9 ms·

The same is true for our AI processing on the cameras. This is entirely local and private. You can even air gap the UniFi Protect system from the Internet and i

The same is true for our AI processing on the cameras. This is entirely local and private. You can even air gap the UniFi Protect system from the Internet and it'll operate fine.

eptcyka 4mo ago
Can I use it without running some inane management VM?
- Avicebron 4mo ago
  Genuine question, if you're running unifi, why don't you want the management vm? Synology makes a decent NAS without the controller.
  - eptcyka 4mo ago
    I like the hardware, cannot stand needing to run another machine just for management.
    - linohh 4mo ago
      If you get one of the Cloud devices, you won't need to, as they bring their own.
  - InTheArena 4mo ago
    Synology hardware stopped being decent a while ago.
    - pinewurst 4mo ago
      Plus their drive type restrictions which are poison in a cost-sensitive NAS. (Seemingly rolled back recently, but a roll back can be easily rolled back itself. I don't trust them enough to count on that not happening.)
- lostlogin 4mo ago
  The UDM runs mine, but prior to that I ran a Docker container with it. It worked well. https://hub.docker.com/r/linuxserver/unifi-controller https://hub.docker.com/r/linuxserver/unifi-controller
  - _rs 4mo ago
    You can't run UniFi Protect like this, only the network controller
    - deleted 4mo ago
      [deleted]
- jon-wood 4mo ago
  Unifi gateways run the management software now, typically they'll also be your networks router and so something you'll need to buy anyway, but if you just want to use the security/wifi elements then you can either run it in a container or if you're really determined not to run a container and not to buy a router there's the CloudKey.
infecto 4mo ago
The cost is just insane though. $4-$500 for a camera that I can get equivalent specs for $50-100.
- projektfu 4mo ago
  They're not all $500, some are $150-300. Overall price comparable to Honeywell, but more than, say, Lorex.
- throwaway219450 4mo ago
  All the basic G6 cameras are in the $200 range and have edge compute? What's the comparison at $50-100?
- 9x39 4mo ago
  With face detection? License plates? Tamper protection? I'm guessing you're thinking Reolink or other Chinese ultra-commodity cam. It's fine, it's just in a different product class and ecosystem - and that's where enterprises fit in, they want that support+ecosystem and not DIYing. Reolink CX820 8MP $129 https://reolink.com/product/cx820/ https://reolink.com/product/cx820/ Unifi G6 8MP ~$300 https://techspecs.ui.com/unifi/physical-security/uvc-g6-dome?s=us https://techspecs.ui.com/unifi/physical-security/uvc-g6-dome... Avigilon H6A 8MP ~$1200 https://www.avigilon.com/security-cameras/h6a-dome https://www.avigilon.com/security-cameras/h6a-dome
  - infecto 4mo ago
    I never really thought of Ubiquity as enterprise always felt more of the premium small to mid sized business but I am sure some enterprises use them.
    - 9x39 4mo ago
      The new enterprise NVRs work pretty well. I think they're definitely not Avigilon, Genetec, Verkada, but we run a few hundred UI cams in some edge areas. It works, esp if you don't demand orchestration.
    - 4mo ago
throwaway219450 4mo ago
I do like the onboard AI, and it works well for entity detection (like people). We haven't found the face detection to be very reliable in outdoor security applications. There doesn't seem to be a way to correct/combine classes if someone's detected as multiple individuals on different occasions, so we end up with the same person detected as 5 "unknown"s. This is not a hard problem to solve. You'd just allow embedding matching to different face groups, but it's annoying as a user.
dmoose 4mo ago
> This is entirely local and private. You can even air gap the UniFi Protect system from the Internet and it'll operate fine. One week ago 3 guys broke into my shop while I was traveling. They had sense enough to power down the starlink that was providing internet which would have taken out all of the remote camera options. They did not realize that almost everything they were doing was being recorded via the unifi system. In the end about the only thing of value left in the building was the hard drive with all of their pictures on it. The police have used the footage to identify all of them and it will be pretty open and shut when they see a court room. Offline and air gapped the whole time they were there but did exactly what it was installed to do.
- electriclove 4mo ago
  How did you hide it so that the thieves didn't find it?
  - iluvcommunism 4mo ago
    [dead]
  - dmoose 4mo ago
