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[acellier]

Can the camera support multiple destinations simultaneously?
In testing set-up for ftp and email, while observing results in a browser on the Mac, and also MyDlink app on an iPad, I observe that a few jpegs get sent to email, a few to ftp, and MyDlink keeps "timing out". My Mac is wired gigabit ethernet to the router, and the wireless LAN is 802.11n.
Maybe it can't handle multiple destinations?
Does MyDlink cause continued transmissions at the video frame rate set in the setup panel, even if no one is connected to look??
...Al

[JavaLawyer]

That raises the age old question, if a tree falls in the woods and there's nobody around to hear it, does it make a sound? In actuality, the DCS-930L doesn't transmit any streaming video unless the data is pulled from another source.

Does your MAC timeout after 60 seconds? If so, this is an issue that many people are experiencing that is related to the UpNP settings (and is not related to the DCS-930L's ability to multi-task). See this thread: http://forums.dlink.com/index.php?topic=38136.0

And yes, the DCS-930L can be viewed in multiple locations.

[acellier]

    Philosophy aside, I am getting very inconsistent results so far in having the DCS-930L send (upon motion capture) jpegs to my router-hosted USB flash memory, while trying to monitor what is going on via browser in the Mac.
    The router+USB hookup has flawlessly handled GB+ sized transmissions over the web (folders of photos), so it seems that part of the link is working properly. The router is set to give the camera a static IP; the camera set to accept the router's DHCP service. My DCS-930L firmware is v1.00 - perhaps I should update? Camera setting selections for ftp are "Enable uploading ...", "motion detection", and "Date/Time Suffix", with "Creat Subfolder" hourly. The video is set to 15 fps currently, but results seem to be as bad no matter how I set it. I notice that the data rate readout on the mydlink mobile app seems not to track the fps setting.
    I've been using the Stainless.app as an auxiliary browser, but looking at some camera page source, I see that there is coded-in reference to certain specific [MS-centric] browsers! This may explain why the browser often reports incorrect page names in the tabs, such as xxxx/wizard.htm in the tab while the address bar is set at xxxx/jview.htm for live video. Other strange things - I have observed the time readout in the "Status" panel incrementing, while unable to get video from ip/video.cgi in another tab; and at the same time a connected-device sensor (WakeOnLan.app) thinks the camera IP address is disconnected. A seemingly impossible contradiction.
    I don't think I have the one-minute problem; perhaps the seemingly random dropouts via mydlink to the mobile device are a separate issue, since that is a stream via mydlink's server vs. the virtually local storage triggered by occasional action of the motion detector.
    I am wondering why you believe that the camera can handle multiple requests - is this documented? There must be some limits imposed by the tiny processor in the camera.

[JavaLawyer]

To view the direct video feed in a browser, you need to use: http://IP_ADDRESS_OF_CAMERA/mjpeg.cgi

I've viewed as many as 4 concurrent local video streams from my single DCS-932L (essentially the same camera except with night vision) using http://IP_ADDRESS_OF_CAMERA/mjpeg. The bandwidth for each local stream is over 1 Mbps, which is substantially greater than the mydlink feed. The total throughput measured ~5 Mbps.

[acellier]

My xxxx = http://IP_ADDRESS_OF_CAMERA/ - I was just abbreviating.

There are multiple addresses that work to give the video feed -
jview.htm  gives the "live video" page
/mjpeg.cgi, video.cgi and image/jpeg.cgi  all work as well
I think there are a couple more, but I can't find the notes.

[JavaLawyer]

My xxxx = http://IP_ADDRESS_OF_CAMERA/ - I was just abbreviating.

I know you were abbreviating (I was simply copy/pasting the "http://IP.." string from another one of my posts). From my initial reading your post I thought you were saying that "video.cgi" wasn't working for you, and I knew that mjpeg.cgi does work. I've found that not all of the common feed extensions worked with the DCS.

