Homeserver advice, particularly with a view to CCTV.

[Minstadave]

Currently running a pretty shonky home NAS setup of cobbled together parts/drives running Windows Server 2016 Essentials. I only really use it as a print server/to back up the windows machines round the house/file backup for my photos. I use WHS with Drivebender and it works ok but I have a dying HDD so I've picked up some decent HDDs and considering my options.

I'm looking to add 1 or 2 CCTV cameras and was thinking that I could move towards either a Synology unit or look at using my current hardware with Xpenology/FreeNAS/Unraid. I don't have any experience with these so not sure how much work goes into geting them running.

I did try getting CCTV running with iSpy on WHS but my camera wouldn't play with it so will need new cameras as part of the upgrade.

Has anyone got any experience of the best way forwards?

 

[WJA96]

Synology Surveillance Station is excellent. If you only need a couple of cameras every Synology NAS comes with 2 licences. If you need more they start to get a bit pricey at £40-60 For each additional camera depending on the size of licence pack you buy. Alternatively, the Synology NVR-1218 comes with 4 licences for about £230 plus hard drives. Native camera support is excellent - I’ve sent them a request to add a new camera and had it added within the same working day.

Blue Iris is the classic standalone CCTV software, but it’s really only as good as Surveillance Station. And you need a decent PC to run it on, and it will be running 24/7. That’s a potentially a LOT of electricity.

QNAPs implementation of Surveillance Station is shockingly awful on the cheaper NAS’s with only ONVIF camera support available for most cameras made in the last 12-18 months. They’re unresponsive if you request new cameras to be added. And the support for motion detection, tripwires, left/missing object detection is poor as well. On the more expensive ones (£1000+) they run a different software solution called QVR Pro which is very good with decent camera support. If you’re looking for something a bit more ‘interesting’ then have a look at the QNAP QGD-1600P Guardian. It’s a pfSense firewall/router, PoE switch, NAS and NVR all in one box and it comes with 8 camera licences for QVR Pro. It’s not cheap at £700-ish but it replaces a lot of other hardware. It only takes 2 2.5” hard disks but you can add additional USB 3.1 (5Gbps) expansion chassis with 4 more 3.5” HDD bays for about £300 per chassis.

 

[Avalon]

If you think your current set-up is shonky, replacing it with a bodged pirate copy of Synology’s DSM that potentially needs patching every time they push an update isn’t really a great shout. Piracy aside, is that really the way you want to handle your data/backups? BI supports direct to disc and HW encode/decode on H264/5, combine an intel CPU with iGPU and a reasonable frame rate and your power usage can be quite modest, BI also has a lot going for it in terms of development/support vs other options.

 

[Minstadave]

If you think your current set-up is shonky, replacing it with a bodged pirate copy of Synology’s DSM that potentially needs patching every time they push an update isn’t really a great shout. Piracy aside, is that really the way you want to handle your data/backups? BI supports direct to disc and HW encode/decode on H264/5, combine an intel CPU with iGPU and a reasonable frame rate and your power usage can be quite modest, BI also has a lot going for it in terms of development/support vs other options.

Whats BI sorry? Blue Iris?

I didn't know Xpenology was piracy and bodged, I'll clearly need to do some research.

 

[Minstadave]

Synology Surveillance Station is excellent. If you only need a couple of cameras every Synology NAS comes with 2 licences. If you need more they start to get a bit pricey at £40-60 For each additional camera depending on the size of licence pack you buy. Alternatively, the Synology NVR-1218 comes with 4 licences for about £230 plus hard drives. Native camera support is excellent - I’ve sent them a request to add a new camera and had it added within the same working day.

Blue Iris is the classic standalone CCTV software, but it’s really only as good as Surveillance Station. And you need a decent PC to run it on, and it will be running 24/7. That’s a potentially a LOT of electricity.

QNAPs implementation of Surveillance Station is shockingly awful on the cheaper NAS’s with only ONVIF camera support available for most cameras made in the last 12-18 months. They’re unresponsive if you request new cameras to be added. And the support for motion detection, tripwires, left/missing object detection is poor as well. On the more expensive ones (£1000+) they run a different software solution called QVR Pro which is very good with decent camera support. If you’re looking for something a bit more ‘interesting’ then have a look at the QNAP QGD-1600P Guardian. It’s a pfSense firewall/router, PoE switch, NAS and NVR all in one box and it comes with 8 camera licences for QVR Pro. It’s not cheap at £700-ish but it replaces a lot of other hardware. It only takes 2 2.5” hard disks but you can add additional USB 3.1 (5Gbps) expansion chassis with 4 more 3.5” HDD bays for about £300 per chassis.

This is really helpful, thanks!

 

[dessimpson]

I ran XPENOLOGY for about 1 day. It was so out of date I scrapped it. Unraid I thought was overly complicated rubbish.

I bought another Synology NAS. The Surveillance Station software is really simple and easy to use. I had both camera's set up in about 5 minutes.

 

[Minstadave]

I ran XPENOLOGY for about 1 day. It was so out of date I scrapped it. Unraid I thought was overly complicated rubbish.

I bought another Synology NAS. The Surveillance Station software is really simple and easy to use. I had both camera's set up in about 5 minutes.

Yeah I think its the way to go, got some 12TB drives to shuck so think ill go for a 4 bay Synology and aa couple of cameras.

Did you use WiFi or PoE cameras?

 

[WJA96]

BI is Blue Iris.

