How to dump raw RTSP stream to file

Question

Is it possible to dump a raw RTSP stream to file and then later decode the file to something playable   Currently I m using FFmpeg to receive and decode the stream  saving it to an mp4 file   This works perfectly  but is CPU intensive  and will severely limit the number of RTSP streams I can receive simultaneously on my server   I would like to save the stream to file without decoding it  and delay the decoding part to when the file needs to be opened   Is this possible   I have tried VLC  which is even more CPU intensive than FFmpeg   I ve also looked at this question where the answer says dumping RTSP to file is not useful  and this question  where the comment below the question says  Raw RTSP content is not well suited for save and replay      which seems to indicate that there is way   Thanks in advance     EDIT Here is the command I m using for FFmpeg   ffmpeg -i rtsp    192 168 241 1 62159 -r 15 C  DB Videos 2013-04-30 17 18 34 703 mp4

User · Accepted Answer

If you are reencoding in your ffmpeg command line, that may be the reason why it is CPU intensive. You need to simply copy the streams to the single container. Since I do not have your command line I cannot suggest a specific improvement here. Your acodec and vcodec should be set to copy is all I can say.

EDIT: On seeing your command line and given you have already tried it, this is for the benefit of others who come across the same question. The command:

ffmpeg -i rtsp://@192.168.241.1:62156 -acodec copy -vcodec copy c:/abc.mp4

will not do transcoding and dump the file for you in an mp4. Of course this is assuming the streamed contents are compatible with an mp4 (which in all probability they are).

User · Answer

You can use mplayer   mencoder -nocache -rtsp-stream-over-tcp rtsp   192 168 XXX XXX test sdp -oac copy -ovc copy -o test avi   The  copy  codec is just a dumb copy of the stream  Mencoder adds a header and stuff you probably want   In the mplayer source file  stream stream rtsp c  is a prebuffer size setting of 640k and no option to change the size other then recompile  The result is that writing the stream is always delayed  which can be annoying for things like cameras  but besides this  you get an output file  and can play it back most places without a problem

User · Answer

With this command I had poor image quality  ffmpeg -i rtsp   192 168 XXX XXX 554 live sdp -vcodec copy -acodec copy -f mp4 -y MyVideoFFmpeg mp4   With this  almost without delay  I got good image quality   ffmpeg -i rtsp   192 168 XXX XXX 554 live sdp -b 900k -vcodec copy -r 60 -y MyVdeoFFmpeg avi

[file] How to dump raw RTSP stream to file?

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