Expanding on my prior post, I effectively instantiated four streams, two in IE and two in FireFox. Using DU Meter, I measured the throughput at a bit over 5 Mbps. The FPS was set at 15 and image size maxed out.

The firmware update contains a Word doc with release notes, so you can see what you're potentially getting into before committing.

[acellier]

    I'm glad to hear that your camera is able to support that smoothly, mine is not. What firmware are you using?
    Question, if DU Meter is running in your computer, I assume that it cannot measure traffic from camera to internet (which bypasses computer)? On the Mac, I have MenuMeters which displays the computer's i/o data rates - but the router has only cumulative packet and byte counts.
    I've been measuring ping times - if I make NO video demands on the camera, it averages about 200 ms (reasonable). But when Firefox has one tab viewing live video (xxxx/jview.htm; frame rate set for 5 or 1 fps), ping goes to about 2000 ms average, with frequent timeouts where it misses a ping completely. Watching the time readout, it misses updating sometimes by a several seconds (correspondingly, all picture movement is frozen). So it seems to me that this camera is not even able to take care of one stream.
    Disabling motion detection brings the ping time average to about 100-150 ms (highly variable, but with some really low numbers now).There are still halts in the time readout, and occasional longer ping times. Sure looks like an overloaded processor to me!

[JavaLawyer]

DU Meter (a GREAT application by the way - www.dumeter.com) runs on the client PC and measures inbound/outbound traffic on that one PC. That said, the four instances of the video stream were all instantiated on one PC (two browsers). So the total throughput was the camera inbound traffic + other overhead.

This weekend I'll perform some ping tests under different scenarios and post anything noteworthy.

[acellier]

I am seeing those excessively long ping times more rarely since updating the firmware on the 930L. Mac "Network Utility.app" usually reads 150-250 ms, but still gets a timeout maybe 1 or 2 times out of 12. I don't know what the program's timeout allowance is - I have seen readings up to 6 or 8 seconds, before the firmware update.
The 932L seems more consistently fast, times often just 1 to 2 ms (with the odd 5 ms) and hardly ever a timeout.

[JavaLawyer]

I performed some ping tests on a DCS-932L this evening:

• No video demands: average 8 ms
• 1 night vision (b/w) video stream: average 62 ms
• 2 night vision (b/w) video streams: average 120 ms
• 3 night vision (b/w) video streams: average 154 ms

[acellier]

@ javalawyer - you are referring to a DCS-932L with those numbers, not a DCS-930L.
I suggest that you amend the post so people won't be misled! Thanks.

[JavaLawyer]

Camera model number Amended...

I have to conduct some tests in color as the DCS-930L is only in color and the DCS-932L uses B/W for night vision. This fact will clearly skew the response times for night-mode only tests in favor of the DCS-932L. However, this setting does not account for the relatively lower response times when the camera is idle (i.e. no stream demands).

[JavaLawyer]

This discussion got me thinking. . .

For argument's sake, if three individuals login to the same mydlink account to view the same camera, I would presume mydlink pulls one stream and distributes the data to all available users (as opposed to 3 individual streams for 3 users making direct requests from the camera IP address). Has anyone validated or refuted this theory through bandwidth monitoring?

[acellier]

    Answering (partly) my original question,  I found this at   http://mydlink.com/faq/DCS930L      –––
15. How many computers can view a camera's Live Video at the same time?
    "Each camera supports up to 10 simultaneous viewers total for both local and remote PCs.
    If your camera is connected to a router that does not support UPnP, only 3 viewers will be able to view the camera’s Live Video remotely."

 

[JavaLawyer]

    Answering (partly) my original question,  I found this at   http://mydlink.com/faq/DCS930L      –––
15. How many computers can view a camera's Live Video at the same time?
    "Each camera supports up to 10 simultaneous viewers total for both local and remote PCs.
    If your camera is connected to a router that does not support UPnP, only 3 viewers will be able to view the camera’s Live Video remotely."

This information leads me to believe that multiple streams are pulled for each stream request through mydlink, answering my prior post.