Moving from BI to Protect?

[marzian]

I have been using BI for many a year, but the lack of good AI postprocessing makes it lacking in today's day and age. CPAI has always been clunky and mediocre for me, and its development seems to be stalling, if not completely dying. I have tried Frigate. Life is too short to deal with setting up a Docker container, a painful setup, etc, even though I did.

I see reviews and videos of Unifi Protect, and it seems very good. I wonder if I should jump ship and invest in Protect. I use unifi for networking but will need protect capable hardware. All my cameras are third-party.

Has anybody done this?

 

[Keizer]

I have been using BI for many a year, but the lack of good AI postprocessing makes it lacking in today's day and age. CPAI has always been clunky and mediocre for me, and its development seems to be stalling, if not completely dying. I have tried Frigate. Life is too short to deal with setting up a Docker container, a painful setup, etc, even though I did.

I see reviews and videos of Unifi Protect, and it seems very good. I wonder if I should jump ship and invest in Protect. I use unifi for networking but will need protect capable hardware. All my cameras are third-party.

Has anybody done this?

I gave Unifi Protect a try after using Blue Iris for a few years. After a few days I packed up the UNVR Pro, sent it back and used the money to build a new Blue Iris PC. Protect comes highly recommended by many people but as far as surveilance goes I didn't see the appeal at all. Keep in mind I only tried it with my 3rd party cams and was sorely disappointed compared to what Blue Iris can do. I'm sure if you invested in their own cams the experience would be better. Maybe stop using CPAI and use the cameras built in AI.......that's what I do. It really depends on what you feel is a good experience as you navigate whatever surveilance software you're using. I also didn't like the idea that I could no longer use any camera I want without having neutered settings. Maybe down the road Unifi Protect software will give 3rd party cameras all the bells and whistles, but it seems to me that doing so would cripple their camera sales.

From another thread that I commented in.

K

Post in thread 'Experience with Unifi Protect and UNVR Pro'

Sep 24, 2025

Which non unifi cams do you run. Do you have the ai port or key? What issues with those cams have you noticed with Protect, and using Empire/ dahua cams?

I will give my experience since I just set up a UNVR Pro. My comments are in no way a knock against MTL4. He has been very helpful with me and my questions. I have only had a couple days worth of using the UNVR Pro and the protect software. I am honestly very disappointed with their 3rd party camera support. I knew going into it that it supported recording and nothing else. First off here's my experience viewing on my PC...

• Keizer

• 

 

[marzian]

I gave Unifi Protect a try after using Blue Iris for a few years. After a few days I packed up the UNVR Pro, sent it back and used the money to build a new Blue Iris PC. Protect comes highly recommended by many people but as far as surveilance goes I didn't see the appeal at all. Keep in mind I only tried it with my 3rd party cams and was sorely disappointed compared to what Blue Iris can do. I'm sure if you invested in their own cams the experience would be better. Maybe stop using CPAI and use the cameras built in AI.......that's what I do. It really depends on what you feel is a good experience as you navigate whatever surveilance software you're using. I also didn't like the idea that I could no longer use any camera I want without having neutered settings. Maybe down the road Unifi Protect software will give 3rd party cameras all the bells and whistles, but it seems to me that doing so would cripple their camera sales.

From another thread that I commented in.

K

Post in thread 'Experience with Unifi Protect and UNVR Pro'

Sep 24, 2025

Which non unifi cams do you run. Do you have the ai port or key? What issues with those cams have you noticed with Protect, and using Empire/ dahua cams?

I will give my experience since I just set up a UNVR Pro. My comments are in no way a knock against MTL4. He has been very helpful with me and my questions. I have only had a couple days worth of using the UNVR Pro and the protect software. I am honestly very disappointed with their 3rd party camera support. I knew going into it that it supported recording and nothing else. First off here's my experience viewing on my PC...

• Keizer

• 

Thank you. I read the whole thread. I have no major beef with BI itself; it's the AI part. CPAI was used in the camera alerts.
I have tried tweaking my cameras' settings (a mix of mostly Hikvision and Dahua), but I never had a reliable person/car/animal identification.

 

[wittaj]

If you are trying to do too much with one field of view, the problems will just follow you to a different platform.

Post some examples of your field of view with IVS settings and camera settings and we can probably suggest improvements.

Most of us here have spot on, never misses AI use from Dahua cams.

 

[tigerwillow1]

I have no major beef with BI itself; it's the AI part. CPAI was used in the camera alerts.

Pretty close to my experience. I tried using CPAI and ended up with an unstable system that had to be rebooted every few days. Since eliminating CPAI I've not had to reboot even once. I'm one of the minority who has a high priority on animal detection, and while CPAI cut down the false triggers a bit, it still made too many humorous detections of plants, a trailer, propane tank, small greenhouse, and other things as parking meters, benches, and so forth. So I've ended up with loads of false detections using "dumb" IVS (because smart IVS won;t trigger on animals), with the saving grace that it's so fast and easy to go through them with UI3. I'm hoping the 54PRO will solve the problem of detecting animals without a lot of false triggers. I'm testing one, and so far the jury is still out.

 

[Keizer]

it still made too many humorous detections of plants, a trailer, propane tank, small greenhouse, and other things as parking meters, benches, and so forth.

It's not just CPAI. I have a couple Tapo cams with built in animal/people/car detection. I don't have them as part of my BI setup and instead use their companion app. It's pretty funny seeing it detect a rock, or a garden ornament as an animal.

 

[marzian]

If you are trying to do too much with one field of view, the problems will just follow you to a different platform.

Post some examples of your field of view with IVS settings and camera settings and we can probably suggest improvements.

Most of us here have spot on, never misses AI use from Dahua cams.

Here is an example.

 

[wittaj]

It is best to leave min size at 0,0 and let the AI do its thing. Only put in min size is getting too many flase triggers from smaller objects.

What about settings for contrast, brightness, etc as that directly impacts the AI.

All that green grass could be problematic with darker clothes and some gamma and contrast needs to be adjusted.

 

[marzian]

It is best to leave min size at 0,0 and let the AI do its thing. Only put in min size is getting too many flase triggers from smaller objects.

What about settings for contrast, brightness, etc as that directly impacts the AI.

All that green grass could be problematic with darker clothes and some gamma and contrast needs to be adjusted.

OK. Picture is "standard". Exposure "outdoors". Backlight "none". EIS off