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goaliebob99  
#1 Posted : Thursday, December 13, 2018 9:12:47 AM(UTC)
goaliebob99

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I'm running NDIcam on a bunch of iPhones, (Iphone SE's). It's a super low budget production. I'm trying to get the people who can write the checks to write one to get some PTZ cameras, but they think the 2100 per camera is expensive when we all know how cheap that is. They just don't get broadcast but want it. So I'm piecemealing stuff together in hopes to get something better. Anyhow, I'm running the iPhones using NDI Cam at 1080P using an Apple USB / Camera adapter and apple ethernet adapter. The goal is to get about 4 hours of use out of each phone per session before needing a charge. Each phone connects to a dedicated Netgear 8 port gigabit switch. One switch, runs four cameras and is isolated and not connected to the internet.

The machine running VMIX is a Quad core I7 7700k with 32 gigs of ram and a GTX 1070 at 8 gigs. The machine has no problem running all of the cameras while outputting NDI Program out so I can stream to Facebook and Youtube live at the same time, streaming and recording. Most of the time CPU usage is under 50 percent. The issue that I'm running into is with one camera, 1080P works great at high quality, Two, Three and Four cameras, we get high drops of source frames from the phones. Each phone is connecting at 100mbps due to adapter and USB limitations. The PC it's self is connected to Gigabit on one adapter on the same isolated switch and on the second adapter is on a gigabit internet connection isolating that from the cameras.

What can be done to get these cameras from dropping frames at the source, aside from buying real PTZ w/ NDI cameras? Any difference between the NDI Cam app and the official one from Newtek? Other than the 10 additional bucks? Any recommendations?
DWAM  
#2 Posted : Thursday, December 13, 2018 11:02:12 PM(UTC)
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NDI requires gigabit infrastructure

A 100Mbit ethernet adaptor is not fast enough for a 1080p NDI feed.

Read specs !!!

And if you plan to heavily use NDI, get a professional switch, don't expect quality with toys!

Guillaume
spencerm24  
#3 Posted : Friday, December 14, 2018 12:32:34 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: goaliebob99 Go to Quoted Post
I'm running NDIcam on a bunch of iPhones, (Iphone SE's). It's a super low budget production. I'm trying to get the people who can write the checks to write one to get some PTZ cameras, but they think the 2100 per camera is expensive when we all know how cheap that is. They just don't get broadcast but want it. So I'm piecemealing stuff together in hopes to get something better. Anyhow, I'm running the iPhones using NDI Cam at 1080P using an Apple USB / Camera adapter and apple ethernet adapter. The goal is to get about 4 hours of use out of each phone per session before needing a charge. Each phone connects to a dedicated Netgear 8 port gigabit switch. One switch, runs four cameras and is isolated and not connected to the internet.

The machine running VMIX is a Quad core I7 7700k with 32 gigs of ram and a GTX 1070 at 8 gigs. The machine has no problem running all of the cameras while outputting NDI Program out so I can stream to Facebook and Youtube live at the same time, streaming and recording. Most of the time CPU usage is under 50 percent. The issue that I'm running into is with one camera, 1080P works great at high quality, Two, Three and Four cameras, we get high drops of source frames from the phones. Each phone is connecting at 100mbps due to adapter and USB limitations. The PC it's self is connected to Gigabit on one adapter on the same isolated switch and on the second adapter is on a gigabit internet connection isolating that from the cameras.

What can be done to get these cameras from dropping frames at the source, aside from buying real PTZ w/ NDI cameras? Any difference between the NDI Cam app and the official one from Newtek? Other than the 10 additional bucks? Any recommendations?


Gigabit is best for NDI. That said, if you are stuck on 100, you might try using 720p instead of 1080. It might not work but it has at least some hope of not sucking as bad as trying to get 1080p over 100mbit, that will not work at all!

