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I have noticed that when i run SecuritySpy that it uses more resources than Firefox (which is a memory hog) and if i have anything else running the fan kicks in on high.
I am wondering if something is awry.
I am wondering if something is awry.
Comments
In another thread Ben linked this about Optimising Performance: http://www.bensoftware.com/securityspy/manual/#performance
to which the only thing I could add, is double-check the "Setup" tab of camera configuration, and if any transformations, or text overlays are used, turn them off in Security Spy, and do them on the camera itself. (This means the camera does the work, not the computer)
The machine I have is an iMac Retina 4K, one of those self contained, sealed up tighter than Tupperware, machine. No option of adding more memory. 8G of Ram. Maybe the next computer, I can get one with a boat load of memory and this won't be an issue.
Seems the CPU runs hot, but I have fans on the back of the unit adding cooling.
Lets see what happens after the upgrade
If you aren't familiar with Activity Monitor (in the Utility folder) it will show things like CPU, Memory - which can be sorted to show the most demanding in each area - Energy hopefully includes GPU usage as well - that might give the biggest clue to what is actually using the most system resources - in my case Security Spy (in Energy this automatically includes the sub processes of VTDecoder) uses about "30" on average. - for me Chrome averages about 3-4 times as much Energy Impact, everything else uses much less.
There likely won't be much of a change from Sierra (10.12) in this regard - certain things take certain amounts of processing which generates heat.
In the case of your iMac, it isn't how its sealed that is the issue with not adding more ram, it's apple's tendency of late to Solder the ram to the mainboard - it isn't in sockets like they used to use - only the Mac Pro and iMac 27" have sockets now, all others are soldered ram.
If your fan speeds fluctuate (it goes faster up for a little bit, then slows down - and repeats) then there is other software out there that can set a higher minimum speed for the fans so the CPU stays cooler (it can still go faster if it needs to, but just has a higher minimum) I use one on my Mac mini 2012 quad i7 - a 3300 rpm minimum speed works for most of the general use I do - the iMac would need a different minimum - the internals are completely different from the Mac mini I have. If the fan speeds are relatively constant, then don't worry about it.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/f4ykvjsse9dvuee/Screen Shot 2016-12-07 at 12.15.37 PM.png?dl=0
This issue started immediately after upgrading to Security Spy 4. SP3 ran at about 60% on one CPU. This software has become unusable for long term monitoring. My only recourse right now is to write a script to kill VTDecoder every 12 hours. PLEASE address this issue!!
Joe
So that I can roughly tell what is a reasonable amount of CPU usage required for the decoding task, could you tell me how many cameras you are using, at what frame rate and resolution? Are they all supplying H.264 video to SecuritySpy, or are some cameras supplying JPEG or MPEG-4 format video?
My Mac is as follows,
Mac Pro Mid 2010
1 Processor @ 3.46Ghz Xeon with 6 cores, 12 threads
16GB DDR3 1333Mhz ECC Ram
macOS 10.12.1 Server
AMD RX 480 8GB driving a Dell P2715Q 4k display
Genuine Apple Radeon HD 5770 1GB Driving a Dell E2414H Full HD display
14.5TB of active storage
Boot drive 500GB Crucial SSD (CT500BX100SSD1)
SecuritySpy Storage - Was the boot drive during this prop, but now swapped over to a 1TB partition in one of my ST3000DM001-1CH166 drives.
FYI, I currently have 5 cameras active with FPS set to 8fps max!
So here is my setup. I have 6 cameras. All HikVision DS-2CD2432F-IW. They are all set to a 10 FPS max capture rate on camera. Here are the video stream specs...
1280x720
Variable Bitrate
Quality High
10 FPS Max capture
2 Mbps H.264 Main Profile
I Frame every 10 frames
They are all connected via Wifi via 2 different WAPs on opposite sides of my building.
Common network throughput to me is about 300 to 500 KBps for all 6 camera's streams combined.
I will say that I installed the 4.0.10 yesterday as I was once again troubleshooting this issue and it has seemed to stabilize for me over the past 24 hours. VTDecoder is so far remaining low at only about 20% CPU usage. This has happened before where it seems fixed and low for a couple days then goes sky high again. But so far so good. I will certainly download the beta in a couple days if it spikes again. I just don't have time to spend on it right now today, and... so far so good for me. So, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, as they say.
Thanks for the response!!
Is it possible the increase in CPU usage has something to do with me turning off my monitor? Could this somehow disable some sort of GPU acceleration causing the CPU to take over?
As I said, 4.0.10 is much much better. I will try the 11beta next week if I get a high CPU spike again.
That's my 2¢.
Joe
Thanks for the feedback. it would be useful if you could try the beta version linked to above, hopefully it will be even better than 4.0.10.
Turning off or unplugging the monitor may have an effect here. The hardware-acceleration video processing is done in the graphics hardware (the GPU), so if this gets turned off then it will have a big impact on the CPU usage of the decoding process. Instead of turning off the monitor, I suggest you set a short "Display sleep" time in the Energy Saver system preference, and simply let your monitor sleep automatically after a few minutes. It would be interesting to hear back from you if this change results in a reduction of the CPU usage or not.
BTW This morning before trying out this beta version I was over 1,000% CPU
There's a new beta version available so please continue your testing with this new one.
I run the latest SecuritySpy software and on the Apple I run latest update of Yosemite.
Note that the frame rate will make a BIG difference and I run 10 fps and 640 resolution on three and 1 camera on 720P.
Christer
1 Camera @ 4fps
3 Cameras @ 8fps
I have been doing further testing on my system still using 4.0.10 and may have found something that is at least a correlation if not a causation. I noticed that during the day as I am using my system SecuritySpy (and by extension VTDecoder) sits at relatively low CPU usage, but on days when I have been out of the office the CPU usage spikes. I had set my displays to never sleep BUT I had not turned off the Screen Saver. So I disabled the Screen Saver and since then the CPU usage has been very low for me. Weeks worth of use with it rarely exceeding 150% CPU. Nothing else has drastically changed on my system. I have done all updates to macOS up to 10.12.2 but even before the latest updates the CPU usage had remained very low.
So anyway, not sure this will help anyone else, but at least for me the issue has nearly stopped altogether.
@MacAssemble, I see your frame rates are very low. I had my camera frame rates set very low in the past and noticed it actually made SecuritySpy (v3 at that point) very unstable. I was always dropping connections to my camera and SecuritySpy would crash. I increased my frame rate to 10 fps and those issues largely went away and it didn't really increase overall bandwidth on my network. Purely anecdotal, but again it worked for me, but that could be related to my camera hardware not SecuritySpy itself.
Thanks all! Good luck!
Joe
Jay