NX Witness (NxWitness) from Network Optics - Opinions?

[Linwood 0]

I've been using Zoneminder for several years after trying various products, but wanted to look again to see if something better (better searches, more efficient archiving, etc.) Xeoma was attractive back then, even more interesting now, but their review process (especially with more than one camera) is horribly slow.

 

I stumbled across NX Witness and had not seen it before. It has a linux version, it picked up all my Hikvision cameras quickly and well (even will change settings on them), but the most impressive thing so far is I can scrub back and forth through the video from 4 cameras (all I can do in a trial) with no delays, incredibly fast. It's own analytics of disk make it look very efficient (need to find out why -- might not be saving full resolution or something). Have yet to look at the motion detection and other features but am so impressed by the speed of archive review that it jumped to the top of my "check this out" list.

 

Interested to hear if anyone has tried it, thoughts? Price (they are one of those who won't sell direct, have to go through a reseller, which may be a deal killer if they won't deal with a DIY'er and require someone to come "install", etc.)?

 

Any problems over time?

[ak357 0]

I've been using Zoneminder for several years after trying various products, but wanted to look again to see if something better (better searches, more efficient archiving, etc.) Xeoma was attractive back then, even more interesting now, but their review process (especially with more than one camera) is horribly slow.

 

I stumbled across NX Witness and had not seen it before. It has a linux version, it picked up all my Hikvision cameras quickly and well (even will change settings on them), but the most impressive thing so far is I can scrub back and forth through the video from 4 cameras (all I can do in a trial) with no delays, incredibly fast. It's own analytics of disk make it look very efficient (need to find out why -- might not be saving full resolution or something). Have yet to look at the motion detection and other features but am so impressed by the speed of archive review that it jumped to the top of my "check this out" list.

 

Interested to hear if anyone has tried it, thoughts? Price (they are one of those who won't sell direct, have to go through a reseller, which may be a deal killer if they won't deal with a DIY'er and require someone to come "install", etc.)?

 

Any problems over time?

good choice

second best after Avigilon

[Linwood 0]

good choice

second best after Avigilon

 

Yeah, but it doesn't do Linux.

 

I think I found that NX Witness is Digital Watchdog Spectrum in the US. Maybe. Or maybe it's branded more than one way. But the one place I found to sell licenses (without an installer showing up) is pretty darn expensive, about $80/camera, which is pretty pricey compared to others I've tried (infinitely more than Zoneminder ).

 

Hoping I find out there are better ways to buy it, as so far I really like it, and it's running nicely now a whole 5-6 hours.

[Linwood 0]

So while I wait to find out pricing, a bit of my observations in case it triggers some thoughts from others....

 

Despite being Windows (I hoped for Linux) I have been trying XProtect Essentials+, as it is free and last time I looked it had a 5 day archive limit, since removed.

 

It's a bit less slick than the NX Witness / Spectrum product, but it seems to do all the same things pretty well. Scrubbing back and forth is nicely fast (not quite as fast), and the motion search looks pretty good. Haven't found anything significant either does the other lacks so far (among what I need).

 

One's free. Unfortunately that one runs on Windows. I use windows on my main desktop, but am not a real fan for a sit-in-the-closet-and-run server. plus I run network management on linux on the same server, so if I go with windows I'll need to get some more memory and run a VM for linux on HyperV (the reverse probably doesn't make sense since the NVR will be the biggest workhorse).

 

I'd love any insight people have on these two (or other similar ones, especially that run on Linux for the server side).

[ak357 0]

So while I wait to find out pricing, a bit of my observations in case it triggers some thoughts from others....

 

Despite being Windows (I hoped for Linux) I have been trying XProtect Essentials+, as it is free and last time I looked it had a 5 day archive limit, since removed.

 

It's a bit less slick than the NX Witness / Spectrum product, but it seems to do all the same things pretty well. Scrubbing back and forth is nicely fast (not quite as fast), and the motion search looks pretty good. Haven't found anything significant either does the other lacks so far (among what I need).

 

One's free. Unfortunately that one runs on Windows. I use windows on my main desktop, but am not a real fan for a sit-in-the-closet-and-run server. plus I run network management on linux on the same server, so if I go with windows I'll need to get some more memory and run a VM for linux on HyperV (the reverse probably doesn't make sense since the NVR will be the biggest workhorse).

 

I'd love any insight people have on these two (or other similar ones, especially that run on Linux for the server side).

Try Avigilon

Core lic

[Linwood 0]

Try Avigilon

Core lic

Is there a free/cheap version? It's windows and I can't find any kind of pricing anywhere, and I've looked over the whole website without finding a trial version to try?

 

Am I missing something?

