Recordings disappear constantly

[acoolov]

Hello everyone,

We've been using Blue Iris for a few years now, and had moved all of our clients from Unifi to Blue Iris, hoping this is finally going to be our main NVR solution for all of our future clients.

However, we've been experiencing an extremely annoying problems with recordings constantly disappearing from the calendar/playback section. They still remain on the hard drive but keep disappearing from BI timeline. We have to constantly log in and do Repair/Regenerate to get the recordings back onto the NVR.

Because of this issue, most of our clients are extremely unhappy with the new systems we installed. It is extremely frustrating, as we thought we finally found a good and flexible camera system.

We tried a lot of suggestions from the forum but nothing seems to fix it. We used to record on the main SSD drive, then move all recordings to the secondary larger hard drive. We thought that was the main reason for the problem, so we started to only record on the secondary drive then delete recordings after size limit is reached. Not using time limit anymore either. Problem happens on both continuous and motion recording NVRs. We have around 10 BI NVRs deployed and ALL of them do this from time to time.

If this problem cannot be fixed, we will have to move away from BI unfortunately.

If anyone can help us resolve this we would really appreciate it!

 

[fenderman]

This indicates that either all of them are setup improperly or all of them are running a version of BI that had database issues. What version of BI are you running?

 

[acoolov]

The versions that have these issues are
5.6.8.4
5.6.9.8

 

[Mike A.]

Those versions are in the range where I and others were having similar problems. Try updating. I've not had any issues for a while now with later versions.

 

[Flintstone61]

Running 5.5.0.15 or something at condo NVR.....hasnt missed a beat on clips since it it went into service 1.5 or more years ago, except for 2 power interuptions.
ran the same version on home BI machine for about a year. until recently tried a 5.7.2.4 and still the db has been stable. my db repair/compact runs 2x a week....on 1 macine and 3x a week on another machine. Clip allocation : I leave at least .5 of a Terabyte free space on drive,,,,just because....

 

[acoolov]

I updated all problematic NVRs. We'll see what happens. How do you schedule automatic data repairs?

 

[fenderman]

I updated all problematic NVRs. We'll see what happens. How do you schedule automatic data repairs?

I would also delete the DB folder and let it rebuild. Note that a compact and repair of the database disables recording. In a proper system it takes a minuet or so. But if you have hundreds of thousands of files it can take hours. The setting is in the storage tab - you should be familiar with this if you are selling and installing the product.

 

[acoolov]

Wait so by default, compact and repair is done every night at 2am? Is that correct?

 

[wittaj]

Wait so by default, compact and repair is done every night at 2am? Is that correct?

That is correct.

 

[acoolov]

Does it have to be that often? Can it cause more problems that not? What does compacting do to the database?

 

[wittaj]

You can change it to whatever time or day and frequency you want, but go too long and issues can happen.

From BI's built-in "Help" book

"Database maintenance is ran each 5 minutes. This is the function that actually deletes and
moves files between folders according to the rules defined. You may start it manually at any
time with right-click menu option in Clips, Database—>Run maintenance.

Database compact/repair is normally performed each night at 2am. The primary purpose
of this function is to remove “holes” in the database produced by deleted records. It is
typically a short process, but recording is suspended during this time. If 2am is not a good
time to pause recording, you may wish to change this time, select specific days of the week
for it to occur, or disable it altogether and perform it manually on occasion by using the
right-click menu option in Clips, Database—>Compact/Repair. If you disable this option yet
neglect to perform it manually, the database will grow unbounded and performance will
suffer.
The option for Database Delete & Regenerate also exists. This one really creates a new
database from scratch and re-imports everything. Please note that video and JPEGs are
retained, but alert images and other flags that exist only in the database will be lost. You do
have the option to save each alert image as a file instead with an option on the Trigger tab in
each camera’s settings pages."

 

[acoolov]

Thanks a lot for the info. I was concerned because a lot of times when I did repair/regenerate, it would not do it properly and I would lose most of the recordings in the NVR calendar. Then once I do it again i would get them back.

 

[looney2ns]

If you are selling this to clients, you should know the built in help file backwards and forwards. This is basic setup stuff you're asking.

You should also know, now since you've been using it for a few years, that for one you turn off automatic updates.

Only use versions that are deemed stable. If it's not broke don't fix it.

You should be using a dedicated computer for only blue Iris.
On the computer c drive which should be an SSD, you only put the operating system, blue iris and the blue iris database.
All video recording should go to surveillance rated hard drives.

 

[Ri22o]

I am constantly needing to regen/repair and it seems like it is mostly the alerts and clips for my LPRs. I am on 5.7.1.3 and other than these recording to their own folders, there is nothing weird about how it is set up.

 

[acoolov]

If you are selling this to clients, you should know the built in help file backwards and forwards. This is basic setup stuff you're asking.

You should also know, now since you've been using it for a few years, that for one you turn off automatic updates.

Only use versions that are deemed stable. If it's not broke don't fix it.

You should be using a dedicated computer for only blue Iris.
On the computer c drive which should be an SSD, you only put the operating system, blue iris and the blue iris database.
All video recording should go to surveillance rated hard drives.

That is exactly how we configure our NVRs. We have some experience with BI already. Just never had to mess with databases yet.

 

[looney2ns]

I am constantly needing to regen/repair and it seems like it is mostly the alerts and clips for my LPRs. I am on 5.7.1.3 and other than these recording to their own folders, there is nothing weird about how it is set up.

I'm using that same version, and have had zero issues'.
Have you tried shutting down BI, console and service.
Then deleting the entire BI DB folder.
Then Start BI and it will rebuild.

 

[Ri22o]

I'm using that same version, and have had zero issues'.
Have you tried shutting down BI, console and service.
Then deleting the entire BI DB folder.
Then Start BI and it will rebuild.

I have not. I will try that when I get the chance. The DB would be the one on the SSD?

 

[looney2ns]

I have not. I will try that when I get the chance. The DB would be the one on the SSD?

If that's were you have set. The SSD is best place for it.

 

[Ri22o]

I'm using that same version, and have had zero issues'.
Have you tried shutting down BI, console and service.
Then deleting the entire BI DB folder.
Then Start BI and it will rebuild.

When does it start rebuilding on its own? Or do I need to prompt it to?

 

[wittaj]

When does it start rebuilding on its own? Or do I need to prompt it to?

It starts to rebuild the moment you start BI again.