Synology Surveillance Station Licenses vs NVR?

furyou on 13/04/2023 - 23:45
Last edited 14/04/2023 - 22:43

I'm a bit stuck. I have a nas w/ 2 Licenses. I'm planning 4 reolink cams.
I also found one of my internal cams support Synology Surveillance Station, tho it's not so important.

For just the 2 extra Licenses for the reolink, it'd be 160-180ish?
A reolink nvr has 8+ch for 300ish - tho I don't know how the software is vs the Surveillance Station

And possibly other brand nvr for less?

I'm keeping SD cards in the cams - event only, running off a poe switch, as per reddit suggestions.

What do you think, Licenses vs NVR?

And really, what does either of these add over just using the cams by themselves? Apart from having storage away from the unit as a backup.

Electrical & Electronics Security System Synology

Comments

  • jv on 14/04/2023 - 01:39

    NVR

  • srsparky on 14/04/2023 - 08:40

    I was in the same dilemma. However after a couple of cameras, the nvr is a cheaper option. I went with the 36 channel, just because it was cheaper and i had some surveillance hard drives laying around.

    • furyou on 14/04/2023 - 10:08

      What brand of nvr did you get? I know my old DVR has a crappy Chinese interface and I guess the no brand nvr the same. Since I am not plugging the cameras in directly I can use the reolink app for the camera featurs so the end-of-year would only be for the long-term storage.

  • SBOB on 14/04/2023 - 10:29

    Cheap refurb ex office dell/HP/etc + blueiris.
    That's what I did, migrating away from the surveillance software in my qnap.

    • furyou on 14/04/2023 - 10:55

      Blueiris I only looked at briefly but it needs its own licence and a bit of configuration right?

      • SBOB on 14/04/2023 - 11:21

        Yep, it does. Plenty of guides online, and total price still likely works out about the same or less than an NVR, and has way more configuration possibilities and upgrade options

  • bdl on 14/04/2023 - 13:43

    This one has the 2tb drive https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32967669961.html

    • furyou on 14/04/2023 - 14:21

      That one's weird. It both says suport 5mp, and not 4k, and also that it does 4k.
      I think that one has some limitation on some 4k feature, but I can't find it anymore.

  • jizmo on 15/04/2023 - 19:52

    I bought 5 qnap life time licenses $50 USD each around 2015. I'm kind of retiring the nas and bought a cheap 32 channel with 4TB drive.
    I can honestly say the same cameras on surveillance station Qnap are clearer than the cheap $70 USD 32 channel NVR.
    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32873072623.html?spm=a2g0o.o…

    You can clearly see a cars number plate on Qnap, the 32 you can't tell a 3 from an 8 or a B from a D and some of the PTZ cams keep going out of focus.

    The Qnap is an old J1900 with 8g ram runs 7 cams easy. I tried running Blue iris on an old i5 4200m laptop but it ran at 100% and was over heating Maybe because it can't decode H265 but the Qnap J1900 can't either but locked the cams at H264 and uses little cpu.

    From what I read 2 years ago they don't want to support Surveillance station and are trying to get everyone over to the annual fees on the new apps

    • furyou on 15/04/2023 - 20:13

      That's interesting. Do you get to choose encoding rate in the nvr? I wonder if it's because cheap Chinese stuff fake their resolutions. Eg I got a "fhd camera" and the recordings are 640x480.
      But I guess I'll keep to branded stuff then.

      • jizmo on 15/04/2023 - 20:47

        There's 3 camera settings or some have 2 you might be viewing the 2nd or the lower quality by default and need to change to the first.
        I am using the same cameras from the Qnap I've only pulled the cable out and stuck it into the cheap NVR and noticed the difference in recording quality
        Just looking at my cheap NVR it's using Novatech chipsets the same as the higher end brands end use, maybe the software isn't as good.
        Saying that the Qnap is in 264 and uses 4x more data than the cheapy's in 265 maybe that makes a difference.
        A friend came saw it and loved it on my 75" TV, but you still can't read a number plate from 20-30 meters away which makes any good picture useless where the Surveillance station app can.

        • DoctorCalculon on 11/05/2023 - 12:00

          where the Surveillance station app can.

          In terms of a dedicated surveillance station, would QNAP be better than Synology, or just go with the cheapest?

          Synology 4-bay costs $4K.
          Then add cost of license (~ $100) per camera.

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