Video watermarking increases the workload of Security Desk. To ensure acceptable performance, you might need to reassess the capability of your client workstations before enabling this feature.
Watermark impact on workstation performance
Video watermarks are rendered by the client workstation. This extra load reduces the maximum number of live and playback video streams that can be displayed simultaneously. On average, the maximum number of tiles that can be displayed when hardware acceleration is enabled is reduced by 10%. This reduction reaches 30% on machines without hardware acceleration. The performance impact increases with the video resolution.
The following tables show the capability of a sample client workstation to display tiles at VGA and full HD resolutions with software or hardware rendering:
| Rendering | Video watermarking disabled | Video watermarking enabled |
|---|---|---|
| Software | 31 tiles | 24 tiles |
| Hardware | 50 tiles | 50 tiles |
| Rendering | Video watermarking disabled | Video watermarking enabled |
|---|---|---|
| Software | 7 tiles | 5 tiles |
| Hardware | 20 tiles | 18 tiles |
Watermark impact on exporting video
Video watermarking introduces transcoding to the export process for G64x, G64, and MP4 files. Exporting video in these file formats takes more time for users with watermarking enabled. The delay is most significant on client workstations without hardware acceleration, where it can take up to the duration of a video sequence to export it. Hardware acceleration can greatly reduce the time required to export watermarked video. The performance gain varies with the graphics processing unit (GPU).
The following table shows how long it takes to export a 10 minute video sequence to MP4 on a sample client workstation with software or hardware rendering:
| Rendering | Export time with watermarking disabled | Export time with watermarking enabled |
|---|---|---|
| Software | 10 seconds | 8 minutes |
| Hardware | 10 seconds | 46 seconds |