Geovison NVR Can It Utilize Multiple Quad Core CPU's

Ken, I forward to Geovision HQ as it is too specific a question for us to guess. It's the weekend already in Taiwan so I would expect a response in a few days. Thanks. Good question.

Two questions in the meantime:

• Do you plan to watch live video on the same machine you are recording?
• What is the throughput of the 16 cameras coming in? 20 Mb/s? 80Mb/s?

Ken,

I haven't worked with Geovision in 3 years, but I may be able to help avoid one potential issue.

Processor: if you want a high end processor look towards the Xeon processor. Geovision is a 64 bit application as of 8.3.3 but Itaniums use a different instruction set: IA-64 vs X86, x86-64 or x64. Itanium would be incompatible with Geovision.

GV-800 cards: If you intend to reuse the cards the model # you have provided is probably PCI. Check to see if there are compatible slots available in the selected server. If you are only using IP cameras there is no need for the GV-800s as they are just being used for licensing purposes, they don't do any decoding of video. A Geovision dealer may be able to sell you a USB dongle.

Multiple processors: Supporting seperate processors is really a function of the OS (which it should) and threading in the application. Please note that I have never used or had the need for dual quad cores w/Geovision. As for Geovision using or even needing 2x4 cores of high end processing for 16 cameras... In my opinion it may be overkill. I am not certain Geovision is multi-threaded enough to make use of that many cores.

If you know what model of AMD processor is in the old servers I can tell you more. I suspect that the performance of just purchasing a new machine with a new processor will benefit greatly without the need to go into high end processors.

Thank every for your assitance.

Let me start at the beginning.

I have 3 DVR'a all the same specs each one using a AMD x4 605e processor and 8 gb ram and 3 x 3 TB hard drives and 2 x Geo GV-800 cards.

I am upgrading from analog to 3mp cameras (will be some 2mp) and will run a combo DVR/NVR untill all cameras are IP cameras at which time I will most likely remove the GV-800 cards.

Each server will run between 16 and 32 IP cameras.

With my current setup I am running 100% cpu cycles and experiencing choppy live video.

I can purchase used Dell R600 servers with 2 to 4 quad core Xeon processors (i mistakenly stated Itanium processors) cheaper than building new PC's or upgrading my exising PC's with I7 Processors.

Didn't initialy consider my GV-800's won't work in the R600 servers.

Then purchase SAN or NAS arrays for storage.

I am considering putting all IP cameras on a recording server.

I like the geovision playback capabilities which is why I use the Geovision vs. standalone NVR's.

I installed a 65 5MP Digital Watchdog Spectrum system recently and also loved the playback (to costley for this customer).

Any thoughts on other NVR's with playback similar to Geovision or DW Spectrum that is cost effective?

Thank you in advance for your answers.

Ken

Ken,

Geovision forwarded a detailed response to me. Here it is in full:

Regarding Ken's first question on using AMD quad core platform with 8GB RAMrunning 2 GV800 cards and 16 3rd party IP cameras, our engineering has aPC performance report also using AMD platform. As we are uncertain Ken's working environment details, we have listed somecombinations provided below. GV-NVR's maximum channels supported is 32channels and therefore the analog and the number of megapixel combineddoes not exceed 32 channels. HQ Test PC Spec:1. CPU: QuadCore AMD Phenom X4 9750, 2400 MHz2. Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-MA770-DS33. Chip set: AMD 770, AMD K104. RAM: 4GB RAM (2GBX2, DDR2-800)5. VGA: NVDIA GeForce 9600 GT Dual Streams with CPU Decoding

Single Stream with CPU Decoding

Note. The tables show CPU usage is approximately 70% to ensure system performance and stability. With the above information, we believe Ken may be using single stream and the CPU usage has reached 100% in his setup.

If possible, we would also like to verifyon what exactly was the analog resolution setup on the GV800 cards and if the IPcameras were using single or dual stream. Due to the increase loading with IP camera's megapixel image processing, GeoVisionNVR has created GPU decoding support to decode video stream Intel's Sandy bridge toprocess 1.3 to 2 MP and Ivy/Hanswell to process 1.3 to 5 MP where this will greatly decreasethe CPU usage during live stream viewing in our NVR. Currently this support is not availableon AMD platform where only CPU decoding on single stream will likely cause CPU to reach itsmaximum resource limit.

Regarding Ken's second question on recommended PC specification for future NVR systemsetup, we suggest the use of i7 CPU platform with Hanswell chipset motherboard tosupport up to 32 channels as we believe 3rd party IP cameras may be used.

We have also attached a pdf file which was the report based on our internal testingwith different resolutions of IP cameras on i3, i5, i7, on single stream with GPU decodingand also dual stream with CPU decoding with sample PC specification, hardware write-inlimitation recommendations.

The information provided above should be able to answer some of the questions and pleasesee if Ken could also contact us directly at support@geovision.com.tw or reply to us againin case any of the information provided that does not seem to be clear enough.

Thank you for response.

I will need to look into if configured for single stream or not.

Ken

Again thanks for your responses.

Did not realize that all of my third party cameras (LTS/Hikvision) when adding to the Geovsion DVR/NVR as OMNIF, defaulted to single stream.

After changing each third party camera to Dual Stream and upping the ram from 4gb to 10gb, my CPU load dropped below 100% on my DVR/NVR's.

Still need to do more tweeking to resolve some choppy video and lower my CPU load, mostly fixed.

Acceptable for now as I am still upgrading more cameras from analog to digital.

Ken