How to Deploy an Outdoor Surveillance Solution

When implementing a video surveillance project in a residential neighborhood, several important points must be taken into account in order to successfully deploy our solution.

On this article, AirLive will be explaining the issues related to the bandwidth needed for each camera.

Each viewpoint needs to be allocated the “right” air borne space to be effectivelly transmitted from the client to the monitoring center. This is determined by calculations that must be kept in mind for this kind of developments::

According to the compression methods, the values ​​in the table are the exact numbers. In this regard, it should be noted the difference between H.264 and MPEG-4, since this pattern compresses much better than the MPEG-4. Based on these specifications, then we have a real idea of the bandwidth required for each camera.

Alternatively,  the user can also get his own calculations by means of AirLive application that can be accessed on the following link: http://fs.airlive.com/firmware /NVR_DiskCalculator.zip

There are several factors that influence the calculation:

1) Resolution of each camera

2) Frames per Second (FPS)

3) Compression Method

Importance: if the camera supports H.264 compression, it is recommended to use it because it is a more advanced method for video compression. Below is a comparison chart of compression methods:

After this first step, you have determined the actual bandwidth required and the amount of each camera, but then another key point to be considered is the calculation of the WiFi connection According to the mode of operation, we get a different throughput. Here's an example (based AirMax5N)

These statistics are essential to calculate the maximum bandwidth that is available from a link as their distances and modes of operation. This is the calculation to be done:

- Number of cameras in possible link = (Throughput available x 50%) / bandwidth needed for each camera

Example

- Throughput of link Static Turbo mode within 1 km: 45 Mbps
- Bandwidth required for each 1 Megapixel camera with 30 FPS: 4.18 mbps

- Number of cameras in possible link = (45 x 50 mbps%) / 4.18 mbps = 5 cameras

Throughput is obtained from the above table, the required bandwidth of each camera, through  the AirLive NVR Disk Calculator. Finally, the factor 50% is always used in the link between two computers as a buffer space to cover  events that might affect and reduce the performace of the link (for instance weather conditions).

Now with all these values in hand, it ​​is possible to install an outdoor surveillance project in a more effective manner, no matter if it is a point-to-point or a point-multipoint deployment.