Looking for good card to replace legacy DVR

[unixgreybeard]

Hi, I work at a place that has gone through a couple Hikvision 7332 turbos because we have a ton of HD-TVI cameras set up we don't want to have to replace. I am wondering if there are any HD-TVI video capture cards available, so we can at least move up to a VMS like ZoneMinder? The 7332s are pretty long in the tooth.

Also, the only card I know about that seems relevant for doing analog/BNC cameras is the 878A, but I'm not even sure if it's TVI-compatible - what card would be the best fit for an HD-TVI camera? Ours are mainly cheap Hikvision knock-offs, some are capable of different formats (CVBS, etc.) but not without losing image quality, even if possible.

Thanks for your help,
Avery

[mikb]

The BT878 chipset is from an era where analogue video meant "up to SD". That is e.g. NTSC at 720x480 and PAL at 756x480 or 744x576, 720x576 ... that about maxxes out the capabilities.

From what I can see TVI-HD is 720p/1080p and higher analogue, which requires capture cards that can go that extra speed. The timings, for a start, are likely to be faster than broadcast TV (horizontal/vertical). It's a non-standard (or, "new" standard) designed to solve the problem that PAL/NTSC timings are just too limiting.

I'd look elsewhere for ways to ingest the video feeds. Possibly more modern kit that can convert HD-TVI analogue feeds to an IP (network) feed, and then treat the cameras as IP cameras.

[iconnor]

You can get really cheap single BNC to net dongles. You'd need one per camera, but can likely find what you need.

Any of those old analog chipsets are really unsupported these days, The drivers are still in the kernel but don't seem to work anymore.

[unixgreybeard]

Awesome, thanks for the info. Any suggestions on HD-TVI to network cards? What about using DVRs for a converter? I've noticed the Hikvision 7332 DVR we have shows up as a 4-ch "camera" device if I search the network for cameras in Milestone.... I'll have to try it just to see what happens. Thanks

[unixgreybeard]

You guys are talking about these things, right?

https://www.amazon.com/EAGLEWATCH-Conve ... B0BWYBDFBY

Also came across this, any opinions?


https://www.cctvcamerapros.com/Geovisio ... vs2800.htm

Tangentially: Any way to resize images using the bbcode on this forum? Sorry they're so huge.

[mikb]

You guys are talking about these things, right?

Be very careful here. Just because it has a "network" plug, doesn't make it a network device.

Network cabling (Structured Cat-5 Cat-6) is very useful stuff and has many uses, so solutions exist to re-purpose it.

Those things you show are (I think!) for extending an ANALOG co-ax video link and power over long distances via existing CAT-5/6 cabling. They will NOT convert your analogue HD video from the TVI-HD into anything you can connect to the computer/network. They are passive devices designed to match an unbalanced coax feed to a balanced twisted pair. Additionally they piggyback DC power in the other direction. They are not converters in any sense of the word. They will just allow you to use CAT-5 instead of coax to connect the cameras back to your existing DVR machine.

What you really need is something that can input an analogue TVI-HD signal and digitally sample it, convert it to an MP4/H265/JPEG etc. stream and then present that as a web-accessible IP-Video stream that you could view in a browser, VLC, ZoneMinder etc. and they are not cheap.

[iconnor]

Hikvision dvrs work ok. One of my clients uses them with ZM as the frontend. PTZ even works through it.

[unixgreybeard]

That's pretty awesome re: hikvision as a transceiver, thanks for weighing in.

As far as the balun adapters, can ZoneMinder use an HD-TVI feed from the cameras directly? The Hikvision Turbo allows 720p at 15fps after either 8 or 16 cameras, but they're all capable of 1080p/30fps, so if we could better utilize them (potentially) with the monster server ZM would be running on, that'd be pretty nice...

I guess I'll search the forums to see if I can clarify, and open a new thread if necessary now that I have more ideas. Thanks, everybody.

[unixgreybeard]

You guys are talking about these things, right?

Be very careful here. Just because it has a "network" plug, doesn't make it a network device.
. . .
What you really need is something that can input an analogue TVI-HD signal and digitally sample it, convert it to an MP4/H265/JPEG etc. stream and then present that as a web-accessible IP-Video stream that you could view in a browser, VLC, ZoneMinder etc. and they are not cheap.

