Trying to diagnose Vivotek dropped frames

[Happy Al 0]

Hope you guys can help me out. I've done some searching and saw that supposedly Vivotek cams have underpowered processor.

 

Regardless of the amount of action going on there is significant skipped frames. Seen with tree branch movements or even worse cars and people going by.

 

However, i noticed that the other day when we had snow for the first time in 6 years and go-cart was running around, dropped frames still happened but were much less. So it not very consistent. Which is whats confusing to me.

 

Set up on Jpg 1280-900 at 15fps. I want to do 30 but not much good when it gets skipped.

 

I am running 2 IP8332's with Cat5e(~60-70feet).

POE Netgear Hub

To Lynksys Router

To Win 7 machine 12g ram, 3.6gb 8 core spu and 4gb video card. WD 5400 rpm dedicated vivotec video drive.

 

System drive is a nice SSHD.

 

Any help would be appreciated. Vivotek just brushed it off as being my computer but i have really hard time believing that it could be it.

[varascope 0]

 

Set up on Jpg 1280-900 at 15fps. I want to do 30 but not much good when it gets skipped.

 

Why are you using JPG vs H.264 compression? JPG is a much larger file size. Try H.264 with variable bitrates first.

 

Also try a secondary drive 6Gbs Write speed. Is there a difference between drives? SSD, varies by manufacturer, have a wide range of performance. Same with SSD Cards, they are limited read writes, great for photo but not video.

[dvarapala 0]

Hope you guys can help me out. I've done some searching and saw that supposedly Vivotek cams have underpowered processor.

 

Regardless of the amount of action going on there is significant skipped frames. Seen with tree branch movements or even worse cars and people going by.

 

Set up on Jpg 1280-900 at 15fps. I want to do 30 but not much good when it gets skipped.

 

I am running 2 IP8332's with Cat5e(~60-70feet).

 

Any help would be appreciated. Vivotek just brushed it off as being my computer but i have really hard time believing that it could be it.

 

I have a IP8332 which exhibits the same issue. At 30fps I can see frames being dropped, with noticeable jumps every second or two; if I drop the rate down to 15fps it's no longer noticeable. Admittedly this camera is getting a little long in the tooth, but none of my Axis cameras of the same vintage have this problem (and they'd better not, since they cost 2-3 times as much ).

 

Why are you using JPG vs H.264 compression?

 

Irrelevant. The camera should not be dropping frames irrespective of the chosen format.

 

Also try a secondary drive 6Gbs Write speed. Is there a difference between drives? SSD, varies by manufacturer, have a wide range of performance. Same with SSD Cards, they are limited read writes, great for photo but not video.

 

I see frames being dropped when viewing the stream directly from the camera in a web browser, so clearly HD performance is not a contributing factor.

[varascope 0]

Why are you using JPG vs H.264 compression?

 

Irrelevant. The camera should not be dropping frames irrespective of the chosen format.

 

Uhhhh how is high bitrate at MJPG around 65k a frame irrelevant to 5k a frame for H.264 for 720p video. And FYI format and compression are 2 different things.

 

For diagnostics purposes, if the video can stream at a higher frame rate while at comparable bitrate then the issue can be the compression codec and how the processor handles it. If H.264 is worse then the processor cannot keep up.

 

It is relevant as compression is done at the camera. H.264 requires more processing but allows higher bitrate and traditionally smoother streaming. For testing purposes I would like to know if:

 

1. At 15fps on JPG is any different than H.264 ?

2. At 18fps?

3. At 21fps?

4. At 30fps?

Where is the breaking point? Does playback seem faster than usual?

 

Sending uncompressed or less compressed video at higher frame rates may cause the dropped frames.

If it is happening during the same settings on H.264 then the problems point more toward the processor.

 

Does the camera allow for I,P,B frame adjustments? What are they currently set for?

[dvarapala 0]

My point is simply this: is a camera claims that it is capable of capturing in a certain resolution at a certain frame rate and providing a MJPEG stream from that captured video, then it is unacceptable for that camera to be dropping frames. In other words, the manufacturer shouldn't make claims that the camera's microcontroller cannot back up.

[SS360 0]

Are you using any other software to view the cameras? Possibly the Vivotek software that is free? I would never expect internet explorer to be able to flash 30jpg images a second and 1mp.

 

One thing to check is the network protocol that is being used. TCP network protocol can cause delays in video security because of the constant high volume of information transporting and when you use TCP it has to check itself for errors sometimes going back to the camera requesting dropped packets. If you can change the network protocol to communicate in UDP then you will get and faster flow of information because there is no error checking. If there are small bits of information lost it usually will show up as slight pixilation in the image instead of a delay or skipped frame due to TCP's attempt to go back and error check.

 

However I have never seen the ability to change stream protocol within Vivotek without using a software as advanced as Genetec VMS. BUT I haven't used Vivotek in a couple years now so they may have changed their firmware to accept it, worth a call to Vivotek.

[Numb-nuts 1]

in one ear and out the other...