Topics included in this article:
- Network Flow
- Bandwidth Requirements
- Bandwidth Reporting
- Variable Bitrate
- Minimize Bandwidth Consumption
- Video Delay when Streaming
- Video Streaming
- Local Recording
- Cloud Recording & Policy Events
- Offline Mode
- Helpful Links
- Contact Support or Sales
Network Flow
Figure 1.) Diagram illustrating a general network flow.
Bandwidth Requirements
The bandwidth used when live streaming a camera depends on the amount of motion and type of camera.
Camera | WAN Live Streaming Bandwidth Range |
R120 | 530Kbps - 720Kbps |
R170 | 530Kbps - 720Kbps |
R200 | 530Kbps - 720Kbps |
R230 | 530Kbps - 720Kbps |
R360 | 480Kbps - 1440Kbps |
R400 | 530Kbps - 1440Kbps |
R500 | 530Kbps - 1440Kbps |
R510 |
530Kbps - 1440Kbps |
R520 |
530Kbps - 720Kbps |
R600 |
530Kbps - 720Kbps (per image sensor) |
Audio Gateway | WAN Live Streaming Bandwidth Range |
A100 | 32Kbps - 52Kbps |
Note: This bandwidth is only taken when a camera is being actively streamed. Otherwise, the upload bandwidth consumption is 10 - 30 Kbps during regular operation for the Rhombus cameras. For the Audio gateway, the upload bandwidth consumption is 2 – 10 Kbps during normal operation. If the camera is being streamed locally, no WAN bandwidth is consumed as all streaming occurs over the LAN.
Bandwidth Reporting
Device Page
You can view the bandwidth usage of any camera by navigating to the camera, selecting the "Historical Data" tab, and scrolling down slightly.
Home Page
You can view the average camera bandwidth on the Home dashboard under "Reports."
Logs and Reports Page
Under the "Logs and Reports" tab, you can select "Bandwidth." Here you can compare different cameras and select a time range to view upload and download.
Variable Bitrate
Rhombus is committed to ensuring the lowest possible bandwidth consumption on customers' networks while maintaining the highest possible video quality. We have implemented the use of smart VBR (variable bit rate), which enables the cameras to greatly reduce bandwidth consumption when there is little change or motion in the camera field of view.
Minimize Bandwidth Consumption
Although Rhombus cameras are designed to consume as little bandwidth as possible, you may find that your cameras consume more bandwidth than anticipated. This section will cover a few ways to minimize bandwidth consumption.
Reduce AI Detections
The most effective way to minimize bandwidth consumption from your Rhombus devices is by reducing the types and amounts of AI detections enabled on your cameras. Each AI detection feature can consume a different amount of bandwidth. The chart below indicates the general level of bandwidth consumption generated by each detection.
Utilize Activity Regions
By default, AI detection features will search a camera's full FoV to identify movement events. Activity regions allow you to highlight the relevant areas of a camera's FoV to limit the AI detections to the highlighted area. If human movement detection is enabled on a camera that has a busy street in the background, an Activity Region can reduce bandwidth consumption as the camera will only search in the relevant areas within a camera's FoV.
See our article on Configuring Activity Regions for more details.
Optimize Bit Rate and Resolution
A camera's bit rate and resolution settings can significantly impact the amount of bandwidth they consume. Reducing bit rate and image resolution can help minimize bandwidth consumption.
Max bit rate and resolution settings can be adjusted within a camera's settings in the camera viewer. |
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Reduce the Number of Active Streams
Reducing the number of active streams is another great way to minimize bandwidth consumption. If multiple users view different points of footage from the same camera at the same time, that camera will produce multiple streams and, therefore, use additional bandwidth. Adjusting user permissions to ensure only the necessary users have access to historical footage will help with minimizing bandwidth consumption. See our article on Role Creation and Management for more information.
Video walls can be another source of unexpected bandwidth consumption. Video walls will pull multiple cameras' live streams into one viewer. This means that when viewing a video wall, multiple video streams will be actively using bandwidth.
Manage Cloud Upload Time
Managing when your cameras upload footage to the cloud won't change overall bandwidth consumption but can reduce the pressure on your network during high-usage times.
Note: Editing the cloud upload time will delay when footage is transferred to the cloud. Therefore, all historical footage may not be in the cloud should a camera lose power/network connection.
