New BI Setup - PC questions

[Chapin]

Sorry to start another “what PC” thread, but didn’t want to hijack someone else’s or dig up an obsolete one.

ive read a lot of info here regarding what computer to use for BI. There always seems to be a sweet spot for price vs. performance.
Choosing Hardware for Blue Iris | IP Cam Talk

I’d like a PC that will support h.265, as my cams all support this.

I’ve got, for now, 8 x 2MP IPC-HDW5231R-ZE AND 1 x 8MP IPC-HDW5831R-ZE cams. I might add up to 4 more cams. That is a total of 24 MP in service and another 8-32 MP future.

I would like Win10Pro for the OS and a SSD for the OS/BI. Is a 250 ssd good enough?

Low energy consumption is desirable.

Reading the above wiki and also many threads here, it sounds like a 6 core cpu is the way to go.

Is the number of threads important?

It also sounds like an i7 is the way to go.

What is the difference between an i7-8700 and a i7-8700K?

How much mem? Is 8GB really enough or would there be a benefit to more?

I would tend to prefer a more powerful machine over one that is merely good enough. Overhead is desirable.

Looking at Dell, it sounds like this spec machine (i7-8700, ssd, win10pro,16GB) is starting around $850 usd. Is this about right?

Is there a less powerful machine that would offer me plenty of power and headroom for my system that can be found at a better price point?

 

[Chapin]

Are there Black Friday or other seasonal deals to wait for at this time of year?

 

[SouthernYankee]

It is not the number of cameras. It is the total bit rate. What is the fps per camera, frame size 1920x1080

 

[fenderman]

Sorry to start another “what PC” thread, but didn’t want to hijack someone else’s or dig up an obsolete one.

ive read a lot of info here regarding what computer to use for BI. There always seems to be a sweet spot for price vs. performance.
Choosing Hardware for Blue Iris | IP Cam Talk

I’d like a PC that will support h.265, as my cams all support this.

I’ve got, for now, 8 x 2MP IPC-HDW5231R-ZE AND 1 x 8MP IPC-HDW5831R-ZE cams. I might add up to 4 more cams. That is a total of 24 MP in service and another 8-32 MP future.

I would like Win10Pro for the OS and a SSD for the OS/BI. Is a 250 ssd good enough?

Low energy consumption is desirable.

Reading the above wiki and also many threads here, it sounds like a 6 core cpu is the way to go.

Is the number of threads important?

It also sounds like an i7 is the way to go.

What is the difference between an i7-8700 and a i7-8700K?

How much mem? Is 8GB really enough or would there be a benefit to more?

I would tend to prefer a more powerful machine over one that is merely good enough. Overhead is desirable.

Looking at Dell, it sounds like this spec machine (i7-8700, ssd, win10pro,16GB) is starting around $850 usd. Is this about right?

Is there a less powerful machine that would offer me plenty of power and headroom for my system that can be found at a better price point?

Blue iris cannot yet support h.265 with intel hardware acceleration. It will work with HA off.
It is insane to spend 850 on that pc for your load.
an i7-6700 or an i5-8500 is way more than enough. The 8th gen processors are much more powerful than the 6th/7th.
HP Elitedesk 800 G2 SFF PC Core i7 6700 3.4ghz 8GB 500GB DVDRW *59 | eBay
windows 10 pro will load right up on that machine despite it saying no OS.
add a 250 ssd for 50 dollars.
If you want 2x3.5 drives you will need the tower version

 

[davej]

There is actually a spreadsheet which might help you develop some confidence in choosing a system. It shows actual systems that are in use along with the resulting BI cpu usage. Perhaps you can search it and find a similar camera data rate.

Blue Iris Update Helper

FYI, I just got my first camera working this evening. I bought an old Dell Optiplex SFF with Win10Pro on a 240GB SSD, put an extra network card in it, have a temporary 1TB data drive in it, installed BI and the Hikvision SADT tool, and it seems to now be working. The SFF has room for only one HD. My next camera is an ebay Hikvision vari-focal with an unknown history. It seems to need a password reset.

 

[fenderman]

There is actually a spreadsheet which might help you develop some confidence in choosing a system. It shows actual systems that are in use along with the resulting BI cpu usage. Perhaps you can search it and find a similar camera data rate.

Blue Iris Update Helper

FYI, I just got my first camera working this evening. I bought an old Dell Optiplex SFF with Win10Pro on a 240GB SSD, put an extra network card in it, have a temporary 1TB data drive in it, installed BI and the Hikvision SADT tool, and it seems to now be working. The SFF has room for only one HD. My next camera is an ebay Hikvision vari-focal with an unknown history. It seems to need a password reset.

