Installing a system for review.

No time for trial and error, as day job is main priority at present

So looking for bullit points on successful install

Config:

Can I run cameras from Mac book Pro? This negates the need to heft workstation from office to larger room
I have been sent 4 camera's, and a dual socket USB3 card.
Im assuming the cameras will work in the normal USB hubs on a Dell T4400?

Any pointers the community can send my way so that I can increase the amount of time I have to actually work with the system will be appreciated.

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Hi Craig,
i did a test this weekend with 4 ps3 eye cams. For the recording part the most important part is to have two controllers if you want to get 60 fps at 640x480 res. IT does not matter how powerful your machine is, the choke point happens at the controller stage(in other words, it does not mattter if your machine has 6 USB ports if they are all being sent to the same controller/card , your machine will choke with 4 video streams at 640x480). I have sixcore I7 extreme(3.333per core/12mb cache) with a gtx 480 machine, and i still could not get the 60 FPS until i added a second USB controller/card. One card for every two cameras. The software max capture is 77fps but to achive that i guess you would need one controller per camera and a very fast drive. My 7200 rpm drive did just fine recording at 640x480 60fps uncompress.
I will post more after i do the processing of the video.

Hope this will helped,

Stuckon3d

What he said. :)

I've used my old Dell e1705 laptop to do video capture. It can't do 60fps with four PS3 cameras because, even though there are six USB ports, there is actually only one USB 2 controller onboard. I think this is pretty typical of most laptops. Even though I got good results with the laptop (at 30fps,) I now use my workstation to achieve higher quality captures. (In other words, I gave up on the laptop and I now lug my box from office to shoot location. Not too big a deal after I bundled all my cables together to make it easier to 'plug-out' and 'plug-in'.)

Also, did you plan on using the MacBook Pro to do the tracking? If so, depending on the graphics card you have installed, it might not work. In general, I don't think there are any laptops out there that can do the tracking step, and typically you need a workstation with an appropriate graphics card for this.

Good luck!

G.

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