Adding a network card for archiving to NAS?

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Rockford622

Getting the hang of it
Feb 19, 2016
185
33
In my Blue Iris PC, I currently have 2 network cards, one that communicates with my main network (where my NAS, a Synology DS1817+ with 4 network ports lives), and another network card that talks just to my camera network (different subnet). This is a headless PC that I use remote desktop to manage it, and UI3 to view cameras. I have noticed that when the PC is archiving clips to my NAS (happens frequently with 14 cameras, like every 5 to 10 minutes), the UI3 gets slow and displays the clock icon in the upper right corner. I believe this is due to my main network NIC in my BI PC becoming saturated with network traffic while its archiving clips to my NAS. I have confirmed this by remoting into the PC and checking the network activity. Sure enough, every time this happens its because the PC is moving files to my NAS at around 600 to 700 mbps. Once the data transfer is complete, the UI3 is nice and smooth again. This got me thinking I could add a 3rd NIC to my BI PC and directly wire it to one of the extra network ports on my Synology NAS and configure BI to use that NIC to move files.

Anyone ever try this before? I can't really see a downside to it and it should allow the main network NIC to be freed up for UI3 and other general, main network type traffic. Basically, have a dedicated network just for archiving files.

BTW, all network cards that I have mentioned are gigabit connected with CAT 6 ethernet cables.
 
I don't see why your idea would not work. Assuming you have room to add another NIC, give it a try. I've also had success with USB 3.0 to 1000baseT dongles (if you don't have an extra PCIe slot available).

If BI is archiving to your NAS every 5-10 minutes, why not just record to your NAS directly instead of temporarily storing it on your BI box for 5-10 minutes?
 
reflection said:
I don't see why your idea would not work. Assuming you have room to add another NIC, give it a try. I've also had success with USB 3.0 to 1000baseT dongles (if you don't have an extra PCIe slot available).

If BI is archiving to your NAS every 5-10 minutes, why not just record to your NAS directly instead of temporarily storing it on your BI box for 5-10 minutes?
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I record to a local Western Digital 6 TB purple drive, so every 5 to 10 minutes, it archives older clips (7 to 8 days old) in order to make room for newer clips. I could record direct to the NAS, but it just seems like it would create an unnecessary amount of network traffic.

I do have room for another NIC, so I might try that route. It just seems crazy to need to have 3 network cards for my camera system, but it does seem like it should work and help my issue.
 
Depending on your PC, if you have a slot left and can get a network card to fit it, grab a card with 4 network ports on it.
This seems to work better then using a couple of USB dongles for me.
 
it is a bad idea to write Video records to a NAS. it increases the network traffic. It is best to do complete file writes to the NAS, that is copy the completed file.

Please provide a screen shots. full frame (use windows 10 snip & sketch tool) .
1) Blue iris status (lighting bolt graph,upper left corner) clip storage tab
2) Blue iris settings clips and archiving tab , for the NEW folder, stored folder, alerts folder. (three screen shots)
3) on two of the camera properties the record tab.
 
Rockford622 said:
I record to a local Western Digital 6 TB purple drive, so every 5 to 10 minutes, it archives older clips (7 to 8 days old) in order to make room for newer clips. I could record direct to the NAS, but it just seems like it would create an unnecessary amount of network traffic.

I do have room for another NIC, so I might try that route. It just seems crazy to need to have 3 network cards for my camera system, but it does seem like it should work and help my issue.
Click to expand...
Instead of 600-700mbps of network traffic in a short period of time, you would have that load spread over a longer period. 10-20mbps trickling in constantly.

However, I could see an issue being that it keeps the file open across the network for a long period of time. Probably not a good idea from that standpoint and should be avoided.
 
reflection said:
Instead of 600-700mbps of network traffic in a short period of time, you would have that load spread over a longer period. 10-20mbps trickling in constantly.

However, I could see an issue being that it keeps the file open across the network for a long period of time. Probably not a good idea from that standpoint and should be avoided.
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True, but the pitfalls of writing constant files over the network are probably not a great idea, like you stated.

As it turns out, I don't have an extra NIC so I ordered one today and should have it in a few days. I'm assuming the bottleneck is the network and not the local hard drive writing camera data and moving files across the network at the same time. I'll find out soon.
 
FWIW, when I first started with BI, I was doing direct-to-disk continuous recording to a WD Purple 10TB drive (NEW) within the BI PC and then doing the move files as space is needed to a WD Blue 4TB HDD (STORED) within the same PC. I noticed that when BI was transferring videos from NEW to STORED, everything slowed down, like logging in, or opening a JPG snapshot. The system is an i7-8700 and at that time I only had about 6 2MP cams.

After discussions on here with SY and LOONY, it was recommended to not bother moving the files. So I ended up replacing that 4TB Blue with another 10TB Purple and just set everything to delete when space is needed. Never had the issue again. Now with 18 cams I have three 10 TB Purple drives six cams recording to each drive) and get about 28 days of recordings.

I really see no reason to do the moving of files around.
 
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samplenhold said:
FWIW, when I first started with BI, I was doing direct-to-disk continuous recording to a WD Purple 10TB drive (NEW) within the BI PC and then doing the move files as space is needed to a WD Blue 4TB HDD (STORED) within the same PC. I noticed that when BI was transferring videos from NEW to STORED, everything slowed down, like logging in, or opening a JPG snapshot. The system is an i7-8700 and at that time I only had about 6 2MP cams.

After discussions on here with SY and LOONY, it was recommended to not bother moving the files. So I ended up replacing that 4TB Blue with another 10TB Purple and just set everything to delete when space is needed. Never had the issue again. Now with 18 cams I have three 10 TB Purple drives six cams recording to each drive) and get about 28 days of recordings.

I really see no reason to do the moving of files around.
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Thanks for sharing your experience. What you are doing is probably the easiest on the system resources that you can do. I have a NAS and allocate 15TB of space for approximately 35 days of retention, its just how I like it setup since I have 14 cameras. My NAS is RAID5 and gets backed up, so there is redundancy and the safely of backups if a hardware failure occurs. Again, just personal preference.

I have in the past moved files from one drive to another and I would have the same experience that you did with the slow system performance. Sometimes I would get "no signal" alerts from the individual cameras during the transfer which to me, seemed to be like a buffer underrun issue. There can be lots of issues just moving files around. It would be nice if Blue Iris had some type of way to throttle file transfers so they can happen at a more metered pace to be easier on the system.
 
If you must move files make them smaller. Start with 1 hour recordings and 3gb size. If this is still a problem go smaller 2 gb. How much memory is in the nas.
 
SouthernYankee said:
If you must move files make them smaller. Start with 1 hour recordings and 3gb size. If this is still a problem go smaller 2 gb. How much memory is in the nas.
Click to expand...

I made them very small recently at 500 MB. Transfers are quick, but more frequent. The NAS has 8 GB of ram and plenty of disk space.
 
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Just as a follow up. Got my 3rd NIC installed and it works great. 3rd network is dedicated between PC and NAS, just a single network cable. Blue Iris has no problem with it and it allows UI3 to operate at full uninterrupted speed for smooth playback even during fast PC to NAS file transfers.
 
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