If you are not already doing so. You can and should run the SSD with larger drive..it can hold both.
Hopefully you didn't overpay for what sounds like an outdated manual varifocal hik.

 

[davej]

If you are not already doing so. You can and should run the SSD with larger drive..it can hold both.
Hopefully you didn't overpay for what sounds like an outdated manual varifocal hik.

Yes, I plan to buy a WD Purple drive. The 1T is just temporary. I bought the almost-new varifocal Hik several years ago. I've been puzzling over this system and accumulating parts for it for years. The SFF is tight. Right now I have the SSD floating next to the power supply. Maybe I can tie-wrap it to the power supply. The NIC card backplate was way too tall so I had to cut it. So the cameras have their own network. I'm still waiting for a DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter.

 

[dvand]

I used velcro to attach the ssd in my sff.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

 

[toastie]

I would appreciate some more specific advice to what to look for and what to avoid on the topic of purchasing a refurbished W10 PC suitable for BI on eBay. Should W10 be pre-installed Home or Pro, otherwise you'll have to factor in a W10 software purchase, I assume W10 on the SSD, and space for one or two TB HDs in a tower case I assume. PC Specs please, not only about the appropriate Intel CPU. Do you need to choose a CPU to avoid a memory leak issue?

 

[looney2ns]

Choosing Hardware for Blue Iris | IP Cam Talk

 

[1fxman]

Last spring I bought an HP i7-8700 with ssd hard drive and 16ram. I also bought a WD puriple (I think it’s 2 TB). I’v been running 4 cameras on it without the WD hard drive. I finely have time to install it. Does anyone have a recomindation on how to? Example: do I need to format it to a specific format that BI likes, etc. I also plan on adding at lest 4 more cameras soon. Thanks.

 

[disbjohn]

Blue iris cannot yet support h.265 with intel hardware acceleration. It will work with HA off.
It is insane to spend 850 on that pc for your load.
an i7-6700 or an i5-8500 is way more than enough. The 8th gen processors are much more powerful than the 6th/7th.
HP Elitedesk 800 G2 SFF PC Core i7 6700 3.4ghz 8GB 500GB DVDRW *59 | eBay
windows 10 pro will load right up on that machine despite it saying no OS.
add a 250 ssd for 50 dollars.
If you want 2x3.5 drives you will need the tower version

So it will boot up into win 10 pro, or do you still need to install it?

 

[TonyR]

Last spring I bought an HP i7-8700 with ssd hard drive and 16ram. I also bought a WD puriple (I think it’s 2 TB). I’v been running 4 cameras on it without the WD hard drive. I finely have time to install it. Does anyone have a recomindation on how to? Example: do I need to format it to a specific format that BI likes, etc. I also plan on adding at lest 4 more cameras soon. Thanks.

Format the new WD purple as NTFS; if your SSD is C: drive then the new WD Purple will most likely be D: drive.
Put only the BI video clips ("New" and "Storage" folders in BI) on the WD purple, keep the BI program and the BI clip database ("db") on the SSD.

EDITED at 0949 to add: Go to BI "Options", "Clips & Archiving" to make changes to those drive letters and/or paths.

 

[fenderman]

So it will boot up into win 10 pro, or do you still need to install it?

You would need to install it. Takes 10 minuets and you would want a clean install of windows regardless.

 

[dvand]

Yes. Even if windows was installed on a machine from ebay it would be wise to wipe and reinstall clean.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

 

[davej]

Yes. Even if windows was installed on a machine from ebay it would be wise to wipe and reinstall clean.

How do you do that safely? It isn't like the olden days when you had a CD with an activation code on the cover.

 

[fenderman]

How do you do that safely? It isn't like the olden days when you had a CD with an activation code on the cover.

it is not the olden days...as long as w10 is activated on the machine once, you will never need to enter any codes again.

 

[davej]

Yeah, but digital licenses are tied to a Microsoft account. If you bought a pc with a Win10Pro digital license, such as all the ones that were upgraded from Win 7 Pro, then you are screwed.

 

[fenderman]

Yeah, but digital licenses are tied to a Microsoft account. If you bought a pc with a Win10Pro digital license, such as all the ones that were upgraded from Win 7 Pro, then you are screwed.

No, you are misinformed. It is NOT tied to any account. I have done this many many times - it is tied to the pc.

 

[looney2ns]

Use the Media Creation Tool from Microsoft.