Cameras Go Offline Randomly, Changing On Each Restart

Flash6199

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Hello All,

I seem to be having an issue with a Blue Iris installation. Occasionally, about 5 or so cameras will go into No Signal state. Typically closing Blue Iris, stopping the service, starting the service, and re opening Blue Iris fixes this issue.

To me this seems fairly peculiar. I have also noted that restarting the Blue Iris service can cause certain cameras that were previously online, to appear as offline, and vice versa. This installation currently has around 20 active cameras and we plan to scale it beyond 30.

Resource usage on the NVR is typically around 50%, and all cameras that are in No Signal state can be pinged, additionally I can access their web interfaces.

Does anyone have any ideas or recommendations?
 

TL1096r

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You are viewing the video through NVR to BI.
What cameras/NVR?
Does it give you any error codes on BI?
 

TonyR

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  • Is there any wireless link anywhere ?
  • You stated the NVR's "resource" usage, what about the PC's CPU utilization?
  • Have you optimized BI settings as prescribed here ?
 

SouthernYankee

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1)Provide a detailed network diagram, with equipment names and model numbers.
2) What is the make, model number, cpu, memory on the BI machine.
3) what type of wire, cable are you usings, ? what is the length of wire runs, how are the cables connections made (purchased, connected on the job). What type of cable tester did you use.
4) are the cameras POE or line powered(wall wart) ?
5) what are your camera settings, Biit rate, FPS, Iframe, vrb/CBR
6) Any wifi ?

Most like this is a hardware problem in your network, it is not a BI problem.
If you what help you will need to provided detailed information...
 

Flash6199

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You are viewing the video through NVR to BI.
What cameras/NVR?
Does it give you any error codes on BI?
  • Is there any wireless link anywhere ?
  • You stated the NVR's "resource" usage, what about the PC's CPU utilization?
  • Have you optimized BI settings as prescribed here ?
1)Provide a detailed network diagram, with equipment names and model numbers.
2) What is the make, model number, cpu, memory on the BI machine.
3) what type of wire, cable are you usings, ? what is the length of wire runs, how are the cables connections made (purchased, connected on the job). What type of cable tester did you use.
4) are the cameras POE or line powered(wall wart) ?
5) what are your camera settings, Biit rate, FPS, Iframe, vrb/CBR
6) Any wifi ?

Most like this is a hardware problem in your network, it is not a BI problem.
If you what help you will need to provided detailed information...
  1. Blue Iris does not give any error codes, just "No signal".
  2. Resource usage was just a broad term overall. At the moment, CPU is at 44%, RAM is at 10.8GB free out of 24GB, Disk Que length is .01 as most cameras are motion based recording. The NVR was custom built by a security company I inherited this project from. Initially this machine was running ExacQ Vision. Some specifications are below. If you need any more in depth details let me know.
    1. Intel i7-4790 CPU (3.6Ghz 8 threads)
    2. 24gb DDR 3 ram (non ecc)
    3. Windows 7 64 bit
    4. 2 6TB Western Digital Caviar Purple (WD60PURX)
  3. All cameras are using direct to disk recording, with hardware acceleration enabled. Cameras typically are limited to 10 fps. Blue iris as mentioned initially is already running as a service.
  4. We have two different manufacturers of camera, as well as several sub models. Due to this bit rate varies and I will list fps and bit rate next to their models below.
    1. HikVision DS-2CD2D14W - 320.79kBs average - 10 fps - x1
    2. HikVision 2CD2342WD-I - 495kBs average - 6fps - x1
    3. HikVision DS-2CD2642FWD-IZS - 495kBs average - 6fps - x1
    4. Reolink RLC-410-5MP - 250kBs average - 8fps - x8
    5. Reolink RLC-420-5MP - 650kBs average - 10fps - x7
    6. Reolink RLC-422-5MP - 238kBs average - 10fps - x1
  5. There are no wireless cameras or wireless bridges in use in this network in regards to surveillance at this time. All cameras are POE powered. Most cables I terminated myself. All cables have been tested and maintain a length of less than 300 feet for data, and 100 feet for POE (I've never seen a camera loose power). Surveillance is on its own VLAN and that VLAN passes only via copper connections. Cat6 Unifi TC-PRO is ran between network switches for backbone connections, the cameras themselves utilize a mixture of TC-PRO or Cat6 / Cat5e depending on their run length and what they're going through (walls, floors, etc...). Network switches are Unifi us-24-250w models. There is one unmanaged dummy POE switch near the roof as it didn't make sense to put a managed switch in that location. In total there are three managed switches, one unman-aged switch, two wireless networks (for laptops not surveillance), a security gateway, and several vlans. A network diagram may be hard to come up with, but I'll do my best to answer any questions.
I hope this helps, please let me know if there is any additional information I can give to assist.
 
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fenderman

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Did you use the 568B standard when terminating the cable?
If you plan on expanding, avoid reolink as they are not compatible with blue iris direct to disk because Iframe intervals cannot be set and they company is a lying spamming entity. There are much better cameras with better sensors available for a few dollars more.
 

