Blue Iris Software

[thedude22 0]

I’m about to purchase Blue Iris does anyone have experience, or perhaps can another software do what I'm looking for?...I’ll have a camera pointed at our mailbox. I want it to record on motion sense. The problem is our home is on a somewhat busy street. Would it be possible to signify the difference between a car or someone walking by and someone actually using the mailbox. I’m guessing by starting the recording if the object stays in frame for a extended period of time.

[Numb-nuts 1]

There are softwares that can analyze to quite ahigh level. Unfortunately I have never had the pleasure to work with such packages.

The is a cheap (Free) software with a small abmout of amnalytic ability called SightHound (formerly Vitamin D) you can try it with one camera for free. You will need to check if your equipment is supported. Personally I found it wanting quite badly but that was 3 years ago it may have improved since then.

 

You haven;t mentioned your equipment at all don't you feel that is somewhat relevant?

[mgb 0]

I can't really speak straight to Blue Iris because I haven't used it.

But you would be best to do a little reading on Video Analytics in order to learn what you can do and what you'll need in order to do it.

A couple of things to consider would be maybe just setting the motion sense area to a very small area like just around the mailbox or something.

You can control the areas that motion is sensed from, so if the street is not within the motion area, cars won't set it off.

Another option is to use a camera with alarm inputs and put a contact on the mailbox door so that when the mailbox is opened, it triggers recording.

There are plenty of wireless sensors for this.

[51cent 8]

With blueiris you can set a minimum time in motion detect for it to start recording. If the cars take an average of 1 second to go past, you can set it for 1.5 seconds, for example to start recording.You can also mask areas to shrink the detection to a smaller area around the mailbox like mgb posted.

Sometimes the camera software will be able to that.

[WatchingHome 0]

There are softwares that can analyze to quite ahigh level. Unfortunately I have never had the pleasure to work with such packages.

The is a cheap (Free) software with a small abmout of amnalytic ability called SightHound (formerly Vitamin D) you can try it with one camera for free. You will need to check if your equipment is supported. Personally I found it wanting quite badly but that was 3 years ago it may have improved since then.

 

You haven;t mentioned your equipment at all don't you feel that is somewhat relevant?

Could I please ask how you found sight hound wanting ?

[ssnapier 0]

SightHound is pretty good, I prefer that to BlueIris actually.

[Q2U 0]

Blue Iris is a great piece of software with a wide range of options which supports many cameras. A+ software IMO. However, to have it run acceptably with 4 or more 2+MP cameras you are going to need an i7 processor in the PC you use as the blue Iris server.

[Boogieman 1]

Blue Iris is a great piece of software with a wide range of options which supports many cameras. A+ software IMO. However, to have it run acceptably with 4 or more 2+MP cameras you are going to need an i7 processor in the PC you use as the blue Iris server.

While an i7 is nice, 4-6 cameras can run easy on an i5 (third or fourth generation). Using the direct to disk recording option I have 3 2mp cameras and one 1mp camera, all at 15fps and using roughly 25% even with 2 cams recording it stays at about 30... this is with a i5-3450s

[Q2U 0]

Blue Iris is a great piece of software with a wide range of options which supports many cameras. A+ software IMO. However, to have it run acceptably with 4 or more 2+MP cameras you are going to need an i7 processor in the PC you use as the blue Iris server.

While an i7 is nice, 4-6 cameras can run easy on an i5 (third or fourth generation). Using the direct to disk recording option I have 3 2mp cameras and one 1mp camera, all at 15fps and using roughly 25% even with 2 cams recording it stays at about 30... this is with a i5-3450s

 

Try the i5 with eight 2MP cameras and you won't feel very nice anymore. So, yeah, if your looking to dead-end your expansion path and i5 is nice.

[tim_yyc 0]

While an i7 is nice, 4-6 cameras can run easy on an i5 (third or fourth generation). Using the direct to disk recording option I have 3 2mp cameras and one 1mp camera, all at 15fps and using roughly 25% even with 2 cams recording it stays at about 30... this is with a i5-3450s

 

Thank you very much for that gem!