Thanks for the thoughtful clarification - it does appear to someone without any experience with these (aka, me) that you'd be able to plug these into the network and see camera output like an IP cam, but that makes perfect sense they're just for longer runs, cabling flexibility, etc. I wonder how many people buy them without realizing.

There are BNC to HDMI converters that can do one camera at a time, but then the issue becomes digitizing the HDMI output, and at around $12 ea, would be expensive for 32 cameras. If for some reason I'm missing the potential relevance of this solution, please let me know.

On the other hand, all sorts of $50ish 8ch DVRs are listed on ebay, but nailing the specs down might be an issue. Do the sellers even know how they present via ONVIF, or is documentation adequate enough to describe it? Here's one example where I messaged the seller - I don't even see a model number printed anywhere to look up docs: https://www.ebay.com/itm/226098656703 Gotta love the "textbook robber" pic of a dude in a balaclava

The Hikvision appears as either a 4 or 8-channel (can't remember) ONVIF source to other NVR software I've used, even though it's 32 channels, so we could use lower-input DVRs solely for converting HD-TVI signals to digital streams. But only if I can find DVRs that produce 1:1 DV streams to camera inputs, super cheap.

This has been kind of a headache, but at least I'm getting somewhere...

[mikb]

I wonder how many people buy them without realizing.

I would suspect people do get caught out. A similar pitfall occurred on the transition from PS/2 (4 pin minidin) mice/keyboard to USB mice/keyboards. The two interfaces are totally different, at first glance. However ...

Some of the newer USB mice had a "compability mode" where they were able to, with the correct _dumb adapter_ be used as a PS/2 mouse on an older system. The adapter was literally a USB and 4-pin minidin, wired to pass +5v and 0v on the right pins, and the "clock and data" wires of PS/2 into the "data+ and data-" of USB. The adapters were nothing of any use APART from the physical connector change. All the smarts was in the mouse.

This doesn't stop people selling that very adapter as "USB to PS/2" converter. Which it is. Kinda. But it won't help you at all if you have a PS/2 mouse (which knew nothing about USB) or a USB mouse that was just a no-frills-USB-only mouse that couldn't go into emulation mode. "Hmmm, I'm connected to something, it won't talk USB on the differential pair, let's try talking PS/2 serial instead? Ah hello!"

I've got a Line-6 POD guitar effects unit. It's got an RJ45 8P8C "network" connector on the back. You can guess from the context that it would not be expecting to be plugged into my network, it has no clue about networking. That's for connecting an external footboard for switches/LEDs/Wah-pedal ... they just used a convenient connector with no implied meaning beyond that. 48v Power-Over-Ethernet up _that_ wouldn't be fun.

... can ZoneMinder use an HD-TVI feed from the cameras directly?

Taking the question literally, no. Zoneminder is software, it can't do anything without a) the right hardware and b) kernel/driver support.

So, if you have a reasonably standards compliant IP-Camera (JPG, MJPG, x264/265 etc.) then hardware is "your existing network card" and kernel/driver is "comes with Linux!"

If you have an analogue PAL/NTSC SD camera setup then the hardware is e.g. BT848 PCI cards (BNC/Phono/Composite/SVideo) and software is BTTV driver, which presents it as /dev/video. Similar for USB analogue capture dongles, although these are external not internal.

Higher resolution analogue, so-called "HD" analogue would need better (faster) chips than the BT848 series, which are SD only.

I don't know about HDMI capturing, I've never needed to do that, but solutions must exist as people use various methods to get HDMI out from cameras etc. into OBSstudio for streaming/YouTubing on Linux.

If you can get the camera's actual hardware output, in whatever format, into an IP stream _or_ into a Linux supported capture hardware, then you should be able to get Zoneminder to do the next step of the job.

.... but nailing the specs down might be an issue. Do the sellers even know how they present ...

A good chance they don't know. The presence of a network port is a good sign. But it doesn't guarantee anything, e.g. "no that's only there to access a web configurator, or to access files that have BEEN recorded by the DVR internally. Live streams? Dunno..." so you need to search. Either search for that model number + other people's projects using/abusing the DVR as a capture device. Or, try and find the manual online and have a good read through it. Many items I've considered buying have been squashed at that stage, because it doesn't do something important!!

If there's no model number, and the seller has no idea, then you are on your own on that one. Also, returning it because "It does work, but doesn't do what I wanted, although you never confirmed it would!" isn't going to be easy ...