Do this. Plug your PC into the 192.168.2.0 network, change your NIC settings to 192.168.2.X(something not in use), also add the gateway of 192.168.2.1, then ping the gateway. Do this from both subnets, then tell us your results.
There is nothing to worry about. If you were an enterprise sitting on customer data, then I would say think twice but you have nothing to worry about. There is nothing wrong with port forwarding. Now if you want to get crazy, you can setup a PFsense box as your router and block incoming...
Camb, your nvr specs are over specc'd for what you are running. The issue probably is that you are doing live view at the same time. Turn off live view on your server. Then test again. you should see a lot of improvement.
it wouldnt exactly be like those tutorials for openvpn. I would honestly just use openvpn. BTW, i made a mistake, you will still need a ddns service for your home ip address for the openvpn server.
I actually edited the post and clarified it. :)
(Home LAN <->Router/VPN server<->)----internet------<->VPNclient(software installed on any hardware)
Just to clarify as well, yes you will need some sort of client on your idevice depending on what vpn server you are using at home. OpenVPN is...
So heres the thing.
If you want to access the NVR remotely, you can do one of 2 things (or both technically)
forward the ports on your router to the NVR. This is a door, but as along as you put a strong password, then at least its a very secure (Strong door). This will be the simplest method...