leaving mac with cam on 24/7

I want to use a mac for home/pet monitoring while on the road for a few.. up to 5 days.


Say i want to use a chrome-browser-based video camera site like Appear.in - whereby you can

make a shared video camera room. between two computers in different locations.


So if I set up a usb camera running off a Mac Mini or Imac, to view a room in my house for-

security purposes -- then set up a video room wherein that is transmitting as the live feed from

that source.... shouldn't i be able to log-in from another city on another computer and view it,

or interact with anyone in the room if speakers are configured as the home computer's system audio

source?


Main question tho is -does this put any undue strain or 'draw' on the host computer in the home

to have Chrome open and running and using this app 24/7... for a week straight, be it a

Mini or Imac ... If i just want a Mac set up to run a camera feed - and i set everything on that

Mac to "never sleep" - is there any potential for problems...even if just for like, a week at a time....


Thanks!


Mike

iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Nov 18, 2016 6:09 PM

Reply
10 replies

Nov 20, 2016 11:03 AM in response to MIKEinMICH

Read up on bonjour sleep proxy if you have hardware that supports it…

About Wake on Demand and Bonjour Sleep Proxy - Apple Support


Personally I have not used it & don't know if 10.6 supports it fully. I think it was used for Back To My Mac around that era but I think Apple killed your iCloud support on 10.6, so BTMM is probably useless to you but you should duly investigate that as it is better than TeamViewer in this regard.


You are misunderstanding what wake on network access is capable of. It is a 'local service' meaning you cannot send the required packet across the internet. TemViewer cannot wake your Mac from outside your network.


Bonjour sleep proxy basically has a device constantly awake to send out the relevant wake packet (a magic packet) to devices on the local network on request. That can be a router or Airport Extreme etc.

Nov 19, 2016 8:28 AM in response to BDAqua

Thanks for the links. I might go with something more basic for the time being like simply putting an old 4,1

white Imac back online with an icecam for a single room. Was experimenting with Appear.in and figure i can set up a video feed, then log in to view that from anywhere. If the Imac is set to never sleep and wouldnt heat up based on this scenario, I guess i wouldnt worry about fan control - it would have a Chrome browser left open with camera feed on, logged into Appear.in, dispay set for always-on, and connection to my home Airport Extreme network via wifi.

Nov 19, 2016 8:35 AM in response to Eric Root

Thanks. i was just replying to BD on what i was looking to use, an older White Imac that i'd set up with cam feed logged in to Appear.in - i hopefully wouldnt have to be concerned with a heat issue in that situation... there wouldnt be anything else open on it but i need to use Chrome and ive seen occasions where it gets a little

strange in its consumption of CPU .. thats where i wonder if i might need to look at something like fan control software

Nov 19, 2016 11:05 AM in response to BDAqua

Frankly I'd much rather be able to remotely start/wake a destop from sleep mode ...

I've messed with some of these apps for remote control in the past and there always

seemed to be some glitchiness with that - quite frustrating when attempting to log in

from across the country and not being able to access the far-end computer because

it would not 'wake upon remote access' as it was advertised to be able to do...


Maybe things have changed with these in recent years. Unfortunately I still prefer

to stick with Snow Leopard so if improvements have come about in versions only

compatible with newer OS i guess options are limited... tho i could throw a newer

OS on one of my old spare IMacs, RAM-limited as they may be...

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leaving mac with cam on 24/7

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