TechnicalThe estimated reading time is 3 minutes

6 Ways How to Calculate Storage Capacity For CCTV Security Camera System Online

January 18, 2021 0

Table of Contents

6 Ways to Calculate Storage Capacity For CCTV Security Camera System

There are too many ways to calculate the required storage capacity for the security camera system – and you don’t have to go through them anymore. What we’re doing this time is plain and simple so anyone can do it with no experience. We’re going through tools that you can use to estimate the required hard drive or microSD card capacity for your future CCTV system.

Initially you have 3 options to go with:

MicroSD card, if supported by your camera;
Hard Drive plus Video Recorder bundle;
Subscription-based Cloud Video Storage;
There’s also an option to store footage on your PC, but it isn’t a common one so we skip it.

And we’re focusing on the MicroSD and Hard Drive options – the solution is universal and applicable to both.

So what we do? We use the Manufacturers’ Tools, of those who produce devices for data storing

Western Digital
Kingston
Transcend
Samsung
Seagate
Panasonic

And then we have cameras manufacturers:

Hikvision;
Dahua;
Axis;
Uniview and et cetera.

Online Tools

The first line is the tools available online, here are the links:

Western Digital: MicroSD

Who produce HDD’s, SanDisk microSD’s and the tools for them are different respectively. The first is card capacity calculator, and the second is storage capacity calculator, implying the hard drive. Yep, we need to fill a form. Your next step is to find a datasheet with your camera’s specs. You can easily do that by just searching the web for your camera’s model name.

Here’s the example with my IMOU Cue 2, so I input its data in the form. My IMOU Cue 2 supports H.265 compression rate, leaving “medium” in video quality, scene activity also would be “medium”. I actually want to know how long will it hold with continuous type of recording 24 / 7 days a week. Resolution – my cam is 2 MP 1080p, and it records in 24FPS.

And it’s 7 days of continuous recording, 128 gigabytes, exactly what I need. Also see the number when I switch to older compression codec. It makes the number increase in 2 times. I mean it is so important to pay attention to the compression technology when purchasing a camera. Select newer H.265 instead of older H.264 – the difference is literally enormous.

Western Digital: HDD

Now for the hard drive and video recorder option. Western Digital HDD estimator. I’m inputting one camera, 7 days to store, 24 h. per daym H.265 compression, 4 megapixels resolution this time, with medium quality and scene activity, 24 frames per second, and getting just an incredible outcome – 233 GB.

Now let’s find out what we will get with 30 days recording.. and it’s not even a terabyte! Now you can play with these tools, select different parameters, there’s really not much of them, but it still can fit in your case.

Seagate Storage Calculator

Although, if Western Digital doesn’t suit you for some reason – here is a brief description of all other tools that you can use for free too. Seagate, a major storing devices manufacturer too, and I pretty much like their tool. Here you’ve got a very similar form, pretty flexible, but not really.

Panasonic

Next up it’s Panasonic’s, that offer a very simple one, yet pretty good estimator. Quantity, resolution, compression, kb/s rate, which is around 4096 for 4 megapixel camera, standard 24 FPS, moderate motion in 50%, though it actually won’t affect it much, but let it be. 30 days, and here’s our number – 660 Gigabytes. What I like about this one in particular is that you input the data manually.

Hikvision

And we have come to video surveillance manufacturers. We begin with Hikvision. What’s awesome about this one is that it is assumed that you are calculating your entire project. And yet it’s made very simple. Creating the channel 1 here and setting the parameters for it: encoding is H.265 for me, resolution is 4MP 1440p, 25FPS, and 4096 bitrate. Now lower here my drive’s capacity is 2 TB., then I want 24h. per day recording. I need 1 month, and here’s my total number:

Dahua & Hikvision Downloadable Tools

The last 2 for today are computer software. Hikvsion and Dahua free storage calculators that you get from their websites:

So, If we look a bit closer – you will see that they are just the same that what you just saw in the previous web one, but it’s a “physical” software that you download. No any differences anymore, same numbers, same formulas.