Amcrest Blue Iris Professional Version 5 – Supports Many IP Camera Brands Including Amcrest, Zone Motion Detection, H.265 Compression Recording, E-Mail and SMS Text Messaging Alerts!(BLUEIRISCD-V5)

So much better than Amcrest Surveillance Pro!
I’ve been using Amcrest cameras for several years and had always used Amcrest Surveillance Pro (free from Amcrest) for monitoring my cameras and reviewing recordings. I was letting each camera record to their own SD cards. The downside to doing this is reviewing the recordings is more tedious because you are reading directly from the cameras SD cards which limits your bandwidth. So playback at 2X or 4X was all but impossible. As I added more cameras, it became clear I needed a more efficient way to manage them. Enter Blue Iris 5. BI5 runs on my PC 24/7. I’m still able to do other work while BI5 runs, so it doesn’t require a dedicated machine. BI5 records to the PCs hard drive so playback now is MUCH faster. 8x playback of 6 cameras simultaneously with no problems. The time savings alone made this a worthwhile purchase. In addition saving me time, BI5 has significantly better Motion Detection triggering which means fewer false alarms to review. BI5 is also offering integration with Sentry Smart Alerts which uses artificial intelligence to check if a person is in the frame when motion is detected. If so, you can send an alert email notifying you that a person has been detected. While it is not perfect yet, the fact the BI5 is integrating with such a service makes my security system much smarter. Sentry is a subscription service so, for me, I’ll wait on subscribing to Sentry until it gets better. BI5 supports audio triggering as well if your camera has audio. BI5 supports a huge range of cameras and has many features which are more applicable to a larger scale security systems such a grouping of cameras, synchronizing triggers, sub-user creation/management, joystick and digital IO support, etc. All of these features make the initial setup learning curve a little steep. After that, daily use is very easy. I still have my cameras recording to their own SD cards as a backup if something happens to my PC, but live monitoring and scrubbing through recordings is now all done in BI5.

It has no easy way to install and use. I am buying a Zosi to replace the old one!!
The previous several systems I have purchased over the last 20 years have been a basic plug and ply you’re on your home net watching it on your PC over your home net with autodetection of all the components useful to it listed and capable of access… To give my opinion of this is: This Software, nvr, dvr and “Support” can leave town on equipment it road in on, it is pathetic and almost like a scam…

Awesome customer service + awesome software = win!!!
I received this product without a product key. Most people would take off a star for this, but Amcrest requested a picture of the inside of the case and swiftly (within the day) sent me the key. This kind of customer service can turn a garbage product into a 5 star product. On that note:This is my second server build directly for Blue Iris software. First build runs 25 POE cameras and this one will run 64 POE cameras. The biggest feature that is much needed from my NVR software is the ability to establish viewing profiles for the cameras which Blue Iris does flawlessly. My kitchen manager gets to see the kitchen and that’s it. Laundry manager gets the laundry room feeds, etc.The web interface is also extremely intuitive and easy to set up…nearly plug and play. The software itself can seem like you need a PHD in software engineering at first glance, but it is pretty straightforward. I honestly would have shelled another $70 dollars for a product key if Amcrest wasn’t able to be AMAZING and send me one when my package was missing it, that is how good the software is. Customer service and product get a 10/5 stars from me!

Best surveillance software for windows.
I bought this to connect my tp-link Tapo cams to a small PC and a NAS. Works great!