the customer wanted Blue Iris.
Blue Iris is a great VMS!
There is no denying it, Who else offers and affordable, reliable, cam license free vms?
DW has incredible features with missing object detection, Failover, High encoding efficiency, ad much more but at the end of the day the customer wanted Blue Iris.
Blue Iris is a great VMS!
There is no denying it, Who else offers and affordable, reliable, cam license free vms?
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fenderman
Staff member
- Mar 9, 2014
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Blue iris is great - i dont think you have read my posts. A Mazda 3 is great too, but not for towing a large load. It will cost the client more in the long term to run BI, they are saving nothing.
I'm surprised this hasn't been asked yet. Can I ask why you are using surveillance grade drives in raid?
Do you have data on what power other VMS solutions would consume with such a setup?
Im in the process of converting to BI from Bluecherry (ubuntu nvr) and Im astonished at the cpu cycles BI is using compared to headless ubuntu.
That being said, running it as a server, on a headless single e3-1220 xeon-8gb ram, full time recording with a total of 15.4 MP/second (at 25-30 fps - 5 cams) - and roughly 55 Mbit data coming into the server, cpu is sitting around 17%. This means the server is pulling approximately 93 watts (according to a kill-a-watt). This equates to lets sat 2.4 kWh a day or about $0.20 in power per day.
OP is in Ontario where they have terrible electricity prices and variable rates for peak hours but I would expect his daily cost to run that server on average will be less than $0.70 a day.
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fenderman
Staff member
- Mar 9, 2014
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93w is a high power consumption number for that load.
You can look at their websites to see the recommended processors.
understand, you can set blue iris to use much lower cpu consumption by avoiding decoding of the video but you lose function - that is how the other vms do it. See limit decoding in the wiki.
The OP's setup is using two systems with dual cpus, at much higher loads, they are using much more power. Add that to the cost of the systems 3500 for both and you are not saving anything.
I would not use a xeon for any deployment really, Intel I5 6gen series is usually more than powerful enough
my setup is an extreme example of what BI is capable of. but it required computer power that consumer grade couldn't handle.
Im sure BI will become more efficient overtime
the dell optiplex with a I5 6400 would be loads better for your application!
That's my pc of choice, sometime HP Prodesks are cheap too!
Plus 10FPS is more than enough, 30FPS will hog your cpu and disk space!
We used a Raid in one server that was 8 4TB drives,
the second server used 2 10TB drives, this is just an experiment to see which performs better.
The company's IT team is actively involved with the servers and they wanted to try it out.
my setup is an extreme example of what BI is capable of. but it required computer power that consumer grade couldn't handle.
Im sure BI will become more efficient overtime
the dell optiplex with a I5 6400 would be loads better for your application!
That's my pc of choice, sometime HP Prodesks are cheap too!
Plus 10FPS is more than enough, 30FPS will hog your cpu and disk space!
We used a Raid in one server that was 8 4TB drives,
the second server used 2 10TB drives, this is just an experiment to see which performs better.
The company's IT team is actively involved with the servers and they wanted to try it out.
yellowgto
n3wb
- Jan 6, 2020
- 7
- 1
How is this setup working out for you? After using a "Enterprise" Panasonic NVR and not being able to salvage ANY data from a faulted array because of a proprietary Array setup. We''re going to use a spare R720 and offload the data to an old SAN we were going to decommission. Do you think your servers could handle 24/7 recording?
check out the latest Blue Iris Support on Youtube. The specifically discuss 2 VM instances of Blue Iris (for a 74-94 camera system). Pretty cool video for education purposes.