Bandwidth Fundamentals for Video Surveillance
Bandwidth is the most fundamental element of computer networking for video surveillance systems. Because video surveillance can consume an immense amount of bandwidth and because variations in bandwidth load of surveillance cameras can be so significant, understanding bandwidth for video surveillance is critical. Bandwidth is typically measured in bits (e.g., 100Kb/s, 1Mb/s, etc.). A bit is the most fundamental unit of bandwidth and storage. You should be comfortable measuring the bandwidth, in bits, on your computer. On your computer, it typically shows bandwidth being received by and bandwidth being sent out from your computer (as when you watch a video on youtube, you are receiving bandwidth and when you send an email you are transmitting bandwidth). These are also known as download and upload speeds respectively. Sometimes, we might want to know what bandwidth is being used by one specific camera or on a VMS server or NVR. Exactly how this is performed differs from system to system...