EX Series - Common Questions » EX-HR Specific Issues

What is the difference between the EX series HR & SR versions? Do I need a much more powerful computer to run HR? (high resolution)?

There are two main differences between the two models.

1)  The HR series uses a different video compression method, hardware-based MPEG, while the SR uses a software-based method. This makes it more efficient than the SR series at processing video data, as some of the processing power needed is derived from the capture card, not the CPU.

2)  Because of the hardware-based compression on the capture card, the HR series can capture video at a much higher optical resolution than the SR (704x480 pixels on the HR, versus 320x240 on the SR). While this is four times the SR resolution - which means four time the image quality - it also can mean that up to four times as much data is recorded, which in turn requires four times as much processing power; the downside is that while the HR can capture 30fps per camera in standard resolution (which is slightly higher than the SR model), it can only capture about 7-9fps per high resolution channel. Fortunately, 7-9fps is more than enough for most surveillance applications and the image quality often makes up for a lack of high recording frame rates.

While you do not "need" a more powerful computer to run HR, the better the base computer system, the better the DVR will perform, especially if  the system is supporting very large hard drives. Generally speaking, a decent processor (2.0 GHz or better) and lots of RAM (512MB or more) will provide excellent performance under "normal" conditions; if the DVR has large and/or several data drives, or supports several network connections, or is used for a lot of interactive searching while recording, then a faster processor and more RAM is recommended.

Last update: 2004-09-10 09:41
Author: Scott Neily

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