LuxRiot Blog

The information applies to:

• LuxRiot 1.x

Symptoms

Under certain circumstances Arecont Vision network cameras may produce low frame rate (FPS).

Resolution

Typical low frame rate issues and workarounds for Arecont Vision network cameras are:

1. Arecont Vision network cameras are not designed for concurrent access. So frame rate will slow down dramatically if two or more users are watching video from the same camera at the same time. Beside this Arecont Vision Network Camera Search Wizard in LuxRiot DVR will not find the camera if this camera already transmits video to some user.
   
2. Arecont Vision megapixel camera consumes large traffic while operating, e.g. AV 3130 camera in max quality mode consumes approx. 20Mbps. Certain network equipment have been noticed to create image transmission problems or slow down frame rate. For example, 3Com routers are not recommended. To bypass network transmission problem try to disable “use double packets” (Advanced tab). This feature specifies whether to use data packets with 2KB instead of the regular 1KB for image transmission (by default, 2KB). This allows increasing image transmission bandwidth, but may lead to a less stable performance on overloaded networks.

The information applies to:

• LuxRiot 1.x

Symptoms

Mobotix network cameras installed with the default settings produce low frame rate in LuxRiot DVR.

Resolution

The default Mobotix settings have to be changed in order to increase frame rate in LuxRiot DVR. This may be done by setting “Refresh Rate for Guest Access” (go to “Admin Menu” -> “Page Administration” -> “Language and Entry Page, Web Server Ports”) to the maximum available values, e.g. “30″.

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We carried out several tests to gather performance data for LuxRiot running with video feeds of different frame resolutions, different number of cameras. Data tables allow to better estimate server hardware requirements for particular case. Test results could be summarized into the following general recommendations:

• LuxRiot DVR Client software makes a significant load on CPU and therefore, if ran locally on the same computer with the LuxRiot DVR Server, overall performance might substantially degrade;
• LuxRiot DVR is a multi-threaded application, so using multi-core CPU is strongly recommended; LuxRiot DVR, both server and client, will be able to effectively scale on multiple cores;
• Each particular hardware configuration has a limit on total number of frames it could process. The limit depends on video format and resolution. Adding more cameras after reaching 100% CPU load will result in decrease of frame rate per second (FPS) per camera keeping total FPS rate on the constant level;
• LuxRiot DVR Server load and performance is almost independent from number of remotely connected client applications, unless they are using video re-sampling feature as a part of Video Transfer Settings (in which case every client application which enabled the feature adds significant additional load on server);
• For megapixel camera installations it is strongly recommended using Gigabit Ethernet as high data transfer rates easily fill 100Mbit/s bandwidth. Additionally, many network adapters start showing much poorer performance transferring data starting at already 30% load;
• State-of-the-art 3D-optimized video adapters in most cases do not increase performance, since LuxRiot DVR Client is only using 2D subsystem;
• Software motion detector adds substantial amount to CPU load. If CPU load is 100% or close, it is recommended to software disable motion detection for as many cameras as possible;
• Showing detected motion on live video streams is not recommended to be used unless it is absolutely necessary due to extra CPU load.

The tests were performed on Intel Pentium D 3.0 GHz Dual Core based computer with Microsoft Windows XP Professional SP2 operating system. LuxRiot Enterprise Edition 1.2.12 was used for testing.

Table 1. Maximum Recorded FPS with Motion Detection

Download LuxRiot Performance Tests at perfomance_luxriot_1_2_12_pd30ghz.pdf (70 KB)

“Exposure threshold to enter to night(day) mode” value sets the illumination level for switching from Day mode to Night mode and back. ( 1 - means that Day mode will be when illumination is very high; therefore, most of the time camera will be in the Night mode; 18 - means that Night mode will be when illumination is very low, and most of the time camera will be in Day mode).

To avoid continuous switching Day\Night modes at the border illumination there is a trusting interval “Exposure threshold delta to return to day(night) mode” (1 - short interval, 5 - long interval).

Good starting point is values 16 and 2. Depending on lighting conditions you would need to slowly adjust these values until switching between Day/Night modes will be satisfactory.

Now (version 1.1.18 and above) you can paste fully qualified network camera web URL, e.g. “http://guest:guest@mycamera.mydomain.com:8082/index.html” into IP Address control to fill out all required parameters.

 

1) At the beginning try to use network cameras search wizard, since there are a lot of cameras of unnamed manufactures selling under known brands (OEM).
To do that, right click on server name and then choose “Tasks-> Find Network Cameras…”.
In opened window mark «intelligent camera search» checkbox, then click next.

Wizard will scan your local network in order to figure out what network cameras you have installed.

2) If it didn`t help, try to use method written in http://blog.luxriot.com/111
3) If any of mentioned above methods not working than make this network camera available online and send us a web URL. Our engineers will try to implement support for your camera.

Luxriot 1.1.18 will have support for any JPEG Compatible network cameras. This feature allows you to specify an URI (Unified Resource Identifier) to retrieve an image. This would make Luxriot compatible with any net camera out there that is capable of exporting the image in JPEG format.

Luxriot 1.1.18 will support Linksys WVC54G network camera. This camera is using MPEG4 codec by default. To view video from Linksys camera you have manually choose MJPEG mode using the following URL:
http://11.22.33.44/adm/file.cgi?h_videotype=mjpeg&todo=save
where 11.22.33.44 - your camera IP address

Please note that this will disable the live view in the camera itself and you will need to use the following to switch it back:
http://11.22.33.44/adm/file.cgi?h_videotype=mpeg4&todo=save

We recommend updating ArecontVision network cameras firmware to fix some issues you may have.

The last available firmwares:
For AV1300, AV2100, AV3100, AV5100: v62414
For AV3130: v62414

Please download the file ArecontFirmwareUpgrades.zip. Firmware update instructions are included.

The motion detection analysis performance improvment dramatically increases speed of analysis for cameras of large resolutions (especially Arecont, IQeye cameras).

Other minor improvements provide slight increase in data processing which has effect on network/IP cameras of all models.

The changes will be available with LuxRiot 1.1.18.