Changing it the Chinese camera to English/International is easy on 5.2.5, I can show you how for free. PM me for details.
hikvision 5.2.8
- Thread starter jordanb
- Start date
Can you post them here or do they require a hack that you would rather not shout about?
I can, just working out some nuances so maybe later today. There's been some language corrections to the Russian menus someone asked me to work out. Also, does it make sense to have regional languages be default, like one where Spanish is default or one where French is default, that way you don't have to select the language each time on international versions.
OK, for those that are ready, want to try it out. I've created it with all languages, but you can chose which default language you want. English, Russian and Spanish. This is the way it works.
First create a directory on the root of your C drive, for example c:\camstuff. Then right click, select Share With and Specific people. Add everyone.
Then go to http://networkcameracritic.com/languages/EN-IEfile.tar.gz and save it to the directory you created above. Substitute EN with RU or ES for Russian and Spanish.
Then login into the camera and turn telnet on. If it's all in Chinese, after you log in, go to Configuration which is the right most tab on the top menu. Then select the 3rd menu item on the left, that's Advanced Configuration, then select the 5th menu item, that's Security, last tab on right and check the box that says telnet and ssh if you want.
Then you telnet into the camera (I use the free PUTTY program), mount the share with a mount command with the IP address of your PC, the share name and username/password, issue df to make sure it's mounted, copy the file to /da/IEfile.tar.gz and reboot. After it comes back up, the all Chinese menus may still be there, this is browser cache, try refreshing the screen by doing a CTRL-F5
1. mount -t cifs //192.168.1.50/stuff /mnt/nfs07 -o username=you,password=yourpw
2. df
3. cp /mnt/nfs07/EN-IEfile.tar.gz /dav/IEfile.tar.gz
4. reboot
First create a directory on the root of your C drive, for example c:\camstuff. Then right click, select Share With and Specific people. Add everyone.
Then go to http://networkcameracritic.com/languages/EN-IEfile.tar.gz and save it to the directory you created above. Substitute EN with RU or ES for Russian and Spanish.
Then login into the camera and turn telnet on. If it's all in Chinese, after you log in, go to Configuration which is the right most tab on the top menu. Then select the 3rd menu item on the left, that's Advanced Configuration, then select the 5th menu item, that's Security, last tab on right and check the box that says telnet and ssh if you want.
Then you telnet into the camera (I use the free PUTTY program), mount the share with a mount command with the IP address of your PC, the share name and username/password, issue df to make sure it's mounted, copy the file to /da/IEfile.tar.gz and reboot. After it comes back up, the all Chinese menus may still be there, this is browser cache, try refreshing the screen by doing a CTRL-F5
1. mount -t cifs //192.168.1.50/stuff /mnt/nfs07 -o username=you,password=yourpw
2. df
3. cp /mnt/nfs07/EN-IEfile.tar.gz /dav/IEfile.tar.gz
4. reboot
My goal was to put this in a windows program, but sort of busy now. If you need help, I can always teamviewer in or telnet in and help you with this.
To help?
Help me?
Did I asked for help?
Under windows (microsoft) do it even easier
So going back to v: 5.2.8 multilanguage seems to be delivered from China with a crappy hacked FW who simply doesn't work.
The most frustrated is the fact on box factory labelled:
01/2015
and fw v5.2.8_141231
The most incredibe Inside IEfile, most of the files are quite old : 15 July 2014.
Looking in other recent cams, 5.2.3/5.2.5, files Inside are more recent September2014/December 2014...
Strange:sad2:
5.2.8 in chineese only works, but requested internal modifications not to reboot every 5/6 min.
Other way need to go back to 5.2.5 to have other languages.
Open thinking: True stickers, oldfiles inside FW and 5.2.8?
The most frustrated is the fact on box factory labelled:
01/2015
and fw v5.2.8_141231
The most incredibe Inside IEfile, most of the files are quite old : 15 July 2014.
Looking in other recent cams, 5.2.3/5.2.5, files Inside are more recent September2014/December 2014...
Strange:sad2:
5.2.8 in chineese only works, but requested internal modifications not to reboot every 5/6 min.
Other way need to go back to 5.2.5 to have other languages.
Open thinking: True stickers, oldfiles inside FW and 5.2.8?