 

I have been running BlueIris for over a year with 8 x Hikvision ds-2cd2032 (2mp) cameras and 3 (mixed) Dlink ip cameras on a VM server computer sharing an i7 cpu with a total of 3 other virtual machines (all are running). Before changing all of the Hikvision cameras to direct disk recording, BlueIris was reporting 94% CPU usage, now, it idles at 31% and so far, I haven't seen it go over 50%.

 

Well worth the effort to find that option! Thanks again!

[dalepres 0]

Blue Iris is a processor hog. Folks with really powerful PCs tend to like it but that power costs money and costs electricity to run. You have to calculate that into the equation. Of course now it is winter and I might want the extra heat.

 

I'm currently recording 4 cameras at 3MP each using Synology DiskStations. They handle up to 12 cameras at 10FPS each using ONVIF with ARM processors (think mobile phone processor) that are about 25 per cent as powerful as an I5.

 

I also record using the software that came with the cameras on an old xeon box using about 4 to 5 per cent utilization (as measured right now) recording at 3MP 10 FPS per camera. Part of the reason that the software that came with the cameras perform so much better is that the software connects to the camera APIs using TCP rather than HTTP. This is important because ONVIF uses HTTP so, all other things being equal, ONVIF will always perform worse and take more CPU. On the other hand, BI was unusable with direct to disk recording and the software that came with the cameras is doing in-software motion detection so that means decoding and re-encoding the video and still hugely less CPU requirements than BI doing just http-to-file-system work.

 

With Blue Iris, recording just two cameras, my Xeon runs at a full 100 per cent utilization and I can't even tweak settings on BI because it is so slow.

 

So a person could spend $560 on a new PC to get something BI will run on, buy a Synology Disk Station (DS214+) for half the price of a new PC and easily handle twice the number of cameras still as Blue Iris will handle, or save the money and use virtually any PC with the software that comes with your cameras. The only down side is that you'll be limited to a single brand of cameras - and that's probably a good thing anyway.

 

It's not that any of those three solutions won't work - they can all work. It's a matter of understanding the real costs and making an intelligent choice based on the cost model that works best for you.

[Boogieman 1]

With that synology you cannot live monitor without another pc or some tablet displaying the cams...

Another thing you fail to mention with the synology

480 FPS @ 720p (1280x800)

160 FPS @ 1080p (1920×1080)

120 FPS @ 3M (2048x1536)

70 FPS @ 5M (2591x1944)

So, if you have say 10 3mp cameras you max at 12fps each...Which is fine for most folks but some want more..

The DS214+ costs 400...say you have 8 cameras...thats 300 more for licensing.....you are now at 700.

It would be WAY cheaper to just replace your cameras with a single brand like hikvision or dahua and use their free vms..

BI runs just fine on modern I5 and I7's that cost 300 to 500 respectively...Your Xeon is just old and slow. BI has a ton more functionality...but yes, if you want a plug and play simple solution then go with the synology...

Dont dish out misinformation about blue iris though...While blue iris does do its own motion detection which uses significantly more CPU resources than others, it allows you to set different motion thresholds for alerts vs recording, day vs night, home vs away...All this could be accomplished on a 300 dollar i5-4570 (using direct to disc) if you are recording 12-16mp which is the standard 4-8 camera system...

[dalepres 0]

You're right my Xeon is old and slow but that doesn't change the fact that BI is a processor hog. I credit some of that to doing ONVIF rather than direct camera APIs but that's not all of it. The much less powerful CPUs in the Synology DiskStations handle many more frames per second than BI does.

 

I'm not anti-Blue Iris. I wanted it to work for me. In fact, it worked well through my trial period and I purchased a license afterwards. It worked licensed for a couple months until I got an update a few months back that killed it. I still try it every month or two to see if it is working any better yet. I would really like to have a reliable ONVIF system that allows me to use cameras from more than one manufacturer.

 

I recognize that many people have had great success with Blue Iris. I don't question the success or failure of others; I simply share my own experience: it just hasn't worked for me. Even though it is more expensive, the answer for me seems to lie in the Synology DiskStation.

[Boogieman 1]

You're right my Xeon is old and slow but that doesn't change the fact that BI is a processor hog. I credit some of that to doing ONVIF rather than direct camera APIs but that's not all of it. The much less powerful CPUs in the Synology DiskStations handle many more frames per second than BI does.

