Best way of facilitating CCTV

[28061]

Hi everyone.

I have an 8 camera IP CCTV NVR that failed last week. Instead of having a separate DVR, I’m looking at how best I can achieve this with FN; it’d be ideal if I could virtualise this somehow.

So, how am I best going about it? I’m anticipating a jail/plugin would be ideal, but none currently supported? VM next? - but this seems a bit heavy just to run a single CCTV application.

My experience with Windows 10 vm’s is that they don’t run very well but think this is because of my limited RAM. Is there a lightweight OS I can use instead? Not adverse to doubling RAM, but reluctant to do so just to facilitate a VM (because it does seem a bit resource heavy).

I’ve got a couple of poweredge 1u servers I can use instead, but the rack is in my office so trying to reduce power/noise/admin complexity.

Oh- just to add, if achieved through FN, it won’t be recording to pool1, it’ll be recording to a single WD purple.

Also... if recording 8 HD cams to FN, will I need to do something with the network balancing or something similar?

My system specs in signature.

Thanks all

 

[Chris Moore]

I don't do camera recording, so no experience here, but I remember there being some discussion about this among other users last year. Did you try a search?
I think the solution they ended up with was a Windows VM to handle the software.
You might want to read through this:
https://forums.freenas.org/index.ph...urity-cameras-with-freenas.34850/#post-209178
and possibly this:
https://forums.freenas.org/index.ph...mining-how-much-ram-to-use.60031/#post-425728

 

[28061]

Thanks for the prompt reply Chris.

I have done a search and read quite a few threads, including now the two you suggested in full. None really answer my questions though, but that’s probably because a template answer doesn’t exist.

I do want the cameras to run through a get undecided application (something like zoneminder), and many of the other topics discuss hardware requirements for large scale storage or setups for individually controlled cameras.

I asssume even instructions for ZoneMinder setups are now defunct with the new jail configuration in FN11.2.

I don’t mind doing a windows VM, with Zone Minder or similar if that’s the best way. Just seems a little inefficient.

 

[MatthewSteinhoff]

an 8 camera IP CCTV NVR that failed last week. Instead of having a separate DVR

I've talked about my security camera config before.

In short, Windows 10 Professional runs in a FreeNAS VM. That small VM (20G disk, 4G RAM) runs the GeoVision video security software then mounts an SMB share also hosted on the same FreeNAS server. Five cameras don't put a meaningful load on my server and I can save 14 days of video using just 500G of my pool. Once you turn off Windows 10's automatic patching and reboots, the configuration is rock-solid reliable. I've never had the Windows instance crash or lock up. It's only when I upgrade FreeNAS that I need to restart the VM.

Going from a separate physical video server to a VM cut the power, heat and noise load in my house meaningfully. Two thumbs up!

Cheers,
Matt

 

[28061]

Thanks Matt. That’s dead useful.

Can you tell me about your cameras, and what CPU and network load they put on your server please?

To run a Windows 10 VM, I think I’m going to have add some more RAM, which will cost me about £200. I’ve tested windows 10 VM’s before but they don’t run for very long on my machine - when I’ve investigated I’ve noticed my free RAM gets very low before the VM hangs.

Otherwise, I’m thrilled with my FN performance, so don’t think more RAM will make much difference, hence the search for a lightweight platform.

 

[MatthewSteinhoff]

Interior cameras are 4MP which can be found for about $130 on Amazon. The exterior cameras are also 4MP but a bit more expensive because they have the rugged housing.

Click the 'Show: Home NAS' link below to see the specs.

Here is the FreeNAS CPU usage, always under 20%...

Here is the network traffic from the VM's cameras and writes to the NAS....

I've given the VM four CPUs and 4GB of RAM. I'm pretty sure I could give it one or two CPUs and 3GB RAM and it would be just fine...

GeoVision (free for up to 32 of their PoE cameras) is lightweight. Even our office system with 30 cameras isn't on especially beefy hardware. It lives in a XenServer VM assigned just 8G of RAM and eight Xeon x5560 cores.

Depending on what cameras and network video recorder you're using, I think you'll be fine with your hardware and might just add RAM.

Cheers,
Matt

 

[chris crude]

Thanks Matt. That’s dead useful.

Can you tell me about your cameras, and what CPU and network load they put on your server please?

To run a Windows 10 VM, I think I’m going to have add some more RAM, which will cost me about £200. I’ve tested windows 10 VM’s before but they don’t run for very long on my machine - when I’ve investigated I’ve noticed my free RAM gets very low before the VM hangs.

Otherwise, I’m thrilled with my FN performance, so don’t think more RAM will make much difference, hence the search for a lightweight platform.

Many people have had the same Win10 VM problems until they added VirtIO drivers. Mine has been solid since the day VMs were introduced to FreeNAS by doing this.

 

[28061]

Many people have had the same Win10 VM problems until they added VirtIO drivers

Thanks Chris. When I noticed that the RAM was running low, I attributed the crashes to that and didn't bother investigating it further. Today, I've reinstalled the windows 10 VM and installed the VirtIO drivers, and it's been running for ?8 hours or so without crashing, so assume that's resolved (It's never previously gone beyond 30 minutes!)

The VM and FN performance has been noticeably poor during this time though, so I do think more RAM is required if I stick with Win10. When I get chance, I'll play with some other OS's and the allocated RAM and see if I can find a balance.