Building Your Own NVR

[nambi]

Thanks for the quick reply and I appreciate the advice, I'm familiar with networking, the networking part I should be ok with. Where I am confused is how the computer will accept the video, 26 cameras recording at 30fps at 3MP going into a single 10/1000 Nic, will it be sufficient, I'm assuming the server is also be compressing the video (am I correct) or does this compression take place at the camera? If the computer is doing the work is it the i5/i7 cpu? or do I need a card in the system to handle this compression. is a raid with redundancy normal practice for recording? Or do most systems setup with Raid0.

SO the router will be sending out ip addresses and connect my cameras to the internet for external viewing, is this commonly installed on a different subnet other than the office computers? Can this setup use Hikvision Cameras? If I were to use Blue Iris with motion detectors which you didn't suggest would this mean that in order to function correctly I would need (two) NVRS? possibly handling 13 cameras each? would the motion detection work then? Is this a good idea or better to create one powerful NVR?

Sorry I have so many questions but the answers are very helpful in pricing out the system, If Hikvision made an NVR to handle 26 cameras I would consider going that route but from what I see they don't unless you can stack 2 smaller systems together.

I'm waiting on a call back from their rep.

 

[fenderman]

Couple of things, there is no way blue iris can handle 26 3mp even with the fasted i7. Its not going to happen. Second, there is no way to display 26 3mp cameras without possibly displaying a substream but not the primary stream. This can be done in milestone. Read this thread http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php?390-DIY-NVR-Suggestions&highlight=40+cameras and networkcameracritic's post.
You dont need your cameras on a different subnet. It makes it more complex for port forwarding. Your best bet is a 32 ch NVR. They do make them. Check with @milkisbad
as an aside, why do you need 30fps? Where are you using these cameras?

 

[icerabbit]

(did not read the whole thread, only responding to two posts up)

The cameras compress the raw image data into an h264 stream, or actually 2, a high quality and a low quality one. So there is only a reasonable amount of full quality data received by the nvr pc. If you put the cams in 1920x1080 with above average quality and settings, (great picture in my opinion, better than 3mp) you can expect a net 1MB/s coming in from the camera, I think, based on trials I've done with a handful of test cameras. Of course it depends on the amount of detail in the environment you are capturing. For extra viewing, one typically looks a the lower quality feed with multiple on screen. As far as getting 26 cameras on screen. I think that may require a 4k screen and some software that can handle it. The most I've seen is 16-up, from the lower sub stream.

 

[nambi]

OK this clarifies some of my question so to build an NVR there really isn't any need for a compression card if the cameras do the h264, I won't be putting the cams in full res because it's not necessary maybe the cameras which I may try to catch license plates coming into the lot, but I know this may be a far stretch. It's not likely we will be viewing the video live, this is more preventative or if we know of problems. This is another area I'm confused I see a lot of NVR are 16 POE and 16 extra channels, does this mean that you can watch a max of 16 at the same time? I really only need to see possibly 4 cams on the screen at once max upto 8 but this is far fetched. I suppose this would simplify my setup, WIth these details in place would Blue iris be suitable? or with 26 cameras this is too much If I want motion detection?

Thanks for the help.

(did not read the whole thread, only responding to two posts up)

The cameras compress the raw image data into an h264 stream, or actually 2, a high quality and a low quality one. So there is only a reasonable amount of full quality data received by the nvr pc. If you put the cams in 1920x1080 with above average quality and settings, (great picture in my opinion, better than 3mp) you can expect a net 1MB/s coming in from the camera, I think, based on trials I've done with a handful of test cameras. Of course it depends on the amount of detail in the environment you are capturing. For extra viewing, one typically looks a the lower quality feed with multiple on screen. As far as getting 26 cameras on screen. I think that may require a 4k screen and some software that can handle it. The most I've seen is 16-up, from the lower sub stream.

 

[fenderman]

A 32ch nvr with 16 poe means you need to use another poe switch with it. You can display any cameras on the screen you want. Just remember that every NVR has a max total frame rate that is divided by the amount of cameras you attach. So a 64ch may only be able to do max 7.5fps each camera, but more if you connect less cams, this is a rough example.
26 cameras may still be too much for blue iris, it may be doable of you set some cams to 1mp, some to 2mp and a few at 3mp. You will need to use the direct to disk function and you will have to lower your frame rates to around 10 per camera on average. There is almost never a need for more than 10-15fps. In fact most 3mp cameras cannot do 30fps at 3mp only when you set it to 2mp. You would need at least a Intel Core i7-4930K. Maybe more.....

