Saving logs & videos to SATA Hard Disk Drive (legacy)

Owned by Technical Service Specialist
Last updated: Feb 06, 2024 by Vladimir Tayzhev
3 min read

Other pages of interest include:

"Connecting hard disk drive",

"AV camera"

 

Units of the 900 series have the ability to connect an internal SATA Hard Disk Drive for saving logs, video, etc. To use the recording from an AV camera, an HDD is required.

The HDD must be formatted by the user before installation. The preferred file system is Ext4, a third-party utility (for example, MiniTool Partition Wizard) that can be used for formatting in Windows. The FAT32 file system is also supported, but the storage capacity will be limited to 32 GB.

On the front panel of the unit, there is an LED showing the recording status of the HDD.

To manage the HDD go to the tab: Preferences >> Logging >> HDD.

Through this tab, the user can set the logging parameters, and view and manage the status of the HDD:

  • Current state - reflects the current status of the HDD (normal/ejected/not connected);

  • Full size - the full memory HDD in gigabytes;

  • Free size - the free memory HDD in gigabytes;

  • Enable logging to SATA Hard Disk Drive - enables and disables the logging function on the HDD;

  • Save video files - enables and disables the function of saving video records;

  • Enable detailed logging - enables and disables the function of recording per-second values of the selected sensors on the HDD;

  • Lifetime of files - the lifetime of the files, all older files are deleted from the HDD memory;

  • Contents of the SATA Hard Disk Drive - specifies a link to the contents of the HDD.

The buttons at the bottom of the panel provide:

  • Refresh - is used to update the page;

  • Save - preservation and application of logging parameters.

The files are written to a directory with the name formed from the name of the device type (for example, VT325) and the value of the Network→Hostname field, and has the form VT325-DeviceName. If the name is not specified by the user (by default, hostname), then the IP address of the device is used to form the directory name, and the name has the form VT325-192.168.0.193. Inside this directory, create a directory for the log files (log), video files (video), sensors dump files (sensors), and log archive files (archive). The files are named based on their creation time, and 2016.11.17_16-37-43.log. At the beginning of the log file, upon creation, service information like the device type, software version, IP address, etc is stored. Log files are written in text form.  Sensors dump files are recorded in a text table format CSV. The CSV format is supported by many office and engineering programs, including Microsoft Excel, OpenOffice, LabVIEW, etc.

Log files are recorded during the day and are closed at 00:00 by device time. If the device reboots, then new files are created.

 

The log file is filled in as events occur, and looks like this:

#

# Device type: "VT325", Firmware version: "2.7.1".

# Hostname: "hostname", IP: "192.168.0.199", MAC: "d8:80:39:9e:97:a7"

#

Thu Nov 17 14:23:20 2016    message: USB Flash was inserted

Thu Nov 17 14:23:25 2016    state: Element Onboard Temperature (id=201001) changed state from "unknown" to "normal"

Thu Nov 17 14:23:25 2016    state: Element Onboard Voltage DC (id=203001) changed state from "unknown" to "normal"

Thu Nov 17 14:23:26 2016    state: Element Dry-1 (id=101001) changed state from "unknown" to "normal"

Thu Nov 17 14:23:26 2016    state: Element Dry-2 (id=101002) changed state from "unknown" to "normal"

Thu Nov 17 14:23:30 2016    message: System started up and ready

Thu Nov 17 14:23:41 2016    state: Element GSM Modem (id=404001) changed state from "unknown" to "normal"


Sensor dump files

Read more about Sensors dump files.