TL1096r

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Did you use the 568B standard when terminating the cable?
If you plan on expanding, avoid reolink as they are not compatible with blue iris direct to disk because Iframe intervals cannot be set and they company is a lying spamming entity. There are much better cameras with better sensors available for a few dollars more.
What is best to use 568B or A?

@Flash6199 - does this happen on all cams or just reolink? When I had reolink NVR set to BI I got the same message a lot and I just had to wait for it to come back online. I had no fix so hope you find one. I would not go back to reolink after learning more about them through IPCT.
 

Flash6199

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Did you use the 568B standard when terminating the cable?
If you plan on expanding, avoid reolink as they are not compatible with blue iris direct to disk because Iframe intervals cannot be set and they company is a lying spamming entity. There are much better cameras with better sensors available for a few dollars more.
What is best to use 568B or A?

@Flash6199 - does this happen on all cams or just reolink? When I had reolink NVR set to BI I got the same message a lot and I just had to wait for it to come back online. I had no fix so hope you find one. I would not go back to reolink after learning more about them through IPCT.
T568B was used for all terminations.

I currently have all reolink cameras set to use direct to disk without problems (at least none that I'm aware of). What are the symptoms of this incompatibility? Reolink was a request due to budget constraints. Though if this proves to be a large ongoing issue, I will certainly push back for a different brand.
 

fenderman

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What is best to use 568B or A?

@Flash6199 - does this happen on all cams or just reolink? When I had reolink NVR set to BI I got the same message a lot and I just had to wait for it to come back online. I had no fix so hope you find one. I would not go back to reolink after learning more about them through IPCT.
It doesnt matter.
 

fenderman

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T568B was used for all terminations.

I currently have all reolink cameras set to use direct to disk without problems (at least none that I'm aware of). What are the symptoms of this incompatibility? Reolink was a request due to budget constraints. Though if this proves to be a large ongoing issue, I will certainly push back for a different brand.
You will find out quickly when the video starts tearing because the firmware will make its own determination as to when to send the iframe interval. They are junk cameras from a horrible company that spams forums and posts fake amazon reviews. By the time you realize you have a problem it will be too late. Read the wiki and learn about low light cams.
 

TL1096r

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I've done as you asked. I do not see any additional cameras.
Yes. I had this same issue with BI and NVR. It wasn't a good combo and always went out. It most likely was my setup but the NVR video and software that was able to stream NVR video never went out and was not out when Blue Iris was out so not sure why video was up and running on NVR/other player but would be out on Blue Iris. Both computers streaming NVR stream was wired.

How often are you seeing the issue?
 

Flash6199

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Yes. I had this same issue with BI and NVR. It wasn't a good combo and always went out. It most likely was my setup but the NVR video and software that was able to stream NVR video never went out and was not out when Blue Iris was out so not sure why video was up and running on NVR/other player but would be out on Blue Iris. Both computers streaming NVR stream was wired.

How often are you seeing the issue?
I think you miss understand me. My apologies. Blue Iris runs on the NVR. NVR is just a term for a network video recorder, in this case, this servers dedicated purpose is for recording network video streams, so I refer to it as an NVR.
 

TL1096r

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I think you miss understand me. My apologies. Blue Iris runs on the NVR. NVR is just a term for a network video recorder, in this case, this servers dedicated purpose is for recording network video streams, so I refer to it as an NVR.
Oh sorry about that. Thanks and best of luck I will see what happens. I never had an issue with my wired computer running BI not connecting but will keep a watch.

Thanks
 

Flash6199

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Today I checked via screen connect and it looks like 4 cameras have dropped offline. All cameras which went offline were Reolink, 3 turret cams and 1 bullet.

Under logs I only see:

upload_2019-7-14_21-25-21.png

Which is really strange, because I can ping the camera without issue. This is the same for the other three as well.

upload_2019-7-14_21-27-1.png

I checked the text log and don't see any events around the initial connection loss (logged a little under 24 hours ago). Nobody has used Blue Iris around the time that these devices started to drop (around 1:37 AM)

As usual, exiting Blue Iris, opening task manager, stopping the service, starting the service, and re opening Blue Iris fixed all issues.

I'm seriously debating if Blue Iris is somehow corrupted, though I've already ran database repairs in my initial period of trial and error.
 

Flash6199

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Are the reolink the only cams that go out?
Checked again today, 12 cameras down "No signal".

4 Reolink turret cams.
4 Reolink bullet cams.
1 Reolink dome.
1 Hikvision pinhole cam.
1 Hikvision bullet cam.
1 Hikvision turret cam.

Given that Hik cams are going down as well, I can't blame this on Reolink.

I closed the app again, stopped the service, and started the service. As usual, everything came back up immediately, however two cams stayed offline. I stopped the service again, restarted it again, this time different cams were offline. Finally I stopped the service, waited a few minutes, started the service, some cameras were still offline. I tried to restart one of the cameras manually, then restart it in Blue Iris. The camera is remained in a "No signal" state until about two minutes later when it finally kicked back on by itself.

I will check again in the morning to see if some are still offline and will log any additional weirdness here for reference as I work towards solving this.
 
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