    A 7U cabinet in an overhead space that is difficult to access. Installation and configuration were a bit of a headache but ended up being worth it. There was a NAS in the office and they stripped 7 drives, sleds and all, out of it. I'm guessing with such an obvious endpoint for the camera storage it never occurred to anyone there was a second box. I had something like this in mind when I wired the building. It seemed like a good idea to make onsite security footage much harder to find given the cameras were obvious and anyone breaking in would probably look to damage or destroy the system. I really thought the cameras themselves were the deterrent, but these guys gave it a shot anyway. Cutting the cable to the starlink and walking off with the NAS drives seemed to be the plan. In the future I'm going to add a local battery backed alarm connected to external siren and strobe that is immediate on opening the office door to draw attention. I was driving down to WWDC when the starlink went offline and saw the notice on my phone but wrote it off to equipment failure which gave them enough time to clean the place out pretty well. The hole in my strategy was thinking nothing could happen without notification, but being in a car in the middle of Norther CA with spotty cell coverage and lots of distractions blew that up pretty hard. I'm also thinking one of ubiquiti's cellular backups is in my future. Starlink offline is annoying but not the attention grabber that a still of a guy walking in the door would have been. Cellular backup would have gotten me that.
ssl-3 4mo ago
The processing can happen within the camera, and it's nice when it does...but that doesn't mean that the only other option is something cloud-based, like some might assume. Open-source NVR software like Frigate can do things like the object-detection/license plate/face recognition game on local hardware, with the cheapest available IP cameras. It's just a program that runs on a computer with a network and some storage and some processing ability like a GPU. Those cheap cameras don't have to be trusted; with things like VLANs, they can hang out on the Group W bench where they have no access to anything important or the outside world. :) (But yeah, it does represent much more of a DIY effort than something from UBNT does.)
radicalbyte 4mo ago
I've been so impressed with Ubiquiti that I've decided to target FreeBSD for my current side project. Their camera system is wonderful. Their DreamMachine is a massive upgrade for my home network. Their APs are rock solid, no hassle, just work, and it integrates so well. I have my work / home on different subnets. I have the kids on a different subnet and behind a firewall providing some protection against ads. Very happy customer here.
- ksec 4mo ago
  >I've been so impressed with Ubiquiti that I've decided to target FreeBSD for my current side project. As much as I wish Ubnt are using BSD in their product, which they are not. I am understanding how FreeBSD relates here.
  - radicalbyte 4mo ago
    An assumption, I made. Failed, it was.
    - br0ceph 4mo ago
      I always advise ppl against ubiquiti devices. They are not open at all, its yet another proprietary router/switch/wifi/nas/etc
      - lostapathy 4mo ago
        So what do you actually recommend?
        psd1 4mo ago
        I like unifi despite the appliance feel. I recommend using the kit that works fire you, but avoiding the temptation to stick everything in a single pane of glass. Use the wifi, don't also cram your routing and switching and firewalling into the same vendor relationship. It's like being apple-everything. Freedom until you bump into the walls of your cell. Unifi APs are a sweet spot of price/performance, and I have no difficulty recommending them. Ruckus hardware is better at five times the price. UISP gear has worked very very well for me for ptp and ptmp. But that's a completely different line.
johne20 4mo ago
Any way to get Protect iOS notifications if using local mode only? Eg, using local local login but away from home.
MrDrMcCoy 4mo ago
I am unable to accept that it is fully local, since you have to bind your network to their cloud just to accept the EULA. [0] I have 0% trust that a subsequent unbind truly severs the link, because this is such a shady thing to require in the first place. [0] https://community.ui.com/questions/e3d50641-5c00-4607-9723-453cda557e35?replyId=725fe892-d8d4-435d-b5be-738d3684be95 https://community.ui.com/questions/e3d50641-5c00-4607-9723-4...
- varenc 4mo ago
  I'm surprised this is required. Agreed that's shady. I wonder what their reasoning is. But if you don't trust it, the fix is easy: just deny the Ubiquiti cameras and controller all internet access. That way no trust is required.
  - mcculley 4mo ago
    But what if I want to access my cameras remotely but not have their manufacturer access them?
    - avianlyric 4mo ago
      VPN. You can even use the Wireguard VPN that all Ubiquiti routers have built in
    - npodbielski 4mo ago
      I am running nginx proxy on my public IP on top of ubiquiti UNVR it works via headscale. But honestly I am super happy with their hardware and software but necessity to link your network to their cloud just be able to use 100% of features of my own hardware, make me want to sell the whole thing and buy something else.
- ragall 4mo ago
  So once you accept the EULA, it's fully local. What's your problem with that ?
  - 4mo ago
jonah 4mo ago
Hey, why can't I get full-resolution 4k snapshots off my G5 Pro bullet?
ahknight 4mo ago
Now if only Ubiquiti could solve the problem where everything is always out of stock.