 

I'm not anti-Blue Iris. I wanted it to work for me. In fact, it worked well through my trial period and I purchased a license afterwards. It worked licensed for a couple months until I got an update a few months back that killed it. I still try it every month or two to see if it is working any better yet. I would really like to have a reliable ONVIF system that allows me to use cameras from more than one manufacturer.

 

I recognize that many people have had great success with Blue Iris. I don't question the success or failure of others; I simply share my own experience: it just hasn't worked for me. Even though it is more expensive, the answer for me seems to lie in the Synology DiskStation.

The diskstation is not a bad solution if you dont need to live monitor..but it is way less customizable..but that is personal preference...Power use on the diskstation will be lower..but you will need another device for live monitoring (additional power consumption and cost for the device)..and there is nothing as reliable as a direct hdmi monitor connection....Note that there is a synology unit that supports hdmi out to be used in conjunction with a synology NAS...

Surveillance Station Live View Companion https://www.synology.com/en-global/products/VS240HD

However that has even more severe limitations and its over 500 (plus the cost of the nas and licenses)

240 FPS @ 720p (1280x800)

120 FPS @ 1080p (1920×1080)

40 FPS @ 3M (2048x1536)

40 FPS @ 5M (2591x1944)

....

As an aside i would do a complete reinstall of blue iris...there is no way that an update made a difference that significant...there may be something else causing this...are you using the server headless? with remote login?

[dalepres 0]

You're right my Xeon is old and slow but that doesn't change the fact that BI is a processor hog. I credit some of that to doing ONVIF rather than direct camera APIs but that's not all of it. The much less powerful CPUs in the Synology DiskStations handle many more frames per second than BI does.

 

I'm not anti-Blue Iris. I wanted it to work for me. In fact, it worked well through my trial period and I purchased a license afterwards. It worked licensed for a couple months until I got an update a few months back that killed it. I still try it every month or two to see if it is working any better yet. I would really like to have a reliable ONVIF system that allows me to use cameras from more than one manufacturer.

 

I recognize that many people have had great success with Blue Iris. I don't question the success or failure of others; I simply share my own experience: it just hasn't worked for me. Even though it is more expensive, the answer for me seems to lie in the Synology DiskStation.

The diskstation is not a bad solution if you dont need to live monitor..but it is way less customizable..but that is personal preference...Power use on the diskstation will be lower..but you will need another device for live monitoring (additional power consumption and cost for the device)..and there is nothing as reliable as a direct hdmi monitor connection....Note that there is a synology unit that supports hdmi out to be used in conjunction with a synology NAS...

Surveillance Station Live View Companion https://www.synology.com/en-global/products/VS240HD

However that has even more severe limitations and its over 500 (plus the cost of the nas and licenses)

240 FPS @ 720p (1280x800)

120 FPS @ 1080p (1920×1080)

40 FPS @ 3M (2048x1536)

40 FPS @ 5M (2591x1944)

....

As an aside i would do a complete reinstall of blue iris...there is no way that an update made a difference that significant...there may be something else causing this...are you using the server headless? with remote login?

 

The Synology is just 369 dollars; I just ordered a second one.

 

I am using Blue Iris on my home server with a monitor on it; I use it for other things as well so no, not headless. But even with the service running and the front end not running I get 100% CPU utilization.

 

Thanks, Boogieman, for the suggestion; I'd love to fix my BI if I could. I've downloaded and re-installed several new versions of BI. As a software developer, I can tell you that patches often cause the kind of problem I am having. Fixing one bug or making some small, seemingly insignificant, change can trigger some other unexpected bug. This problem absolutely began instantly upon upgrading. I had been using it very happily up to then... well, not very happily; it does have a bit of a cumbersome UI, but I had learned to live with it. One day it offered an upgrade and I accepted and the rest was history.

 

I understand that the creator of BI may never be able to fix it and may never even be able to reproduce the problem in his dev environment. If ever it works for me again then I will tell stories of troubled beginnings and ultimate success but for now I can only tell of troubled beginnings.

 

But I get 120 frames - up to 12 cameras at 10FPS on the Synology. So far, it isn't even breaking a sweat with my 4 cameras at 15 FPS. The only reason I ordered a second is that I will have recording in multiple devices in different areas so bad guys will hopefully not, in what time they feel safe to rummage around in my home, find and steal all of the recordings of their misdeeds.

