Amcrest Shield (IPM-HX1) Connectivity Issues

[meissen]

This might be more of a camera issue than Blue Iris itself, but I was hoping since there's a community here of camera users that maybe others have experienced this and/or can provide guidance.

I have two Amcrest Shield wifi cameras (model IPM-HX1) that routinely experience high latency pings and loses connection to Blue Iris. If I ping other cameras from my laptop I'm seeing 25ms to 200ms depending on how much activity is going on in my network. But if I ping these two Amcrest Shield cameras I'm seeing 1500ms+ consistently if it responds to pings at all.

The weird part is that these two Shield cameras seem to drop connectivity at the same time. I don't know if their wifi antenna just sucks compared to other cameras and that's why they both drop at the same time or what.

Amcrest support has had me put in static IP addresses, changed some of the video streaming settings, etc. but nothing seems to resolve. It's really bad at night so I thought maybe it was bandwidth related, but I'm keeping an eye on the cameras right now and they both are dropping like yo-yos.

Netgear Orbi mesh system and I have excellent signal strength around these cameras. I have 7 cameras total on Blue Iris - 5 of which are WiFi. Running Blue Iris on Windows Server 2016 on a Dell R710 with 16 CPUs and 48gb of ram. Average CPU utilization is only 15-20%.

 

[meissen]

The annoying part too - the one camera you can see the Orbi satellite on top of the kitchen cabinet ~10 feet or so away. Doesn't matter how close or far away from the access point I still get the same exact results. For example if I swap the camera in my son's room that's aimed at his toddler bed - that camera NEVER has connectivity issues... Put the Shield in its place and same problem - no signal and high ping latency while the camera that WAS aimed at the toddler bed works perfectly fine in the Shield's old location. It's not a wifi signal issue, that's for sure.

 

[meissen]

If I have multiple people viewing the stream through blue iris, wouldn't that be putting the burden on the Blue Iris server instead of the camera? Whether we're viewing through the web or tinyCam Monitor PRO - they both are pointed to the BI feed, nothing else accesses the stream directly.

Networking wise -- Comcast Internet Extreme 150mbps download, 25mbps upload, Netgear CM-700 cable modem (rated for 1.4gbps), Netgear Orbi AC3000. I would think the networking equipment I have should be able to handle the load?

 

[looney2ns]

WiFi blows for security cams. Especially when used with multiple WiFi cams.

The symptoms are exactly what you have described.

Search and read VPN primer for noobs.

 

[TonyR]

Have you tried enabling the log in the cam to see what shows up? My Amcrest IP2M-842 has a log under 'Information' that you enable and it will give date and time of event, like 'Reboot', Loss of Signal, etc.
And speaking of logs, any hints in BI's 'Status' , 'Messages'?
And lastly, have you tried resetting the cams then reconfiguring?
If all else fails, maybe install latest firmware?

 

[meissen]

I do have an Untangle appliance set up on my network and have blocked all inbound/outbound access to my cameras through the WAN interface. But, admittedly, I do have Blue Iris' webgui exposed. I'll configure the VPN app on Untangle and remove the port forward to BI. Do you think that would alleviate the issue with seeing those two cameras specifically, though? I have two Foscam 8910s and an Amcrest 1080p ProHD bullet camera running through WiFi and they work OK without any issues.

I also installed the latest firmware a few weeks ago - 2.420.AC00.17.R, Build Date: 2017-03-22; web version 3.2.1.434383.

I'll have to take a look at the camera's logs when I get home - the last time I looked at the Amcrest logs they were very sparse with not much information.

 

[TonyR]

I do have an Untangle appliance set up on my network and have blocked all inbound/outbound access to my cameras through the WAN interface. But, admittedly, I do have Blue Iris' webgui exposed. I'll configure the VPN app on Untangle and remove the port forward to BI. Do you think that would alleviate the issue with seeing those two cameras specifically, though?

Not sure, but I doubt it.

I also installed the latest firmware a few weeks ago - 2.420.AC00.17.R, Build Date: 2017-03-22; web version 3.2.1.434383.

I checked today and latest f/w is V2.520.AC00.18.R. Build date 6/29/17.

 

[meissen]

Hmm, weird. I just upgraded back in September. I'll go back out and grab the latest.

 

[meissen]

Well - that was interesting... the second that I stopped the Blue Iris service running on my server - BAM, single digit ping responses on both of the Shield cameras....

 

[meissen]

Untangle shows network layout and it seems like the pipe is hardly being used. At the highest I was seeing 140kb/s up on the internal side. This is with Blue Iris service started again and everything running. Ping responses to both cameras are stable with BI restarted.

 

[bp2008]

I hope you now realize that WiFi is an intermittent nightmare. Even when you set up multiple high-end access points in all the right places, things often do not work as they are supposed to. However in your case it sounds like it could simply be a matter of creating too much interference for yourself.

You may be able to reduce the chance of future trouble by reducing your WiFi load. The easiest thing to change is to reduce the bit rates of any wireless cameras. However that has a negative impact on image quality. It is better to run cables to everything you reasonably can. If your Blue Iris server is connected wirelessly, then wire it and disable/remove its wireless interface. That should be priority number one for ANYONE who runs a wireless NVR of any kind. Next, if any of your WiFi access points are wirelessly repeating (e.g. they don't have their own wired data link hooked up) then wire those and make sure the wireless repeating function is disabled so you get no surprises. Wireless repeaters used in camera systems are almost as bad as wireless NVRs. Lastly, run cable to servers and desktop PCs, Smart TVs, set-top boxes (Apple TV, etc), and as many cameras as you can. Basically anything that doesn't move should be a candidate for a wired network connection.

 

[bp2008]

Oh and one other thing, your Blue Iris server may have 16 cores but it is a power-hungry old fossil that is probably costing you hundreds of $$$ per year in electricity. That is to say nothing of the extra time and energy an air conditioner needs to remove the heat your server produces (if applicable).

 

[meissen]

I'm not saying I don't believe you guys, but it's just boggling my head that it's only the Amcrest Shield cameras that are exhibiting any issues and many times at the exact same time. I don't/didn't have this problem with any of the other cameras on my network. I also would have thought that if the issue was truly pipe congestion that I would see universally high latency across my network and/or issues with the other cameras losing their signal and I'm not seeing that. When the two cameras are pinging in the 1500ms+ range, I can ping the other cameras and be 20-200ms.

The beauty with the Orbi mesh system is that the satellite has its own 5ghz radio specifically for backhaul to the router. Hardwired backhaul isn't even supported.

I don't know if it was just the firmware update or restarting the BI service, but both cameras are now maintaining a consistent sub-100ms ping rate. We'll see how long this lasts...

 

[bp2008]

I'm going to guess the wifi chips in the "Shield" cameras aren't handling the congestion as well as the other cameras handle it.

Powerline network adapters are something you could try. Though you may want to try temporarily running one of the Shield cameras wired first, before spending the money. If running wired doesn't make it stable, then a powerline network adapter won't do it either.

 

[meissen]

I downgraded the bitrate on one of the Shield cameras to 640 and the other to 1024. Both were set to 2048. Might see if that helps keep things stable. Will give it a few days and see if the ping rates climb back up.

 

[meissen]

I moved the bitrates back to 2048 where it used to be last night to undo making too many changes at once. It has been 24 hours and the pings are still consistently <100ms and not dropping connection to Blue Iris. So at this point, there's only two changes which were made and appears to have fixed the issue -- upgrading the firmware and restarting the Blue Iris service. Either upgrading the firmware on both cameras resolved the issue (very plausible) or there is a bug in Blue Iris which was overloading these two cameras.