PC choice

[dermotd]

Have just installed (demo) copy of BI and it is running well on an old Core-I5 laptop with a single HD IP cam.

I'll be running a couple of HD (Axis M3005) cameras and an Axis 241Q with 4 standard res analogue cameras.

What minimum PC spec should I be considering, before I get a licence key and lock it in?

I'd like to use a relatively low power consumption box for 24/7 use. I have a Shuttle PC with a 2.13GHz dual core hyperthreaded Atom and an SSD which I suspect is a bit puny for HD cams.

How about a Core I7 or I5 Intel NUC with an SSD? Would that give me enough headroom to replace the SD cams with HD in the future?

Dermot

 

[bp2008]

Thanks to hardware accelerated h264 decoding in Blue Iris, the most recent i5 or i7 NUC models could probably do the job.

But before you buy one of those, consider ... how important is energy-efficiency and size? Are you running off-the-grid, or is your electricity uncommonly expensive? Usually, the added cost of a NUC is not worth its value in energy savings compared to a refurbished quad core i5-4570 or i5-4590 system.

Take a moment and search ebay for "i5-4570 refurbished" or "i5-4590 refurbished". Filter to Buy It Now listings, and sort by lowest price first. You should find several machines in the $270-$330 USD range with 4-8 GB of RAM and hard drives between 320GB and 1TB, including a Windows license and sometimes a manufacturer warranty. If you buy a NUC instead, you'll pay that much just for the barebones system, not including RAM, storage, or OS, and the NUC will only be half as fast.

 

[camsmith]

Have just installed (demo) copy of BI and it is running well on an old Core-I5 laptop with a single HD IP cam.

I'll be running a couple of HD (Axis M3005) cameras and an Axis 241Q with 4 standard res analogue cameras.

What minimum PC spec should I be considering, before I get a licence key and lock it in?

I'd like to use a relatively low power consumption box for 24/7 use. I have a Shuttle PC with a 2.13GHz dual core hyperthreaded Atom and an SSD which I suspect is a bit puny for HD cams.

How about a Core I7 or I5 Intel NUC with an SSD? Would that give me enough headroom to replace the SD cams with HD in the future?

Dermot

I picked up a refurb Dell Optiplex I7 4790, SFF, Win 7 Pro. $482.30 shipped from Dell
I thought about going with an NUC because of the power savings and small size, but after reading from others here on the board I decided it was better to go with one of the well built machines used in businesses, the Dell OptiPlex or HP elitedesk.