[Boogieman 1]

369+tax=400, im in jersey so newegg and amazon both charge..plus the 50 dollars per camera license...10 cams brings you cost to 800.

Two recorders is way overkill...do you have to pay for double licenses on both boxes?

You still need a device for live monitoring?

The total cost of a synology solution is more than the cost of a system that can handle blue iris and your cameras...its just a matter of preference...i love the options built into blue iris that synology simply does not have available to it...

Also i need a large monitor with live view...

As an aside, with blue iris, you can actually record to 7 auxilary locations (aside for the new and stored folders on the actual machine). The folders or drives can be local but they can also be NAS. This allows you to record to another nas drive hidden away as well as simultaneously recording to your blue iris machine. (by cloning cameras and recording one to the nas and one to the machine)...this would let you record to a cheap nas with no added license fees...heck you can record to more than one if you are paranoid..

Even if you take blue iris out of the equation, you would be better off running hikvisions with their ivms software...you could buy all new cameras for the cost of the synology..

[spork947 0]

I recently purchased blue iris on sale. I have't had much time to mess with the full version but I liked the demo. I've used acti nvr, xprotect, and installed ivms just goofing around. I bought a hik cube camera so that eliminated acti from my options. Why didn't I buy a acti cube cam with wireless and night vision? Because they don't make one! This is a good example of why its hard to rely on a manufacturers offerings. I guess I could replace the acti cams with hikvsions but I shouldn't have to. If I went this route I would probably just purchase a hikvision nvr.

 

So that leaves most of us with a choice between xprotect and blue iris. For a residential hobbyist paying for xprotect is a bit much imo. The free version seems like they are trying to nickel and dime away features. Blue Iris seems like a much better option and did I read users saying the motion detection is superior to whats on the camera? I use an a10 from amd with the intergrated gpu. Not sure how far this will take me in blue iris but it probably cuts 20 watts from the cctv machine. I would like to run one of those mini pc's and use on cam detection software however without the video card, maybe lowers fps, and the direct to disc recording it seems you can make a good compromise with BI.

[Boogieman 1]

I recently purchased blue iris on sale. I have't had much time to mess with the full version but I liked the demo. I've used acti nvr, xprotect, and installed ivms just goofing around. I bought a hik cube camera so that eliminated acti from my options. Why didn't I buy a acti cube cam with wireless and night vision? Because they don't make one! This is a good example of why its hard to rely on a manufacturers offerings. I guess I could replace the acti cams with hikvsions but I shouldn't have to. If I went this route I would probably just purchase a hikvision nvr.

 

So that leaves most of us with a choice between xprotect and blue iris. For a residential hobbyist paying for xprotect is a bit much imo. The free version seems like they are trying to nickel and dime away features. Blue Iris seems like a much better option and did I read users saying the motion detection is superior to whats on the camera? I use an a10 from amd with the intergrated gpu. Not sure how far this will take me in blue iris but it probably cuts 20 watts from the cctv machine. I would like to run one of those mini pc's and use on cam detection software however without the video card, maybe lowers fps, and the direct to disc recording it seems you can make a good compromise with BI.

BI will not support in camera motion detection (at least not yet) It uses it own pixel based detection...if you will be recording lots of megapixels you cannot use a low power pc...

if you have a total of 15-18mp go with at least an i5-haswell...i7 haswell if you want a bit more breathing room.

I get about 22 percent cpu use recording 22 megapixes on a i7-4770 (direct to disc) 15-20fps per camera. When cameras are triggered it bumps up a bit but not much..

Because blue iris does its own motion detection , you can easily set up separate levels of detection for alerts vs recording, day and night, etc...

For example, i have my recording threshold low, so that i dont miss any recordings..but i have my alert threshold high to minimize false alerts...i have my day night settings tweaked as well.

[spork947 0]

I was aware BI does its own motion detection. What I was asking is if its at least superior to what can be done on the camera and from your post it seems that way. I'm hoping I can tweak the recording delay to not record cars and flybys from mothra. I already have the machine with the a10. Does intel offer any chips with the integrated gpu like amd?

