CPU Usage

[zak]

Ah I see, that makes sense.

I do appreciate you looking into this option and responding quickly.  I think any implementation of this "dynamic audio" option would be very powerful - whether it be a user toggle from icam, or just an automatic enable when someone logs in.

I've already impressed a bunch of my friends with this iphone app and this security setup.

[Kurtois]

Anyone in the "audience" using the iCamSource on a WinXP P4 machine w/1GB RAM?  I just upgraded today, and I must admit, I still have poor results (image not displayed on iPhone using a connection at a remote location) running three cameras (all Wi-Fi based cameras).

I will try disabling audio and ensuring other parameters are set to help the "cause".

[OUAnthony]

It sounds like you have an issue with port forwarding. Have you either:

1) set up a static IP address for each camera, enabled uPNP in both icamsource and in your router settings and rebooted your router?

2) set up a static IP address for each camera and your computer running icamsource, set up manual port forwarding in the router, and enabled port forwarding in icamsource?

[Jay]

Kurtois - What error message are you seeing on your iPhone exactly?

Do you see the same behavior if you only run one camera?

[Kurtois]

OUAnthony/Jay - Thank you for your replies.

As background, I have been running iCam since Feb '10.  The software prior to this recent upgrade did not show connection errors for my IP cameras.  Note I had just ran the icamsource upgrade yesterday on the XP machine, but did not reboot.  The machine dropped off the network yesterday about four hours after running the upgrade.  I rebooted and I am able to see the live view, however, bringing up motion events is an issue.  It seems when the cameras are recording, bringing up Motion Events is particularly laggy.  Regardless of camera image activity, bringing up Motion Events and viewing the photos is laggy. 

Historically, I have ALWAYS had lag when trying to pull up past Motion Events.  Would appreciate figuring out how to speed up the recall of these events AND viewing them.  Note that I have changed the value allotted for image storage to 2GB.  If that needs to be changed to increase performance, I can do that.  Files are being saved to the OS disk.  This morning the Motion Events would not come up for one of the cameras. 

Any chance there is a function to log to a log file?  I am always running into "bumps" with this software and some bit of frustration.  I am always thinking about upgrading the box that iCamSource runs on, but would rather not, of course.

Questions answered below:

OUAnthony:
1) set up a static IP address for each camera, enabled uPNP in both icamsource and in your router settings and rebooted your router?

I have setup a static IP for all three cameras outside of the DHCP "pool", the WinXP box is also setup with a static IP.  I have NOT enabled uPNP (is that a settable option?) in icamsource; is this even necessary? 

Jay:
1) I initially ran just one camera after running the upgrade and all appeared normal.  I can revert back to one camera, if needed. 

[Jay]

If you have a very large number of motion events, that would increase the delay because the iCamSource has to compile and send a large list to the iPhone.  I would imagine that 2GB worth of small JPEG images would be a very long list.  Are you actually filling up the 2GB storage limit?

What error message are you seeing on your iPhone?  If you're seeing the Source Connection Error, then the UPnP option may resolve the problem. In iCamSource, enable the "Auto-Config Router" option.  If it doesn't work, let me know what error message appears next to the "Auto-Config Router" checkbox.

[Kurtois]

>Are you actually filling up the 2GB storage limit?

Here are stats for one of the folders:
1.97 GB
41,700 files
4,740 Folders

Is the app sending an XML file?  Doesn't text take minimal bandwidth?

If this is too much, perhaps the app needs to have a limit put in place?

Errors?  I receive from time to time "One or more of the iCam brokers could not connect" and then a view says "Connection Closed".  It has been rare.

[Jay]

If you aren't receiving images on your iPhone, you should see an error message every time that happens.  Some of the error messages take a while to show up since they are timeouts.  You can try enabling the "Auto-Config Router" option to see if it helps with the connectivity.

Text takes up less space than audio or video data, but a set of data with thousands of entries is a lot regardless.  I don't know if the limiter is the bandwidth or the processing.  The limit we have in place is the storage limit, but we have given control over that limit to the user.  Have you tried lowering the storage limit to see if has any effect?  You can copy the motion event folders first if you don't want to lose the existing recordings.

[Kurtois]

Jay,

The error messages of simply viewing the live images will often display when I am within the same local network of the cameras.  As I mentioned, these error messages are few and far between with the prior version of the app.  They popped up again with the upgrade, but seem to have subsided.

I am not sure Auto-Config router would help with the live view timeout error above given I am in the same local network.  Agree?

I will lower the storage limit.  That said, at what level should I "archive" folders off.  Is it necessary to stop data collection? 

On a related note, could you describe how one would save the images to Dropbox on a Windows machine?  Instructions for OS X (10.5 or 10.6) would also be appreciated.  Perhaps point me to a thread. 

[GaryW]

Try searching for DropBox - here is one thread that I found:

http://skjm.com/forum/index.php?topic=615.0

[Jay]

Without an error message, it'll be hard to determine what's going on.  You are correct when you say that the Auto-Config Router option won't help for connectivity problems on the same local network.

If you are seeing the Source Connection Error when the iPhone is on the local network, that indicates that firewall software on the computer running is blocking the iCam traffic. 

In order to find more information about what's causing the problem, I'll need you to email the external IP address of the computer running iCamSource to support@skjm.com.  To get that, go to http://whatismyip.com in your computer's web browser.

[Kurtois]

I just wanted to follow-up and indicate that I have cleared all the captured files to a subfolder.  I set the storage limit to 500MB and things have been sort of running smoothly. 

I say "sort of" because I am encountering instances where the "Record Motion Events" checkbox gets cleared spontaneously.  I thought perhaps it was because I "checked in" on my cameras using an iPad, which I occasionally do.  I thought perhaps one of the settings using that app was causing the option to get flipped. 

Has anyone seen this behavior?  Quite disappointing.  Let me know what I can do to perhaps track the events leading up to this option getting changed.

To follow up to another question, from time to time I will get "Source Connection Error" when I go to look at a particular camera's Motion Events and the progress wheel spins for a long period of time.  It is not often, and I haven't paid attention enough to determine if it is on a local, hotspot, or 3G connection.

[Jay]

Have you noticed any pattern to when this occurs?  The only events that should change the recording setting are manually checking the checkbox in iCamSource or toggling the switch in iCam on the iPhone.  Does this happen immediately when you enable recording on the first camera, or does it happen some other time?

If you enable recording for one camera in the iCamSource window (not through the iPhone), do you see this same behavior?

[Kurtois]

Jay,

No update on this issue.  I will keep you apprised if it raises again. 

Kurt

[Kurtois]

Jay,

Here is the error message I receive fairly routinely with the Motion Events folder size set to 500MB:



The way these images are being fetched, could it not be improved?  I don't need to look at the older events often.  Couldn't the app just load the last 30 days of events or something?