 

[agw_01]

As someone who ran a DS212 with multiple Hikvision cameras (2 through Surveillance station, 2 recording directly via SMB), my advice would be to skip the Synology and buy an NVR.

Hikvision cameras and a low end IP NVR are not expensive, in fact probably cheaper than going down the Synology route. It all works seamlessly and the Hikvision iVMS software is superb. Not quite as straightforward to use as Surveillance Station but just as powerful.

I wanted to repurpose my DS212 as storage for additional cameras, but instead I chucked a couple of SSDs into it for some other fast storage and bought another Hikvision NVR.

 

[Minstadave]

As someone who ran a DS212 with multiple Hikvision cameras (2 through Surveillance station, 2 recording directly via SMB), my advice would be to skip the Synology and buy an NVR.

Hikvision cameras and a low end IP NVR are not expensive, in fact probably cheaper than going down the Synology route. It all works seamlessly and the Hikvision iVMS software is superb. Not quite as straightforward to use as Surveillance Station but just as powerful.

I wanted to repurpose my DS212 as storage for additional cameras, but instead I chucked a couple of SSDs into it for some other fast storage and bought another Hikvision NVR.

Thanks thats interesting. I only need 2 cameras and would prefer a single box solution so the Synology would be easier. I'll get some quotes for the cabling and see what works best, don't have any network cables currently or power in the loft so need to get that in place.

 

[agw_01]

I'm not knocking Synology btw If you will utilise some of the extra features of the Synology and only need 2 cameras, I would highly recommmend a DS as a one box solution. I've had my DS for many years and still really like it, it's incredibly feature packed and has a great UI.

If I was looking to upgrade, I would have gone for something like a DS1618 or 1819 without a hitch. It's only because I've handed most of my storage/servers off to other solutions that it became mostly reundant. As a surveillance server on its own, it doesn't make a great deal of sense especially once you start factoring in extra camera licenses.

 

[dessimpson]

The synology made sense for me. I use it for Plex, Sonarr etc too. If you've got another use for the Synology it's a no brainer. If you're only going to use it for CCTV then there are much cheaper alternatives.

 

[Minstadave]

Well the Synology 220+ came up cheap so I've gone that route for simplicity. I totally get the separate NVR route, but I needed to sort my NAS setup and I'm going to try a Eufy wireless camera setup that plays nicely with Synology. Means no wires or power to sort out and an almost single box solution. I'm sure it'll be compromised but it should do the job.

Set the Synology up this evening with 2x12TB drives and it's very slick. Got it syncing my files over currently then backing them up to Onedrive without any fuss. Will pop the cameras up tomorrow and get everything linked up.

 

[HungryHippos]

Well the Synology 220+ came up cheap so I've gone that route for simplicity. I totally get the separate NVR route, but I needed to sort my NAS setup and I'm going to try a Eufy wireless camera setup that plays nicely with Synology. Means no wires or power to sort out and an almost single box solution. I'm sure it'll be compromised but it should do the job.

Set the Synology up this evening with 2x12TB drives and it's very slick. Got it syncing my files over currently then backing them up to Onedrive without any fuss. Will pop the cameras up tomorrow and get everything linked up.

What cameras did you use? I have a Synology interested in adding some for CCTV on my property

 

[Minstadave]

Went for a Eufy setup with two EufyCam 2s. Pretty slick setup for a WiFi setup.

https://www.eufylife.com/uk/product...ZZJrEtni4qPtri0GBlVTosAnMnIXKY0hoCDi4QAvD_BwE

Daytime performance is excellent, motion detection is solid, night time is less good. Would like a bit more resolution perhaps, 1080P is a bit sub par. They have a EufyCam 2 Pro coming out which I might add in future.

 

[HungryHippos]

Went for a Eufy setup with two EufyCam 2s. Pretty slick setup for a WiFi setup.

Looks like it needs a basestation thing, how does that work with the Synology?

 

[Minstadave]

Looks like it needs a basestation thing, how does that work with the Synology?

The base station is tiny and acts as a wifi extender to the cams. I think it has to be present. Once you've paired the cams with the base station you can set up RTSP for each camera and use the address in gives you to link to the Synology.

 

[sk.]

Hi all! Am new here so sorry if I’ve posted this in the wrong place. I’m looking for a local storage cctv just because I don’t trust the cloud with all these hacked camera stories you hear. Can anyone suggest one? Hopefully not too expensive and can be used outdoors and relatively easy to install. Thanks!

 

[WJA96]

What cameras did you use? I have a Synology interested in adding some for CCTV on my property

The list of cameras supported by Surveillance Station is very extensive. Nearly 8000 different types.

https://www.synology.com/en-uk/compatibility/camera

And it supports ONVIF and RTSP so in reality you can use any camera you want.

 

[WJA96]

Hi all! Am new here so sorry if I’ve posted this in the wrong place. I’m looking for a local storage cctv just because I don’t trust the cloud with all these hacked camera stories you hear. Can anyone suggest one? Hopefully not too expensive and can be used outdoors and relatively easy to install. Thanks!

The easiest possible cameras I've seen recently are the Reolink Argus range. You literally charge the battery and stick them on the wall. And you can get a range of recorders from Reolink, Synology or QNAP if you want local storage.

With regard to hacking cameras, everything and anything can be hacked. They hacked the Pentagon. If they can hack the Pentagon, they can EASILY hack you. So just don't put any cameras anywhere you wouldn't want people seeing stuff. Like your bedroom. Or your child's bedroom. Outside I can't really see what difference it makes unless you like to dance around the garden naked at the Summer Solstice or something like that...