I want to add outdoor surveillance cameras. I have two main requirements:
Cameras must be PoE
48h continuous recording
Trigger events on vera (to turn on lights, send text message) for instance when there is movement while away/night
From what I have found on this forum it seems that I can’t use any of the standard DVR systems from companies like Lorex, Swann, etc. The only (windows based) solution is Blue Iris which can execute a bat file on certain conditions and that bat file triggers an event on vera.
By going the Blue Iris way I believe I cannot see live video feeds through MMS Vera (or other vera mobile apps) because the camera is already connected to Blue Iris. Is this correct? It’s not a big issue but I would prefer one app for everything instead a separate app to see live video feeds. Another disadvantage is that I will need a fairly powerful computer that runs 24/7.
Are there any other options that meet my requirements and would not require a PC running 24/7 and/or allow me to see live video feeds through a MMS Vera (or similar app).
That is not correct. Ip cameras can be shared between both blueiris and Vera at the same time. But live views on Vera suck and are delayed. Blue iris app for android or Apple much better way to view both live and recorded images.
Seconded. You can view feeds both on BI and Vera. For testing I also plugged them into GeniusVision [url=http://geniusvision.net/]http://geniusvision.net/[/url] at the same time and was perfectly able to view the feeds on all 3. Although FPS rates dropped due to the increased traffic requests.
You’d have to create a plugin to interface Vera with one of the DVR solutions providing that solution allows external access.
I run an HP N40L microserver with WHS2011 as a media server so BI had a spot to go and that box is not using that much juice.
I am surprised that it’s possible to see this on multiple devices but that’s good to hear. That means I should chose video cameras (for me external PoE) that work both for Vera and Blue Iris (which has a much longer list).
BOFH, do you stream continuously? If so how many cameras, what resolution, what frame rate and what cpu usage? I have a HP 470 Media Server with the previous version of Windows Home Server. I think this PC will be underpowered (1.8GHz AMD Sempron) for running about 5 cameras continuously at probably 1080p and 15fps. In any case, if you can give me the above info then it will help me better understand what I need in regards to a new PC.
From what I researched it looks like all the standard DVR systems (Lorex, Swann, etc) cannot integrate with Vera, quite unfortunately.
I currently run 3 Foscam 8910W (640x480), 1 Foscam 8905W (640x480), 2 D-Link 930L (640x480), 1 Wanscam JW0011 (640x480) and 1 Foscam FI9821W at 720P. All on wireless-N on a 300N router. Frame rates are unfortunately a bit limited by the wireless connection but BI achieves about 20fps on most of the camera’s No constant streaming to Vera normally apart from 1 640x480 feed during business hours so I can keep an eye on my dogs. But that is not a continual one but basically a snapshot about every 8 seconds.
The HP N40L is certainly no powerhouse and my current camera setup is taxing the hardware somewhat. Which is an AMD Turion II NEO at 1.5GHz with 2GB memory. I intend to up the memory to at least 4GB if not 8GB. I have a 2nd N40L that runs my Unix server with the same specs that could get the 2GB currently in the WHS one to boost it up to 4GB. (Got both a while back for $99 a piece)
Eventually, the majority of these will be wired network. Most likely passive PoE as that is available for the Foscam/Wanscam ones.
I have 6 wired Foscam Fi9821w v2 running on a AMD Phenom II X6 with 265GB SSD main drive then backed up 2 days later to a much bigger slow drive.
I have tried to run 3 foscams on a cheap computer and it failed badly. It was a newer 300.00 dual core computer from office depot. CPU was maxed out and everything was lagging.
Just know 3 1080p cameras running a full res. and blue iris uses alot of resources.