Hey Mike...
Do you know how much upload bandwidth your cameras use? I have limited upload bandwidth and want to know if I have enough to spare for a stream.
Thanks...
Scott from Austin
Hey Scott....
short answer: 4 Cams=My Webcam 7XP settings allow for a potential total of 2.4MB. However, that never happens. Typically much less than 1MB - on the order of 100-400KB. The 4 camera still image scan I've put up, and the 10 second stills (same image) take a load off my local streaming servers, since people hit them through my website server, not the local PC servers, and don't access the streams as often. My machines upload a new image for each camera every 10 seconds. The 'streaming' is accessed indirectly to my PC, from the website, and that's what you're asking about.
Long answer, and I hope I've got my facts and experience straight
First, go to my site
http://frankfortweather.us and select any stream 1-3. In the lower right,
in green right under the time display, you can see the average bandwidth streamed.
The numbers after the BW is percentage of CPU. Typically it won't be more than 200KB, and 40-50%. In the upper right hand corner, some idea of the FPS you're getting. You'll see it speed up and slow down, even pause, and the image will 'move' accordingly.
On Cam 4, the bandwidth is at the top left, and rarely exceeds 100KB at 30-40% CPU. I'm not displaying FPS on that cam, forgot I suppose....????
I'm streaming large images from the one PC... the three cams on the dedicated weather pc (the Logitech 920's) are set for 1024x576px, with FLV streaming set at 24FPS max at 1200K
bits. The max bandwidth allowed per
internet connection is set for 400KB. Most people connect at much lower than 300, and their FPS will be quite low, often 1-5 FPS. Typically I see a controller reading BW of around 875kbs-1.2Mbs for one camera when I connect
intranet at about 15-20FPS.... but that is not what actually streams... rather it seems to reflect 'potential', and it appears to be self limiting by the WC7 server, since the full 24 FPS are almost never served.
The 4th cam, on an old HP Pavilion A820n is set for 800x600px, and people connect at 100-300kb, though max
internet is set for 600, also set for 24FPS... at 1200Kbits. My connection through
intranet is again at a potential 875-1.2M as monitored by the controller, but about 75KB actual.
So, basically, for my setup, net connections could demand 2.4MB for 4 cams, out of my 3MB upload max... but it never works that way, it's always much lower because of the server limiting and router limiting, etc. It also depends on the images being streamed... bright day with puffy clouds call for more BW than a cloudy sky, for example. However, again that's not the case. The server reduces FPS to match BW limits and viewer's connection and graphics, etc.
Smaller images = less bandwidth required. I just push to a convenient limit. I've seen as many as 15 connections at one time on the 3 cam server, and the total FPS never reached 24, which means they were limited to a combined 400KB actual bandwidth.
Cheers!
Mike