 

[acmaster]

Hi Nambi,

Depending on the model, the major thing to note about the 32 ch NVR (16 POE + 16 Extra channel ) is that it has 160 Mbps of recording bandwidth. Up until recently, you are right, it could only watch 16 cameras, but it wasn't due to the built-in POE, it was just due to the firmware. Right now they have the firmware which supports up to 36 view and you can watch all 32 cameras on a single screen(for HIkvision, the Dahua one had it for a long time already). But of course, 32 squares crammed into a 40 inch TV you can't see much details of what is happening at all.

The network structure of the built-in POE + external POE is important, because the built-in POE switch acts as a NIC card in itself, and assigns all cameras with its own IP configuration, which means all the traffic from the cameras (for the 16 x built-in POE) is directly going to the NVR, instead of going from camera to router (and bogging down your network) then to NVR for recording. Also, generally built-in POE only works with its own vendors if you want the plug-and-play function.


I haven't tried Blue Iris so I can't comment on it, but with an NVR it seem to be easier to use (maybe because I work with it everyday). I used to have to do tech support for Geovision stuff and hated it, so most PC based I can't stand.

The other thing to keep in mind is playback and finding content. I think if you are using all Hik their NVR may be a better bet for overall cpu resources over BI but I've never used it to know. I have been using Milestone and its fantastic for playback. If you are willing to spend the extra dollars it allows more control over playback. You can select which cameras to view and simultaneously view synchronized playback across those cameras. Meaning you can see people/things moving from one cameras field of view to anothers quite easily. Also since its a client/server model I can run the playback on any other machine with the client on it.

Bottomline is you are either going to have to spend money on beefed up server or on the SW. Perhaps the investment in Milestone might make your life a little easier all around.

 

[fenderman]

@acmaster, you make some great points. The synchronized playback is nice if you need it. Blue iris cannot do it (although its a feature in the works). The client server split is also something that blue iris cannot do. However for the op its a significant cost to go with mile stone as 26 cameras is the limit for the essential version which is 50 per camera, but if op wanted 27 then it would be 100 per camera which is very steep. It comes down to personal preference.

 

[nambi]

@acmaster, you make some great points. The synchronized playback is nice if you need it. Blue iris cannot do it (although its a feature in the works). The client server split is also something that blue iris cannot do. However for the op its a significant cost to go with mile stone as 26 cameras is the limit for the essential version which is 50 per camera, but if op wanted 27 then it would be 100 per camera which is very steep. It comes down to personal preference.

out of the 26 Cameras about 19 of them are for doors, and parking lots, so if these were set for motion, 3 cameras in detail (reception) and the remaining on the entrances to the parking lot. Would this take a significant strain off of the NVR? Or does the NVR record nonstop regardless of motion trigger? the 19 cameras don't really need to be high end detail. I prefer the others to show better detail. I dont' really plan on monitoring them unless I was suspicious of something or we had an incident.

 

[acmaster]

@acmaster, you make some great points. The synchronized playback is nice if you need it. Blue iris cannot do it (although its a feature in the works). The client server split is also something that blue iris cannot do. However for the op its a significant cost to go with mile stone as 26 cameras is the limit for the essential version which is 50 per camera, but if op wanted 27 then it would be 100 per camera which is very steep. It comes down to personal preference.

Milestone is even worse in the sense that you have to pay for updates after the initial period is over. I like the features but given MS costs you need to be able to justify it. Hopefully some of the more cost effective solutions catch up. I would love not to use Milestone because of their licensing policy.

With 19 of 26 cameras just on motion detection recording that will take a significant load off the system. However you still might be pushing the limits of BI unless you reduce frame rates. That being said I'm guessing you are at or near the limits of an I7 4770k. The 4930 might be better or look for a xeon or dual xeon system. Xeon presumably will give you more server grade reliability. But a tad more expensive. As Federman says, I think you can tweak the cameras and system to make the NVR work with an i7 if you use motion, direct to disk, less than 30 fps and or less in many cameras and perhaps stick to 1080p in some cameras.

I use a Raid 5 configuration with 4 RED WD drives. Depending on how long you need to keep the files and the settings mentioned above that is lots of space. For Raid 5 seems to me the most cost effective is to use at least 4 drives. I have a single SSD for OS. Most suggest dual but I just back up the SSD to the Raid. Not as good as mirrored but good enough.