ITGuy1024 wrote: ↑Sat May 27, 2023 7:11 pm
It's the NV4108E-A2 NVR.
Certainly a capable unit, but it does have limitations at 4K as you likely already know from the spec sheet. I gather the camera in question is the only 4K camera and should not be affected by the inherent constraints of the NVR when running multiple hi-resolution devices. That said, there are other aspects of the NVR and camera settings that could have a bearing on the issue(s) at hand that you indicate also apply to a 5M camera. And while camera settings could well be playing a role, and after four pages of discussion on the matter with indications that the current condition applies to multiple cameras, it's time to investigate other possible causes.
But first, I'd reduce the bitrate of the camera to 4096 or maybe even 2048 to smooth that out a bit. Amcrest themselves suggests as much, especially running H265 encoding. And just for the heck of it, kill the substream for now, well..., just because at this point. Reboot the camera to make sure the changes have been implemented. And as previously suggested, you may also want to try 2560x1440 (4M) at a bitrate of 2048 @20~30fps with a 1 sec I-frame interval. It doesn't get much more general than that as mid-resolution settings go and should provide a more than acceptable image -- if not a very nice one.
This gets us past the camera to what's left -- the NVR, the display(s), and the connectivity among all the devices involved. And from everything discussed so far, I'm ruling out the camera itself as the problem since the comparison to even your 5M camera seems to indicate a level of quality in the 720p range as referenced from your previous experience with such a system. To me that indicates something is choking the camaras.
I realize there are different viewing mediums involved, beginning with the camera physically interfaced to the main point (NVR) with UTP of some type via RJ-45 connectors and terminations. The wire should be 24AWG solid copper. Nothing else. Ideally, the cable terminations should be professionally done with excessive cable length kept to an absolute minmum. The outdoor connection should be housed in a weatherproof enclosure without exception. (The gland type enclosure provided by most manufactures with their PoE cameras are usually acceptable.) Any cable fasteners used should be approriate for the application. Staples, sharp bends and pinches of the cabling must be avoided. And while probably (and normally) not an issue, checking the PoE voltage should probably be done under these circumstances..., again, just because. A cable tester could also come in handy for checking the pairs. So there's the connection part.
The NVR is obviously the next in line. The first thing I'd check under the circumstances is the video output display setting. Even with a 4K TV as a monitor, a 1080p resolution will play much nicer across the board for general purposes. The higher the resolution, the more artifacts will be visible from lesser resolution sources as will settings anomilies from higher resolution sources. The larger the display area, the worse the image will be at a higher display resolution for a digital IP camera NVR display output.
Across the network on various other types of displays can certainly be different story altogether, e.g. a 4K stream viewed on an Android phone. With that in mind, and depending on the type of display available on what I presume is a PC or Mac somewhere in the mix, you may want to try VLC Media Player as an alternate viewing platform for an image comparison and to also confirm the peformance of the stream by analyzing the codec (within certain limits). If you're not familiar with it, it's a free Open Source project available here:
https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ I'd happily provide the required details for establishing an RTSP stream directly from an NVR channel to an external device running VLC if you're not already familiar with the general format for doing so.
There could be other issues with the NVR all the way down to its power supply and that's a level of assessment well beyond this thread. But with
that said, installing any of the HDDs you mentioned should take less time than to remove the screws once the lid is off, so there may indeed be additional issues with the NVR contributing to your image quality issues.
Lastly, you can eliminate the NVR entirely using VLC and a PoE switch to power the camera and get it on your network for a completely raw test just using the camera's web interface for setting it up. Not difficult to do and would bypass everything currently between the camera and the VLC display. If the image quality is still bad, it's the camera.
I'm just about out of bullets on this one and hardly an expert. I'm sure there are a few other areas to explore that Revo will undoubtedly bring to our attention! His rundown on the cameras is essentially what I was alluding to also and he covered it well.
Good luck!