1. Navigate to "Settings" and select "Cloud Upload Time." |
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2. Choose to use the same upload time for all locations/cameras or customize upload times per location or camera. |
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Schedule Firmware Updates
Scheduling firmware updates outside of your normal high-usage times won't reduce overall bandwidth consumption but will reduce the pressure on your network during those times.
1. Navigate to "Settings" and select "Firmware Updates." |
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2. On this screen, you can choose when you'd like your firmware updates to take place and the duration of the updates. Note: To ensure your devices have enough time to complete an update, you must have a minimum of 8 hours of allotted time. |
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Video Delay when Streaming
Many IP camera solutions struggle with live HD video streaming. The Rhombus solution offers near real-time with an average latency of the below stats depending on where you are streaming:
< 200 milliseconds on LAN (local network streaming)
< 500 milliseconds on WAN (remote streaming)
The actual performance can vary depending on the number of cameras being streamed concurrently, the distance from those cameras, and the available bandwidth on the network.
Video Streaming
Each camera comes with an embedded microSD card which serves as the primary storage mechanism for all video data. When a user wants to view either live or past footage, it is streamed directly from the camera to the user’s viewing device. The exact mechanics vary depending on whether the viewer and the camera are on the same LAN, but there is no configuration required to make both work seamlessly. The video player automatically detects the network.
- LAN: When on any network where the private IP address of a camera is routable from a user’s laptop or mobile device (so not strictly on the same LAN), the video player will automatically stream video directly from the camera instead of going out through the internet. This means that no internet bandwidth will be consumed, and the video feed will experience extremely low latency. The connection to the camera will take place over port 8000.
- WAN: On an outside network instead of going directly to the camera, which would require ingress ports to be opened up in a firewall, video streaming is proxied through our geo-distributed Video Streaming servers. Each camera initiates and maintains a persistent connection to a server on port 443, while the video player makes its own connection to the same server. Video content is then piped between the player and camera, with the server acting as a tunnel. Bandwidth used over the WAN typically averages between 120 and 1400 Kbps depending on the camera type and resolution.
Regardless of LAN or WAN, streaming is performed over a low-level web socket connection. A custom, lightweight, binary protocol is used to control the data flow and keep data transmission as efficient as possible. While streaming live footage, our cameras automatically detect transmission speeds and will adapt the video quality based on the consumption speed of the video player.
Local Recording
On each camera, H.264 encoded video is stored in 2-second segments on the local /ext4 filesystem. The size of each segment varies substantially based on the amount of content captured. Light, movement, and area under purview are the biggest variables. These variables can cause segments to fluctuate from as small as 20 KB to as large as 500 KB.
The storage mechanism works like a circular buffer, expunging old data only when new data needs to be written. This creates a fairly constant sliding window of time available to view, typically around 15 to 45 days, depending on the storage model. Once data has expired, it is no longer available for viewing.
Cloud Recording & Policy Events
When Cloud Archiving is enabled on a camera, segments of locally stored footage are continuously sent directly to our cloud storage service (Amazon S3). Once enabled, all past footage will be streamed from the cloud unless you are connected via LAN. Viewing live footage will always be streamed directly from the camera and will prioritize a LAN connection.
Policy events are configured to intelligently upload content to the cloud where more substantial analysis can take place. Selective video clips are uploaded in 30-second blocks, finding a balance between consuming upload bandwidth and identifying activity. The camera does a first pass of analysis, further restricting uploads to only content worth analyzing. The bandwidth usage for policy events varies significantly by the amount of activity the camera detects.
Offline Mode
If a connected camera loses its internet connection (either over WiFi or ethernet), it will continue to record as long as the power is uninterrupted. Since the cameras are writing segments locally, that continues with or without network access. However, no new movement events (motion, human, vehicle, etc.) will be shown on the seek bar during this time. Once the camera comes back online, all missing events will be populated, and the video will be remotely accessible again.
If Cloud Archiving is enabled, you can view past footage online while the camera is offline. Furthermore, once the camera comes back online, the missing footage will automatically be uploaded to the cloud.
When the camera reconnects, it will auto-scan for certain ports including the NTP/123 port. This port must be open for the camera to connect to an NTP server and obtain time to re-assimilate the footage in the proper timeline. If this port is blocked or the connection is inaccessible, then the camera will not begin to record again.
Helpful Links
Contact Support or Sales
Have more questions? Contact Rhombus Support at +1 (877) 746-6797 option 2 or support@rhombus.com.
Interested in learning more? Contact Rhombus Sales at +1 (877) 746-6797 option 1 or sales@rhombus.com.
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