athlon guidance

athlon guidance

[Joe Briggs]

I am attempting to build a 16-camera surveillance system with 8
2-channel multiplexed frame-grabber channels each.. Each channel is read
at at about 5 frames per second, the image converted into JPEG and
saved, and an MPEG-1 clip made at the same time (lots of storage, yes). 
I typically use a small IDE drive for my OS, and a 2-drive RAID-0 built
with WD120JB 8-MB cache drives.  I have learned the hard way that
regular IDE RAID controllers of the Promise type loose interrupts and
result in disk corruption, whereas the 3-ware (with its SCSI-like
hardware) are reliable. There is a LOT of processing and storage going
on here, and I have had good luck on my 8-camera systems using a
GigaByte GA7VAXP with AMD2400XP processors, but average about 10% CPU
utilization for each active (detected motion, now capturing and
encoding) channel.  So when all 8 cameras are active, I sustain about
80% or more total CPU loading.  Typically never more than 5 are active
at the same time.  My question is how can I scale up to get 16 camera
channels?  I use Debian Woody 2.4.19 with Reiserfs (good job Hans!).

The fastest Athlon that I can get is a AMD3200 XP with 400 Mhz FSB. On
the other hand, I can use the Tyan 2466 Dual Athlon board, but MP
processors only have a 266 Mhz FSB and the fastest speed is the 2800
MP.  So, given the nature of the CPU and data intensive application,
which is the faster platform:  a slower 2800/266 MHZ FSB dual processor
or a single 3200/400 MHZ FSB processor? 

All suggestions and analysis welcomed.

Joe

[OT] Re: athlon guidance

[Leonard Milcin, Jr]

Joe Briggs wrote:
> MP.  So, given the nature of the CPU and data intensive application,
> which is the faster platform:  a slower 2800/266 MHZ FSB dual processor
> or a single 3200/400 MHZ FSB processor? 
> 
> All suggestions and analysis welcomed.
> 
> Joe


I think dual processor system would be a bit faster for your needs. On 
the other hand it will be cheaper to set up second or even third 
machine, and split the data channels or processing stadiums between them.


Leonard

-- 
"Unix IS user friendly... It's just selective about who its friends are."
                                                        -- Tollef Fog Heen