Clarification of Wiki's "Choosing Hardware for Blue Iris"

[TheE]

Please forgive me in advance, but I do not understand this part:

"Storage(top)

Blue Iris performs best if you put the clip database on a fast solid state disk (SSD). However for video recording, you want a mechanical hard drive (HDD) as these are more cost-effective and have better write endurance. Western Digital Purple drives are a popular option for Blue Iris."

I'm looking to buy a BI PC for six 2MP Starlight cameras now and may grow to 13 cameras or so in the next few years. So with the Wiki recommendation above and to future proof my PC for camera growth and BI updates/upgrades, should I buy an SSD or HDD? And where does the Western Digital Purple Drive come into play?

Thank you very much for your time!

 

[crw030]

Put BI Clip database and OS on an SSD boot drive. Clip database location is just one of the configurable file paths in Blue Iris. You want it on SSD so you can navigate your clips history seamlessly & quickly.

Buy 1 or more large capacity SURVEILLANCE drives (for WD that’s the purple ones, Seagate are the SkyHawks I believe) based on how long a period of retention you think you will need and the total bitrate of the cameras you plan to record.

The surveillance drive IS A mechanical drive, but surveillance drives are specifically constructed for high storage density and constant writes (constantly recording cameras live to it will basically be nearly 100% write duty cycle especially as your camera count and bitrates go up)

 

[TonyR]

Put your O/S, the Blue Iris program and BI's "db" folder on the SSD; put all other BI folders, which incudes the video clips (i.e., "New", "Storage", "alerts", etc.) on the HDD, preferably a WD Purple.

 

[TheE]

Thank you for your input/suggestions cro030 and TonyR! Another question if y'all don't mind... To future proof this PC, what's the minimum GB I should be looking for in an SSD to install the O/S, BI, etc. on?

 

[samplenhold]

To future proof this PC, what's the minimum GB I should be looking for in an SSD to install the O/S, BI, etc. on?

That's hard to say if you are trying to get away with the smallest size SSD. But SSD prices have come down quite a lot. Personally, I am using a 256Gb M.2 as a boot drive containing all of the WIN 10 OS, all other apps including BlueIris and the BI database. All of that only takes up 47GB.

 

[IAmATeaf]

I also use 256gb as a minimum but you could easily get away with using a 120gb.

 

[TonyR]

For O/S, BI and BI db, I'm using a 2.5" SATA III 250GB Samsung 860 EVO with Win 10 Pro, installed from a Kingston 16GB flash drive using the Win 10 Media Creation Tool.
For video clips, a 2TB WD Purple HDD.

 

[TheE]

Makes perfect sense, thanks for the insight fellas...

Hopefully my last noob question on this topic; can I install a WD Purple HDD in any PC or is there something in particular I should look for to ensure the PC and Purple HDD are compatible?

 

[TonyR]

.... can I install a WD Purple HDD in any PC or is there something in particular I should look for to ensure the PC and Purple HDD are compatible?

Just some physical and technical requirements:

• PC should have an available bay to mount a 3.5" HDD
• PC's power supply should have an available SATA power connector.
• PC motherboard should have an available SATA III (data) port.
• You'll need a SATA data cable (from motherboard to HDD) and 4 screws to mount the HDD; they are not supplied with the new HDD.

 

[TheE]

Just some physical and technical requirements:

• PC should have an available bay to mount a 3.5" HDD
• PC's power supply should have an available SATA power connector.
• PC motherboard should have an available SATA III (data) port.
• You'll need a SATA data cable (from motherboard to HDD) and 4 screws to mount the HDD; they are not supplied with the new HDD.

Screenshot and saved!! Thank you very much!

 

[mat200]

Just some physical and technical requirements:

• PC should have an available bay to mount a 3.5" HDD
• PC's power supply should have an available SATA power connector.
• PC motherboard should have an available SATA III (data) port.
• You'll need a SATA data cable (from motherboard to HDD) and 4 screws to mount the HDD; they are not supplied with the new HDD.

FYI - update on these notes:

If you purchase a RETAIL HDD kit, it will typically include a SATA cable and 4 screws for the HDD. ( retail kit, is typically in a nice box with nicely printed marketing info on the box )

 

[TonyR]

FYI - update on these notes:

If you purchase a RETAIL HDD kit, it will typically include a SATA cable and 4 screws for the HDD. ( retail kit, is typically in a nice box with nicely printed marketing info on the box )

You're right....but since I don't recall buying a RETAIL kit since I bought my first hard drive almost 35 years ago, that factoid escaped me. And having replaced probably several dozen motherboards in that time, I have boxes of SATA cables and food containers loaded with screws and misc. hardware. I even have a few flat ribbon cables for PATA/IDE drives. Every time you buy a m/b you get stuff and the brand of power supplies I buy (EVGA) you get screws and of course, a power cord. Got power cords out the wazoo.

About 6 months ago, after stepping around and over baskets and boxes of crap for years (and the wife threatening me) I got rid of dozens of cables and other vintage crap....DB9 pin and DB25 serial, modem and null modem cables, 36 pin Centronics parallel cables, serial and ball mice, PCI cards (modem, video, serial, parallel and USB cards), DIN and P/S2 mice/keyboard adapters and extension cables.....even beige 5-1/4" drive bay blank covers...BEIGE for crying out loud!

 

[TheE]

I have contacted two sellers of Small Form Factor PCs and they stated that the 3.5 inch WD Purple would not fit with along with the included SSD (250GB)... Does anyone know if this is the same with all the SFF PCs not fitting an additional 3.5 drive?

 

[IAmATeaf]

Depends on the make and model to be honest, try going for a small desktop rather than a SFF PC as they do tend to be tiny. I've always gone for desktop sized as they give you more flexibility, recently I got a HP 600 G2 which can accomodate 2 3.5" hard drives and also has room for a 2.5" SDD, also has all the power connectors, all I needed to do was find a spare SATA cable and some mounting screws.

 

[TheE]

Thank you, IAmATeaf! Very useful info!

 

[mat200]

I have contacted two sellers of Small Form Factor PCs and they stated that the 3.5 inch WD Purple would not fit with along with the included SSD (250GB)... Does anyone know if this is the same with all the SFF PCs not fitting an additional 3.5 drive?

Hi @TheE

Look for a "hack" on the SFF PC you have, I have seen a Dell Optiplex SFF hack with a 2.5" SSD and 3.5" HDD

If you're ok with DIY it did not look hard to do.

update: Here's one DIY hack option - replace the optical drive space with a ssd

 

[TheE]

Lol... It feel soo much like I'm running circles and wasting people's time here... Sorry. From Wiki's recommended hardware, I click "i7-4790". Then filter for "Windows 10", "256 GB SSD" and "8 GB of RAM". My results are mostly all SFF PCs that will not fit the WD Purple 3.5 inch drive

mat200, thanks for the info but I have not bought a PC yet

 

[IAmATeaf]

What I did was find a pc model number that had all I needed then did a search for that on eBay. Took me around a month to find and get a desktop that I was happy with both spec wise and price wise.

 

[bp2008]

Don't worry about getting an SSD with a used system. It will seriously limit your choices and it isn't even very beneficial for BI anyway.

 

[dmiller]

Don't worry about getting an SSD with a used system. It will seriously limit your choices and it isn't even very beneficial for BI anyway.

SSD is beneficial in that it puts the OS and programs on a device without moving parts. But I agree that there is no reason to look for SSD in a used system. All new drives is the way to go on a used system that hopefully will be trouble free for a long time. At ~$30 for a 256gb SSD it should be an easy decision.