What is the most efficient way to reduce high CPU usage on Smart Client and Recording Server(s)?

Installing a dedicated GPU for hardware acceleration is the most efficient way to reduce high CPU usage on Smart Client and Recording Server(s). This is because many video processing tasks that would otherwise consume significant CPU resources can be offloaded to the GPU. Modern GPUs are specifically designed to handle graphics rendering and processing tasks more efficiently than a CPU, which allows the CPU to focus on other operational tasks, potentially improving performance and responsiveness of the system.

By enabling hardware acceleration, the application can utilize the capabilities of the GPU for tasks such as video encoding, decoding, and rendering. This leads to a more balanced load between the CPU and the GPU, thereby preventing the CPU from becoming a bottleneck which can degrade performance, especially in video-surveillance environments where real-time processing is essential.

While the other options may contribute to improved performance in certain scenarios—like reducing simultaneous users, increasing memory, or closing unnecessary applications—the impact is often less direct or substantial than leveraging a dedicated GPU designed for intensive graphic processing. Therefore, investing in hardware acceleration is more likely to lead to a significant and noticeable reduction in CPU usage in the context of using Smart Client and Recording Server(s).