Hikvision Virtual Host with non-Hik ONVIF cameras

yorkie

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I am running a Hikvision DS-7716NI-E4/16P NVR with an array of various cameras and a DS-6704HUHI-K encoder connected either through a LAN switch or the onboard PoE ports. The NVR is on the latest firmware version.

As I had got the cameras before the NVR I had set up the cameras to check they worked using the LAN connection, and then when it came to adding the cameras on to the NVR this was done manually in the configuration settings. Configuring the cameras via LAN was fine when the cameras were working through a LAN switch, but obviously once connected to a PoE port on the NVR it puts the camera on a different subnet so the web Ui of the camera cannot be accessed... initially I had just been using a long Cat5 patch lead from my router up to a spare PoE port on the NVR if I wanted to change any settings on a camera, however in the longer term this is going to get slightly inconvenient and so I've been trying to get the "Virtual Host" function to work.

It should be noted that I have been successful in getting all the Hikvision devices connected via PoE to work with Virtual Host. To do this I have selected the camera channel in the configuration settings and then changed the method to "plug and play" and OK'd it, this in turn wipes the prior settings such as IP and automatically assigns an unused IP address from the internal NIC of the NVR; then I set the adding method back to "manual" but leave the IP address alone and merely add in the admin password; for the camera I used SADP to change the IP address to match that assigned from the NVR and also changed the subnet to 255.255.255.0 and the gateway address to match that of the NVR's internal NIC... and this has been enough, on the Web UI of the NVR the listed Virtual Host config links for the Hikvision cameras and encoder have correctly directed to the login page for the respective device.
BUT when I try pretty much the same approach for any non-Hikvision camera using ONVIF protocol the Virtual Host link doesn't work. I have tried this for a Samsung PNF-9010RV and a Wisenet XNF-8010R and have used the ODM software to change the camera's IP address, subnet, and gateway - yet clicking the link provided on the NVR's web UI just brings back the generic "unavailable" type error according to the web browser. I had wondered if this was down to the configuration port of the ONVIF cameras being port 80 compared to 8000 for the Hikvision cameras - so I changed the HTTP port of the Samsung from 80 to 8000 and still no go. I also tried changing the protocol for this camera from ONVIF to SAMSUNG, and not only did this not work but it also put the camera time forward +1 hour..... I don't want to reset either the NVR or the cameras, particularly the fisheyes as I have a seperate RTSP feed going to a different channel providing a dewarped 4-way view - resetting the camera will wipe that profile and the directions of the 4-way view which will be a ballache to set back up..... so has anybody been successful in adding 3rd party cameras and getting Virtual Host to work??
 

alastairstevenson

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has anybody been successful in adding 3rd party cameras and getting Virtual Host to work??
If your router has the ability to define a static route, you could experiment with accessing the PoE-connected ONVIF cameras directly via the NVR LAN interface.
The needed settings are described here :

You'd probably need to have the PoE port set to Manual instead of Plug&Play to stop the NVR setting the gateway value back to the LAN gateway instead of the needed NVR PoE interface address.
 

yorkie

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If your router has the ability to define a static route, you could experiment with accessing the PoE-connected ONVIF cameras directly via the NVR LAN interface.

You'd probably need to have the PoE port set to Manual instead of Plug&Play to stop the NVR setting the gateway value back to the LAN gateway instead of the needed NVR PoE interface address.
I'll give that a try if I can borrow another phone from the household - my router can only be accessed through an app and my mobile was stolen last week; this also means I can't use the 2-way audio output to cameras either due to the unusual setup in which the RCA input to the NVR can't be routed to a camera (but that's a whole different issue)

I have got the PoE set to manual though - I'd only had it as plug and play temporarily so as to assign an IP from the internal network card
 
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