The New Post-Milestone OnSSI Tested

Author: Ethan Ace, Published on Jun 01, 2015

OnSSI surprised the industry earlier this year by acquiring rival VMS company Seetec.

For years, OnSSI's market position has been hurt by the perception that they were just Milestone with a different client, due to their OEMing of Milestone's 'recorder engine'.

Now, by acquiring one of the largest VMSes in Europe, not only has OnSSI eliminated that criticism, the combined companies have a stronger position across the Western world.

But is the new OnSSI VMS good? What does OnSSI lose (or gain) from moving away from Milestone?

We tested the new OnSSI Ocularis 5.0 using the Seetec recorder to find out, looking specifically at changes in licensing, camera addition, discovery, database, UI and pricing.

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Comments (8)

Pat Villerot

06/01/15 02:25pm
It sounds like ONSSI needs to focus on building out their driver pool badly to truly disconnect from Milestone. When the move is complete it certainly makes them a ripe target for acquisition.

Undisclosed #1

In reply to Pat Villerot | 06/01/15 06:40pm

IMHO, Onssi did not really need the Milestone recorder as much as the driver packs. Based on sheer intuition I would say that the amount of development time spent on all the driver packs is greater than that spent on the recording engine by a long shot. The debugging time alone is enormous. And it never slows down.

The driver packs .dlls are written specifically for the recorder so that why they used it. After all Morten could have written another one, (and probably did!), but then they would have to take on the task of writing drivers for it.

Wade Pinnell

06/08/15 02:04am

Has ONSSI added a 64bit client or are they still restricted to the 32bit version?

Undisclosed Integrator #2

In reply to Wade Pinnell | 06/08/15 02:41am

The requirements for the Seetec client list 64 bit as being recommended. It also lists a recommendation for 8 GB of RAM. 8GB RAM is only possible with a 64 bit OS. Perhaps someone who has the latest version installed can confirm.

Dan Berg

In reply to Wade Pinnell | 06/08/15 12:22pm

OnSSI is actively working on a 64-bit client and expect it to be available later this year.

Undisclosed Integrator #3

06/08/15 01:38pm

Are there any ongoing software maintenance fees?

Dan Berg

In reply to Undisclosed Integrator #3 | 06/08/15 01:48pm

OnSSI offers an optional software upgrade plan (called StayCURRENT) that covers major releases. Interim releases, service packs and other updates are freely available. StayCURRENT is not required for tech support.

With the 5.0 release, if a customer chooses to purchase a one year term, any additional licenses they purchase during that year do not require additional StayCURRENT fees. Instead, the customer will just renew their plan on the anniversary date for the number of camera licenses included in the system at that time.

Bob Brislin

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Dan Berg | 06/09/15 03:33pm

This is AWESOME news. The StayCURRENT fee on top of the new camera license made it very difficult to get customers interested in "staying current". I really like the anniversary date renewal plan better and I'm sure most customers will as well.

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