Poor Client performance (yet, resources not even close to peaking)

Netcam Studio Problems & Bugs
1

Greetings!

Loving NCS so far! I pretty much built an NVR dedicated just to NCS and running my home security/automation applications.

However, my laptop isn’t able to function as a client connecting to the NVR server (running Netcam Studio as a windows service). It is incredibly unresponsive, taking anywhere between 5 to 40 seconds for any clicks to register, including simple things like selecting a view layout. Normally, I’d just think "oh, my videos are too high quality for my laptop to handle. But, strangly, my laptop’s CPU usage remains < 10% according to task manager, and only about 50% memory is used (in fact, the Chrome process this post is being written in is taking more resources)

So, how would I go about diagnosing what’s going on here? I’m thinking there’s a bug you may be interested in…

Video stream selected doesn’t seem to make any difference. I have 2 Camius Bolt X5 cameras, each sending two RTSP UDP streams. One is 2048x1024 @ 30FPS, the other is 640x480 @ 30FPS. Codec is H.265 (I may test H.264 this weekend)

My laptop is an Asus X551M, running Windows 10 64-bit, Intel Celeron N2830 2.16Ghz, and 4GB DDR3 RAM.

NVR is a Core i5 7500, 8GB DDR4, Windows 10 64-bit. It’s performing very well with the client connected to it. In fact, I’m still using my laptop to monitor things through remote desktop just fine =P. I don’t think the NVR is the issue, as my desktops can also connect to the NVR and perform just fine with the client.

I also run the Android client on my Motorola G 2nd gen, and that actually performs really well (obviously struggles with the higher resolutions, but the client is still responsive and it does the lower resolutions perfectly, hence why I’m using those streams for mobile notifications/recordings)

So… thoughts? I’d understand if it was performing slowly because the laptop can’t keep up, but… it’s not even trying! Heh. Thanks for your time :slight_smile:

2

Hi there,
On the NVR with i5 7500 it works fine running NCS as a service. So the problem seems to be the laptop running on Celeron N2830. The only thing you should need to do is to start the NCS Client, red icon, and connect to the NVR running NCS as a service. Take a look at the cpu load when this happens. Is is up to 100%? Also when NCS is not running take a look in the Task manager and under processes and make sure that no NCS processes are running.
On the Celeron, did you install the complete version of NCS or did you install only the client? If you installed only the Client remove that first and then install the complete version of NCS and use only the Client as see if there is a difference.
-Henrik

EDIT:
Just installed and running NCS Client on an Intel CPU T7100 2.4 GHz with no problems. Have also ben running it on an Intel Celeron Dual-Core J1800 2.41GHz with no problems.

3

Thank you very much for the prompt reply!

The problem is indeed isolated to just the laptop client.

I’ve uninstalled the client, and re-installed the client and server together (“Full Installation”), and unfortunately there’s no change.

The Celeron CPU on my laptop never seems to hit 100%, except during the initial loading. I’ve taken 3 screenshots, with annotations. One is idle, after a fresh reboot (before starting NCS Client), the 2nd is the loading process, and the 3rd is video display and “running”. The performance graph as it’s running stays very similar (CPU, Memory, Disks, WiFi) throughout the run process indefinitely.

It’s like the hardware is ready, but it’s just not being fed anything to process.

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Thanks for info. This was a tricky one and I really don’t know. Do you have another computer to test with? It runs by wifi, run by LAN cable. If you run a video from the Library, is that ok?
If the client hangs it will say so in the title on top “Netcam Studio Client - Multi Source View”. After this it will say something like No responce …
If you start the web client with IE, Chrome, … is that running normal?
Exit NCS on the NVR. Add a camera to NCS on the Celeron laptop. What happen? Run in wifi and LAN.

7

Sorry for the late reply!

I got two desktops which work perfectly, the server itself (also works perfectly, obviously), and my mobile devices (all work). Just the laptop seems to be slow-performing.

I adjusted some video settings, such as setting everything to H.264 instead of H.265, and there’s no difference on my the Celeron N2830 (Laptop).

I plugged the laptop into the Ethernet network the cameras are on, and accessed both of their (high quality) streams with no issues, both H.265 and H.264 (well, the high quality 5MP could only deliver ~10fps, but the 720p got 30fps and smooth video)

So, it definitely doesn’t seem to be a video issue, especially since it seems the NCS client is sluggish before it even receives any frames - it’s sluggish right at the load.

It’s strange indeed! I personally am not too bothered by the issue, as I can just use remote desktop or my mobile device. But, I definitely wanted to do my part in figuring out this odd behavior!

8

Oh! The web clients don’t seem to ever load on my laptop regardless of browser. I’ll look into that more too.

Also, I forgot to try running NCS server on my laptop to add a camera. I’ll try that later as well!

9

Hi,
Most likely the slow Celeron processor or another running process limiting the performance
"well, the high quality 5MP could only deliver ~10fps, but the 720p got 30fps and smooth video)" That is not a camera problem. It is the Celeron computer that is limiting the FPS.
-Henrik