The same is true for our AI processing on the cameras. This is entirely local and private. You can even air gap the UniFi Protect system from the Internet and it'll operate fine.

eptcyka 4mo ago

Can I use it without running some inane management VM?

Avicebron 4mo ago
Genuine question, if you're running unifi, why don't you want the management vm? Synology makes a decent NAS without the controller.
- eptcyka 4mo ago
  I like the hardware, cannot stand needing to run another machine just for management.
  - linohh 4mo ago
    If you get one of the Cloud devices, you won't need to, as they bring their own.
- InTheArena 4mo ago
  Synology hardware stopped being decent a while ago.
  - pinewurst 4mo ago
    Plus their drive type restrictions which are poison in a cost-sensitive NAS. (Seemingly rolled back recently, but a roll back can be easily rolled back itself. I don't trust them enough to count on that not happening.)
lostlogin 4mo ago
The UDM runs mine, but prior to that I ran a Docker container with it. It worked well. https://hub.docker.com/r/linuxserver/unifi-controller https://hub.docker.com/r/linuxserver/unifi-controller
- _rs 4mo ago
  You can't run UniFi Protect like this, only the network controller
  - deleted 4mo ago
    [deleted]
jon-wood 4mo ago
Unifi gateways run the management software now, typically they'll also be your networks router and so something you'll need to buy anyway, but if you just want to use the security/wifi elements then you can either run it in a container or if you're really determined not to run a container and not to buy a router there's the CloudKey.

infecto 4mo ago

The cost is just insane though. $4-$500 for a camera that I can get equivalent specs for $50-100.

projektfu 4mo ago
They're not all $500, some are $150-300. Overall price comparable to Honeywell, but more than, say, Lorex.
throwaway219450 4mo ago
All the basic G6 cameras are in the $200 range and have edge compute? What's the comparison at $50-100?
9x39 4mo ago
With face detection? License plates? Tamper protection? I'm guessing you're thinking Reolink or other Chinese ultra-commodity cam. It's fine, it's just in a different product class and ecosystem - and that's where enterprises fit in, they want that support+ecosystem and not DIYing. Reolink CX820 8MP $129 https://reolink.com/product/cx820/ https://reolink.com/product/cx820/ Unifi G6 8MP ~$300 https://techspecs.ui.com/unifi/physical-security/uvc-g6-dome?s=us https://techspecs.ui.com/unifi/physical-security/uvc-g6-dome... Avigilon H6A 8MP ~$1200 https://www.avigilon.com/security-cameras/h6a-dome https://www.avigilon.com/security-cameras/h6a-dome
- infecto 4mo ago
  I never really thought of Ubiquity as enterprise always felt more of the premium small to mid sized business but I am sure some enterprises use them.
  - 9x39 4mo ago
    The new enterprise NVRs work pretty well. I think they're definitely not Avigilon, Genetec, Verkada, but we run a few hundred UI cams in some edge areas. It works, esp if you don't demand orchestration.
  - 4mo ago

throwaway219450 4mo ago

I do like the onboard AI, and it works well for entity detection (like people). We haven't found the face detection to be very reliable in outdoor security applications. There doesn't seem to be a way to correct/combine classes if someone's detected as multiple individuals on different occasions, so we end up with the same person detected as 5 "unknown"s. This is not a hard problem to solve. You'd just allow embedding matching to different face groups, but it's annoying as a user.

dmoose 4mo ago

> This is entirely local and private. You can even air gap the UniFi Protect system from the Internet and it'll operate fine. One week ago 3 guys broke into my shop while I was traveling. They had sense enough to power down the starlink that was providing internet which would have taken out all of the remote camera options. They did not realize that almost everything they were doing was being recorded via the unifi system. In the end about the only thing of value left in the building was the hard drive with all of their pictures on it. The police have used the footage to identify all of them and it will be pretty open and shut when they see a court room. Offline and air gapped the whole time they were there but did exactly what it was installed to do.