 

I don't ever see myself running more than 4 - 6 cams. My cube cam I set to 1080p and others sometimes I use less than 5 fps.

[Boogieman 1]

I was aware BI does its own motion detection. What I was asking is if its at least superior to what can be done on the camera and from your post it seems that way. I'm hoping I can tweak the recording delay to not record cars and flybys from mothra. I already have the machine with the a10. Does intel offer any chips with the integrated gpu like amd?

 

I don't ever see myself running more than 4 - 6 cams. My cube cam I set to 1080p and others sometimes I use less than 5 fps.

The motion detection is more flexible than the cameras...some hikvision cams offer line cross detection that is not available in blue iris (yet..he is always adding features)..

Which specific a10 are you using. Almost all intel chips have integrated graphics in them..Intel in general is more power efficient which is important in a system running 24/7.

[spork947 0]

Which specific a10 are you using. Almost all intel chips have integrated graphics in them..Intel in general is more power efficient which is important in a system running 24/7.

 

I have the A10-5800K which was the first gen model I think. I just did some googling and the onboard gpu is still better than the 4600 graphics that intel has but thanks for letting me know they do have something built in . I've mostly bought amd stuff and don't pay attention to anything intel. I may have to consider a i7 if I start having issues. My processor is sort of comparable to a i5 I think. A new i7 is 3x the cost of the a10 so I will hold out as long as I can.

 

I'm glad to see both companies offering a quality built in gpu. Makes for a much simpler build and saves energy. Now time for me to starting playing with Blue Iris instead of asking so many questions

[Q2U 0]

AMD A10-5800B APU benchmarks at 4,782. Intel Core i7-4770 @ 3.40GHz benchmarks at 9,904.

 

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

[Boogieman 1]

Which specific a10 are you using. Almost all intel chips have integrated graphics in them..Intel in general is more power efficient which is important in a system running 24/7.

 

I have the A10-5800K which was the first gen model I think. I just did some googling and the onboard gpu is still better than the 4600 graphics that intel has but thanks for letting me know they do have something built in . I've mostly bought amd stuff and don't pay attention to anything intel. I may have to consider a i7 if I start having issues. My processor is sort of comparable to a i5 I think. A new i7 is 3x the cost of the a10 so I will hold out as long as I can.

 

I'm glad to see both companies offering a quality built in gpu. Makes for a much simpler build and saves energy. Now time for me to starting playing with Blue Iris instead of asking so many questions

AMD, is way behind the curve in the cpu business. That A10 actually compares to a haswell i3...and i5 is way faster http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i5-4570+%40+3.20GHz

Blue iris does not benefit from the better graphics performance...its all about cpu..

Since you have the system see if it works..

In the future, you can buy refurbished business class haswell (fourth generation) i5 systems for 300 dollars (dell, lenovo outlets, or ebay) with next business day warranties for at about 2-3 years. The i7 are around 500...

[spork947 0]

I was goofing around with some power cost calculators. It seems most people can get their pc usage under 50 watts for a basic setup. Just a rough guess but a nuc using software that uses on cam motion would save maybe 20 watts of power a month for a 4 - 6 cam setup. Please feel free to correct me with a more accurate estimation. At my rate of 7.37 cents kw/h it would probably only cost me $15 more tops per year for a machine to run blue iris. This would be vastly cheaper than paying $300 plus every 3 years for whatever xprotect costs.

 

Also thanks for the link showing how inferior my a10 is to the i7! So you guys usually purchase a pre - built machine? Maybe I will try a business class machine next time around.

[Boogieman 1]

7.3 cents is very cheap an well below the national average...are you sure thats the rate? make sure you add both the supply and delivery. While i think the national average is about 12 cents, i pay about 20.

That said the only way to determine consumption is to use a killawatt meter to test the machine under its normal load.

I never build anymore...its makes no financial sense...Particularly if you are paying for the OS. There are TONS of great deals of refurbished business class systems that are only a few months old (make sure they are using haswell fourth gen processors)..they are built exceptionally well and run perfect. Every single one of my blue iris installs (and i have many) run on refurbished dell/hp/lenovo business machines without a hitch..There are some great small form factor business machines as well if you dont care for expansion room...Always check the processor benchmark...