Confused over frame rates, codecs and bitrates....

[Dewcal]

I am using BI v5.9.1.3x64 with 20 cameras of various kinds - 18 are IP/POE and 2 are Wi-Fi. The PC is running at about 7% CPU and 30% memory utilisation. Half of the cameras are full time recording. All bar one camera has the sub stream set up. All cameras connect to the BI PC via Cat6 cable and unmanaged switches.

The issue I have is that, when I right click on a camera in BI, I will never see a fps greater than about 0.5.

All of the cameras have been set up in a browser to give either 15 / 20fps and key frame interval of 15 / 20 for both streams. If I am correct this should give a value of 1?

The security cameras (Hikvision) all show fps of 0.5 and none give a warning of low frame rate.

The other cameras, lower cost ex AliExpress and used on various bird boxes and other nature themed locations, most show the yellow triangle warning for low fps and, when viewed, can have a fps of 0.03 on main and sub streams. These cameras are a mix of 4Mp and 5Mp devices.

I have one of the "cheaper" cameras that does not show the warning triangle (despite reporting an fps of 0.25) yet when I set another camera bought at the same time to the same settings, it gives the warning triangle. Both of these feed into the same switch en-route to the BI PC.

Am I doing something incorrectly here to get these apparently low and very low fps rates?

Should I use H264, H264+, H265 or H265+ as a setting? I believe that both sub and main stream should have the same codec, frame rate and key frame interval.

Assuming the PC can handle it, should the bit rate be set to maximum? CBR or VBR?

Should hardware acceleration be left at "default" or set to "no"?

Thanks for any help to sort out my confusion!

 

[wittaj]

It is best to use H264.

BI can struggle with the + designation as nobody follows a standard for that. That alone can be causing the FPS fluctuations. Or it could be the cheap cameras that will run whatever they want despite what you tell it to run.

The warning triangle is for when the KEY drops below 0.4

Always best to use CBR.

No, intel quick sync (Hardware Acceleration) is no longer necessary. It was a requirement prior to the days before substreams could be used. The substreams allow a lot more types of computers to be used for BI now.

But there really isn't any reason for using Quicksync/Hardware Acceleration anymore either.

Around the time AI was introduced in BI, many here had their system become unstable with hardware acceleration on (even if not using DeepStack or CodeProject). Some have also been fine. I started to see errors when I was using hardware acceleration several updates into when AI was added.

This hits everyone at a different point. Some had their system go wonky immediately, some it was after a specific update, and some still don't have a problem, but the trend is showing running hardware acceleration will result in a problem at some point.

However, with substreams being introduced, the CPU% needed to offload video to a GPU (internal or external) is more than the CPU% savings seen by offloading to a GPU. Especially after about 12 cameras, the CPU goes up by using hardware acceleration.

My CPU % went down by not using hardware acceleration. Here is a recent thread where someone turned off hardware acceleration based on my post and their CPU dropped 10-15% and BI became stable. A GPU is only needed if you plan to do a lot of CodeProject, which would be insane as most find the AI in the cameras to be more than enough.

But if you use HA, use plain intel and not the variants.

Some still don't have a problem, but eventually it will result in a problem.

Here is a sampling of recent threads that turning off HA fixed the issues they were having....

No hardware acceleration with subs?


Hardware decoding just increases GPU usage?


Can't enable HA on one camera + high Bitrate


Amcrest T2599ew Lagging really bad

 

[Dewcal]

Many thanks for response, information and links - appreciated. H264 with CBR appears most stable.

My query re hardware acceleration was not so much should it be used, but is there a difference in the settings between "default" and "no" on the BI page?

Thanks again.