electriclove 4mo ago
How did you hide it so that the thieves didn't find it?
- iluvcommunism 4mo ago
  [dead]
- dmoose 4mo ago
  A 7U cabinet in an overhead space that is difficult to access. Installation and configuration were a bit of a headache but ended up being worth it. There was a NAS in the office and they stripped 7 drives, sleds and all, out of it. I'm guessing with such an obvious endpoint for the camera storage it never occurred to anyone there was a second box. I had something like this in mind when I wired the building. It seemed like a good idea to make onsite security footage much harder to find given the cameras were obvious and anyone breaking in would probably look to damage or destroy the system. I really thought the cameras themselves were the deterrent, but these guys gave it a shot anyway. Cutting the cable to the starlink and walking off with the NAS drives seemed to be the plan. In the future I'm going to add a local battery backed alarm connected to external siren and strobe that is immediate on opening the office door to draw attention. I was driving down to WWDC when the starlink went offline and saw the notice on my phone but wrote it off to equipment failure which gave them enough time to clean the place out pretty well. The hole in my strategy was thinking nothing could happen without notification, but being in a car in the middle of Norther CA with spotty cell coverage and lots of distractions blew that up pretty hard. I'm also thinking one of ubiquiti's cellular backups is in my future. Starlink offline is annoying but not the attention grabber that a still of a guy walking in the door would have been. Cellular backup would have gotten me that.

ssl-3 4mo ago

The processing can happen within the camera, and it's nice when it does...but that doesn't mean that the only other option is something cloud-based, like some might assume. Open-source NVR software like Frigate can do things like the object-detection/license plate/face recognition game on local hardware, with the cheapest available IP cameras. It's just a program that runs on a computer with a network and some storage and some processing ability like a GPU. Those cheap cameras don't have to be trusted; with things like VLANs, they can hang out on the Group W bench where they have no access to anything important or the outside world. :) (But yeah, it does represent much more of a DIY effort than something from UBNT does.)

radicalbyte 4mo ago

I've been so impressed with Ubiquiti that I've decided to target FreeBSD for my current side project. Their camera system is wonderful. Their DreamMachine is a massive upgrade for my home network. Their APs are rock solid, no hassle, just work, and it integrates so well. I have my work / home on different subnets. I have the kids on a different subnet and behind a firewall providing some protection against ads. Very happy customer here.

ksec 4mo ago
>I've been so impressed with Ubiquiti that I've decided to target FreeBSD for my current side project. As much as I wish Ubnt are using BSD in their product, which they are not. I am understanding how FreeBSD relates here.
- radicalbyte 4mo ago
  An assumption, I made. Failed, it was.
  - br0ceph 4mo ago
    I always advise ppl against ubiquiti devices. They are not open at all, its yet another proprietary router/switch/wifi/nas/etc
    - lostapathy 4mo ago
      So what do you actually recommend?
      - psd1 4mo ago
        I like unifi despite the appliance feel. I recommend using the kit that works fire you, but avoiding the temptation to stick everything in a single pane of glass. Use the wifi, don't also cram your routing and switching and firewalling into the same vendor relationship. It's like being apple-everything. Freedom until you bump into the walls of your cell. Unifi APs are a sweet spot of price/performance, and I have no difficulty recommending them. Ruckus hardware is better at five times the price. UISP gear has worked very very well for me for ptp and ptmp. But that's a completely different line.

johne20 4mo ago

Any way to get Protect iOS notifications if using local mode only? Eg, using local local login but away from home.

MrDrMcCoy 4mo ago

I am unable to accept that it is fully local, since you have to bind your network to their cloud just to accept the EULA. [0] I have 0% trust that a subsequent unbind truly severs the link, because this is such a shady thing to require in the first place. [0] https://community.ui.com/questions/e3d50641-5c00-4607-9723-453cda557e35?replyId=725fe892-d8d4-435d-b5be-738d3684be95 https://community.ui.com/questions/e3d50641-5c00-4607-9723-4...

varenc 4mo ago
I'm surprised this is required. Agreed that's shady. I wonder what their reasoning is. But if you don't trust it, the fix is easy: just deny the Ubiquiti cameras and controller all internet access. That way no trust is required.
- mcculley 4mo ago
  But what if I want to access my cameras remotely but not have their manufacturer access them?
  - avianlyric 4mo ago
    VPN. You can even use the Wireguard VPN that all Ubiquiti routers have built in
  - npodbielski 4mo ago
    I am running nginx proxy on my public IP on top of ubiquiti UNVR it works via headscale. But honestly I am super happy with their hardware and software but necessity to link your network to their cloud just be able to use 100% of features of my own hardware, make me want to sell the whole thing and buy something else.
ragall 4mo ago
So once you accept the EULA, it's fully local. What's your problem with that ?
- 4mo ago

jonah 4mo ago

Hey, why can't I get full-resolution 4k snapshots off my G5 Pro bullet?

ahknight 4mo ago

Now if only Ubiquiti could solve the problem where everything is always out of stock.