Looking for software to save IP security camera feed to disk

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Kulith

Limp Gawd
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Dec 13, 2009
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I have this security camera: http://www.amazon.com/Wireless-Wind...2?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1276738607&sr=8-2

What I was going to do, is install whatever software it came with on my Windows Home Server, and then save all the video feed to a shared folder on my WHS.

It didn't come with any software, it just uses a mediocre web interface. Which means I can only save the video feed from whatever computer is viewing the web page. Which means I have to have a browser window open on my server in order to save the feed to the drive.

Thats a pretty ugly solution. I'm looking for some software I can run on the server that will detect the camera and save the live feed to the drive. I've tried Active Webcam, it doesn't work with this camera. Any other ideas?

Alternatively, I was thinking about ZoneMinder, but if I understand it correctly I would have to install a linux distro as a virtual machine on the server, which doesn't let me save files to the WHS shared folders I don't think.
 
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There's a program called WebcamXP which lets you set up a security system from webcams and IP cam feeds. I haven't tried it with IP Camera feeds though.
If you did a virtual machine with Zoneminder, you could easily have it record to your WHS shares over SMB.
 
how would I go about saving something from a virtual machine on the host drives?

Also, any suggestions on a linux distro to use for this purpose?
 
Kulith said:
how would I go about saving something from a virtual machine on the host drives?
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It shouldn't be difficult to mount a shared drive from the WHS box in Linux via the virtual network.

Also, any suggestions on a linux distro to use for this purpose?
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I like Debian for any kind of server-like task, like this, and it appears ZoneMinder is packaged in the 'testing' distribution, but I have never used it, so I can't comment beyond that. Ubuntu Server may be a better choice, since running Debian testing is not always straightforward.

Are you sure your camera will work with ZoneMinder? It isn't at all clear from the product description whether it supports any of the IP camera standards or if it uses some random proprietary protocol.
 
keenan said:
Are you sure your camera will work with ZoneMinder? It isn't at all clear from the product description whether it supports any of the IP camera standards or if it uses some random proprietary protocol.
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Given that ZoneMinder is open source, I highly doubt they're using a proprietary protocol.
Here is the wiki page for supported hardware.
 
RavenD said:
Given that ZoneMinder is open source, I highly doubt they're using a proprietary protocol.
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I was talking about the camera. But it looks that it is supported.

Looks to use some fairly basic HTTP-based streaming of standard video formats. You might be able to rig up some other applications to use this as well. Might work with software designed to rip streaming video from the web, for example.
 
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RavenD said:
There's a program called WebcamXP which lets you set up a security system from webcams and IP cam feeds. I haven't tried it with IP Camera feeds though.
If you did a virtual machine with Zoneminder, you could easily have it record to your WHS shares over SMB.
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Any of these support multiple streams?

Also, what kind of disk space usage are ya looking at with this?

I have a network cam in my office I could try this on, then I got a lorex system setup that has a built in web server.

Hmmm....
 
sc0tty8 said:
Any of these support multiple streams?

Also, what kind of disk space usage are ya looking at with this?

I have a network cam in my office I could try this on, then I got a lorex system setup that has a built in web server.

Hmmm....
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I believe WebCamXP has a lite (free for home use) edition that only supports one stream, and a Pro edition that supports multiple webcam and/or IP Cam streams. They have a 60-day trial on the website. The name is also a little misleading - the newest version is designed for Win 7.
Zoneminder definitely supports multiple streams. Both should also support pulling streams from an IP Cam's built-in webserver.
 
what worries me is the zoneminder page says:
For Network Cams to work they need to be able to stream MJPEG without the requirement of activex controls. If you see the requirement for the camera calls for IE then there is a good chance it may not work.
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My camera does require activex controls in IE, but it also has a very limited option for other browsers.

Right now I have a webcamXP saving a 24/7 feed to disk. One video for every day, which is exactly what I wanted on my server. WebcamXP even automatically installed itself as a service, which is great. I'll stick with webcamXP for now and full around with a linux vm with zoneminder as I start expanding my security system.
 
WTF is up with all these camera companies and DVR companies that think ActiveX is a good idea? Then the ActiveX controls aren't signed, and Microsoft is making it more and more difficult every day to run unsigned controls. It just doesn't make sense...
 
awesomo said:
WTF is up with all these camera companies and DVR companies that think ActiveX is a good idea? Then the ActiveX controls aren't signed, and Microsoft is making it more and more difficult every day to run unsigned controls. It just doesn't make sense...
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Foscam is just a cheap Chinese company. I don't think they give a shit. I'm already regretting buying this thing, i wish I'd bought something simpler from a more reputable company, like logitech.
 
Apparently there's a firmware upgrade that exposes an HTTP GET interface to the camera controls that works in other browsers and can be leveraged by monitoring apps.
 
Kulith said:
Foscam is just a cheap Chinese company. I don't think they give a shit. I'm already regretting buying this thing, i wish I'd bought something simpler from a more reputable company, like logitech.
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I'm just saying this from experience. I have seen dvr's from speco and qsee that only give out active x and it drives me nuts every time someone asks about remote viewing on these things. It's so bad and these are expensive name brand systems used by all the sob's around here installing security camera's.
 
I used a program called Blue Iris for what it sounds like you are trying to do and worked great, had good support and was a solid program
 
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