 

If it's expensive AND windows I have much less interest; if it's cheap and windows it may be worth putting up with windows if it's good.

 

Why doesn't Avigilon put some useful information on their websites, like trial information, license cost or TCO estimators, or something?

[ak357 0]

Try Avigilon

Core lic

Is there a free/cheap version? It's windows and I can't find any kind of pricing anywhere, and I've looked over the whole website without finding a trial version to try?

 

Am I missing something?

 

If it's expensive AND windows I have much less interest; if it's cheap and windows it may be worth putting up with windows if it's good.

 

Why doesn't Avigilon put some useful information on their websites, like trial information, license cost or TCO estimators, or something?

Download Avigilon server and u will get 30 days trial

[Linwood 0]

Download Avigilon server and u will get 30 days trial

Why won't you give me a rough idea of pricing?

 

I might like a Lamborghini, but I don't test drive it because I don't want to pay that much. Not sure I should have for Nx Witness but it ran on linux.

 

Seriously -- why is pricing a secret?

[prairietech 0]

Try Digital Watchdog Spectrum software instead. It's the same software with different branding at more affordable cost. It is also available in Windows and Linux.

 

You can download for free and see live views of yours cameras. To record, a one time license fee per camera is required. I have found these licenses on ebay and other online distributors for around $80 per camera. There is also a 4 camera free 30 demo license you can activate after installing the software.

 

The motion search feature is extremely easy to use and fun to use.

[Linwood 0]

Try Digital Watchdog Spectrum software instead. It's the same software with different branding at more affordable cost. It is also available in Windows and Linux.

I did find that B&H had the license for 4 @ $278.29, so yes, about $70 each. Comparable.

 

My issue and it's an unfair comparison in some ways is I did the whole system on the cheap, using an old PC, doing all the wiring myself. I only have about $600 or so total invested in it. Buying $550 in licenses almost doubles my investment.

 

If I were a more typical security consumer, having paid probably a few thousand for all the wiring and professionally installed cameras that's a minor increase in cost. For me it's double.

 

Unfair standard perhaps.

 

I'm hoping they return my contact and say "we love DIY'ers and would like to make a deal".

 

I won't hold my breath though.

[prairietech 0]

Linwood, be sure to share with us how they respond.

 

A couple of years ago I stumbled across Digital Watchdog software compiled for the Raspberry Pi. I loaded it up and it worked fine. I only had 4 cameras so not much load. When I inquired about getting recording licenses, I was told that version was accidentally released on their site and was available only for OEM in large quantities.

[thewireguys 3]

Digital Watchdog OEMs NxWitness in the US and now Hawha is also OEMing NxWitness. You can't purchase NxWitness directly from them you need to purchase though the OEMs.

[Linwood 0]

Just a brief update: Nx Witness did two different referrals to resellers asking them to respond to me, neither one did. The first one suggested I reached out to separately and no response. It seems clear they are not interested in people who want to use it on the cheap.

 

For anyone interested, or if you think I need to look at these more carefully, here are some other windows products I tried. I finally gave in and decided I wasn't going to find something good (and cheap) on linux:

 

- Genius Vision: really like a lot of what it does, but it was just too buggy.

 

- Sighthound: even moreso like the way they approach motion detection, very powerful, but multi-camera playback just did not seem to work, period with a timeline, and it's "clip" approach was extremely awkward for reviewing the archive.

 

- Luxriot: Limited to 2mp, didn't try.

 

- AT Vision - could not get it to work at all, could not even get a camera to display, period.

 

- Herovision: Like milestone, but very buggy, but more free.

 

- Novosun Cyeweb - very arcane, but a nice set of features. A lot of stuff just plain would not work (e.g. motion detection masking would not show a preview even though the camera was working). UI was very obscure, and setup arcane. Could not figure out licensing only, and whether what I was running was free or very expensive.

 

- Trassir - unable to get the "trial" to even run, kept asking for a license file, but no obvious place online to get one.

 

- Milestone XProtect - this seems to be where I am landing. On the bad side the motion detection processing is very basic. On the good side it seems rock solid, no bugs have reared their heads, no crashes; in all the experimentation it just works. The multi-camera review (several ways) is quite fast, not as fast as NX Witness, but fast enough; the visibility of motion detection in the review is mediocre (no multi-camera timeline even in multi-camera review, so you can't see which cameras on the timeline had motion); no visualization or highlight of motion in (most of) the review techniques. But it seems reliable, the price is very right (free for and did I mention it seems reliable?

 

If these sound wrong, and I need to look more carefully, please let me know. If I've missed some key ones to try, please also let me know.

 

Oh... Avigilon was nice, but too expensive, so did not try. I'm really hoping to stay in the $20-30/camera range or under.