Now if you're using NDI|HX, that is a lower bandwidth requirement. I think I read about 35mbps, so that scenario you might have no problems with it, but you're asking for trouble if you are using 100mb network connection.
mjgraves  
#4 Posted : Friday, December 14, 2018 1:44:50 AM(UTC)
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I've used NDI Cam on my Pixel. I very much doubt you'll get 4 hours from a charge. The app is heavy lift, draws a lot of power. The phone gets notably warm after just a short while.
DWAM  
#5 Posted : Friday, December 14, 2018 3:11:33 AM(UTC)
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Quote:
Now if you're using NDI|HX, that is a lower bandwidth requirement. I think I read about 35mbps

NDI|HX is not available for smartphones, tablets or even computers. It's dedicated to licensed PTZ cams and some converters like Connect Spark or Kiloview E1.

Besides NDI|HX maxes at 12 Mbits
goaliebob99  
#6 Posted : Friday, December 14, 2018 3:24:33 AM(UTC)
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Let me update a bit, I have some USB 2.0 Gigabit Ethernet adapters that should work with the apple camera adapter. While I won't get full gigabit even though it will negotiate at that, I should be able to get at least 200 Mbps out of it which should be enough for 1080P NDI per the specs. I also think part of the problem is the backplane speed of the switch I'm using but am unsure. I'm using a Netgear GS308. According to Amazon, it can do up to 16 Gig nonbinding. I am thinking about ordering the Trendnet TEG-S16D which has a 32 Gbps Switching Fabric (fancy talk for backplane speed). Right now I just need 4 cameras but may bump it up to 8 in the future especially once we can get cameras with NDI HX.

Aside from our current 4 cameras, I may do an NDI output from Vmix to another machine for youtube broadcasts.

It's funny the more cameras I add the more the latency goes up and the more drops happen. WHo would have thought that! LOL :P

I also have had good luck using the apple 24v chargers that keep the phones charged and allows for the power draw at the same time. I may eventually put in place an external battery on them to help out as well. If anything these phones will be useful in getting supplemental camera angles and crowd shots once I get better cameras.

The NDI cam app does not support 720P whereas the NewTek one does. I haven't downloaded the Newtek one yet but will give that a shot as well. I think I'm on the right path.
goaliebob99  
#7 Posted : Friday, December 14, 2018 3:26:55 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: DWAM Go to Quoted Post
Quote:
Now if you're using NDI|HX, that is a lower bandwidth requirement. I think I read about 35mbps

NDI|HX is not available for smartphones, tablets or even computers. It's dedicated to licensed PTZ cams and some converters like Connect Spark or Kiloview E1.

Besides NDI|HX maxes at 12 Mbits


You would think that Newtek would implement that into their smartphone app. It would be extremely useful. It probably has to do something with how the video is encoded and the power needed to do that.
zenvideo  
#8 Posted : Friday, December 14, 2018 4:59:11 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: goaliebob99 Go to Quoted Post
You would think that Newtek would implement that (ie NDI|HX) into their smartphone app. It would be extremely useful. It probably has to do something with how the video is encoded and the power needed to do that.

NDI|HX requires specific hardware for encoding, so it's not something you can just add into a software app. There is no software NDI|HX encoder.
goaliebob99  
#9 Posted : Saturday, December 15, 2018 1:19:59 PM(UTC)
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This is an interesting solution for those who are reading this. I ended up going out and getting a 4 port dedicated gigabit Ethernet card for my PC instead of putting a switch in place. The card its self is more like 20 bucks (USD). I segmented each camera to it's own network going with a /28 subnet. You cant set each Ethernet port to the same subnet otherwise Windows 10 will yell at you, and it just straight up wont work. With everything set, not surprising my latency times dramatically decreased as now the traffic from each camera is a direct IP connection instead of riding over a switch. It was a really big improvement that I was seeing and tells me a few things. The switch I have, the back plane speed might not have been enough to handle all the traffic on the same subnet from two camera feeds let alone 4. The 1080P performance was also dramatically improved, but still dropping frames as the Apple Ethernet adapters are only 100M and by the time you factor in overhead it's much less than that. But while it's dropping frames overall the video is acceptable. Once I get the Gigabit adapters in that issue should be solved. So now I have all 4 cameras running with latency between 30 and 60 ms per camera. Over all I'm really happy that this is moving forward with good results.
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