Substreams and Foscam R2

[gbarnas]

Halleluiah! Switching to the rtsp configuration but connecting via http solved this for me. My AMD 8-core system is now down to 9-11% CPU and 1.15G RAM with 7 cameras, including 3 new 5M units with audio. Prior to this, configurations would cause the Foscam cameras to "blank" and refresh every minute or so when enabling sub-streams, and CPU was 45-60%. Just checked the recorded video and it looks to be high quality. The tell-tale seemed to be that the Foscam cameras were showing 0 stream on the primary and full stream on the sub. Now it shows full stream on the primary and a fraction on the sub channel.

Glenn

[TimG]

For example on some clips I would get the correct picture but when playing the clip it would actually play an earlier clip.

I've seen this a few times. If I clicked on the clip again, it would play properly. I just had this happen again, and noted the timestamp on the erroneous video, then I clicked on the clip again, and it worked correctly. I dragged the video slider back to the left - the timestamp was the very beginning of the present (24/7) bvr file

[TimG]

The tell-tale seemed to be that the Foscam cameras were showing 0 stream on the primary and full stream on the sub. Now it shows full stream on the primary and a fraction on the sub channel.

Yes, my Foscam did that until I figured it out. Don't forget to check your masking, and trigger levels, as it is now checking a much lower resolution image for movement. Some experimentation required !

[gbarnas]

Now that I have sub-streams enabled on all the cameras, I'm down to 7% average CPU load with 7 cameras. There's a "but", however. Events are not triggering effectively. For example, if I walk OUT of the house, the front camera will trigger consistently, but when the delivery guy or mailman comes up and places a package on the porch, it doesn't trigger about 60% of the time. (front cam is now a ANPVIZ 5M)

I don't use any masks on the cameras (except the driveway, which sees a small part of the neighbor's sidewalk and about half the width of the street). Everything else is focused within my property boundaries. I'm wondering if there's something else I should do before I start tweaking the trigger size and contrast. The "critter-cams" in the back yard are mostly for tracking the passing wildlife so the trigger size is pretty small. What's strange is that a video will start with a cat sitting in the middle of the yard, then gets up and walks away. It's as if it teleported there.

Should I increase the sub-stream res or frame rate before tinkering with the trigger settings?

[aesterling]

Thanks TimG.

Tried those settings. Still having the issue. I think this is a lost cause.

@MikeBwca did you ever get substreams to work on your R2? I haven't been able to despite following TimG's instructions.
I wonder if it's related to different hardware versions of the R2?

[MikeBwca]

Gave up. I think I returned the camera.

[TimG]

If I remember when I get home, I will have a look at the present settings. It's been OK other than the usual wifi issues.

[TimG]

OK, I have checked, and both main stream and sub stream are working, as well as audio. Settings presently look like this:

R2.png (236.11 KiB) Viewed 6882 times

[aesterling]

Thank you both for following up, MikeBwca and TimG!

My Foscam R2 cameras are almost 9 years old, but for one last attempt, I sent an email to Foscam support yesterday. I was surprised to have a response from a support person this morning suggesting that I create a new user account on the camera "admin123" with pw "admin123" and test the streams again.

I tried loading the RTSP stream in VLC, and to my surprise both the main and substreams worked. I changed nothing from my previous attempts except for the new UN/PW. Both user accounts that I've tested are set to administrator and there aren't any special characters in my old account US or PW. I just sent a reply to Foscam support to ask for clarification about why it's working with a new account.

The addresses I'm using in VLC are:

rtsp://admin123:admin123@192.168.86.10:88/videoMain
rtsp://admin123:admin123@192.168.86.10:88/videoSub

In Blue Iris, I'm using the same settings that TimG suggested:

Screen Shot 2023-08-04 at 09.21.42 Large.jpeg (205.36 KiB) Viewed 6873 times

And I also have the PTZ presets working with these settings:

Screen Shot 2023-08-04 at 09.24.18.jpeg (164.89 KiB) Viewed 6873 times

It only took a few years, but I'm happy to have these old cameras working properly in BI.

[TimG]

Good result, it must be Friday. Yes the PT not Z works here too. I say "not Z" as although it appears to zoom, it isn't optical, and BI5 doesn't use it in a preset like it will with my Dahua PTZ's. Have an excellent weekend