Here's what you can try that's low risk. Use 7zip or WinRAR to open up the EN-IEfile.tar.gz I put out there. Take the doc directory in the file and copy it to the /home/doc directory on the camera. This is a temporary as it gets re-written at boot time, but you can verify that it's working before committing it to the IEfile.tar.gz file. Also, even if something goes wrong, anything in the /dav directory gets overwritten during a firmware update.
I would advise not doing this on 5.2.8. Not only will it not work, but under a specific set of circumstances it could also brick your camera (yes even files in /home)
I took at look at the /dav directory you sent me and ironically, the hack they used on your 5.2.8 camera is the same one I proposed here for 5.2.5. Never seen it before, but affirms I'm on the right track. Here's the code below from your 5.2.8 camera and it has the same XML files for various languages. Adding my hack would not make a difference as it's already there and 5.2.8 may be an unstable release, don't know but some have loaded 5.2.5 over 5.2.8 which.
Is the day of week on your camera in English or Chinese?
If you do go to 5.2.5 for whatever reason, you can use my EN-IEFile.tar.gz to get to the same level of English you have now. If you apply 5.2.8 again for whatever reason and make it Chinese only, just copy the IEfile.tar.gz from what you sent me and it will make it International/English again.
At least we know something now, you can in theory use the same hack in 5.2.8 as in 5.2.5. If anyone has a Chinese only 5.2.8, I can send you the file specific for 5.2.8 as I have not had a chance to do a bit for bit compare, safer to take the one from a 5.2.8 camera.
Is the day of week on your camera in English or Chinese?
If you do go to 5.2.5 for whatever reason, you can use my EN-IEFile.tar.gz to get to the same level of English you have now. If you apply 5.2.8 again for whatever reason and make it Chinese only, just copy the IEfile.tar.gz from what you sent me and it will make it International/English again.
At least we know something now, you can in theory use the same hack in 5.2.8 as in 5.2.5. If anyone has a Chinese only 5.2.8, I can send you the file specific for 5.2.8 as I have not had a chance to do a bit for bit compare, safer to take the one from a 5.2.8 camera.
Hopefully this will be helpful rather than anything negative.
This approach as it is won't work - it's not that 5.2.8 is unstable, but rather it's different. The supplied firmware was indeed poorly hacked (actually saying it was hacked is generous!).
I've seen the specific camera in question and fixed the reboot issue (for free I might add) so it's stable, but if you want non Chinese language then I would advise going to 5.2.5.
Whatever you decide - good luck!
This approach as it is won't work - it's not that 5.2.8 is unstable, but rather it's different. The supplied firmware was indeed poorly hacked (actually saying it was hacked is generous!).
I've seen the specific camera in question and fixed the reboot issue (for free I might add) so it's stable, but if you want non Chinese language then I would advise going to 5.2.5.
Whatever you decide - good luck!
I wanted to add some comments and special thanks:
- CBX who spend around 1 hour connected to this Chineese cam version and fixed the reboot issue (and for FREE : thanks a lot and works correctly)
- networkcameracritic, who shared his work in public for all interested people
- All others for their contribution in the topics providing "5.2.5 zip", "xxx, tar.gz files" and their working approach methods
- and this one who is the initiator of my curiosity with it: http://www.arden.ie/?p=319
But all this is only for personal use: Not for profits, not for reseale, not to disturb the resealers and vendors.
Just Hobby and curiosity, educational purposes : Work around as Hik allows that opening back doors.
Hik decided to play both sides allowing grey market to grow and improve their sales.
Now, this is the reverse of the medal and why these posts around FW existed.
I'm the 1st one to be surprised and see we can buy a cam half the price and used it whit some workaround correctly for our personal use.
Thanks to the forums and topics and people who shares the same passion.
We don't want to break resellers buisness in USA as some claimed in other topics and forums.
Here in my region, we cannot simply buy series 2 from Hik reseller or from Hik directly.
They decided not to go with series 2 range as they are too cheap and will disturb the regular pricing face to other models and vendors in the market.
So no support from CS and no warranty, normal.
They know perfectly a parallel world exist through Ebay/Aliexpress but they don't care about as these models are not officially proposed in my region.
So free to us to buy from anywhere and play with around a group of people who shares the same passion.
Just think, forums are International and we can see people from different Country sharing their passion.
This is that the forums...
And Honestly: which profesionnal will spend time here and propose these "series 2" to their customers?
This is just for DIY home security, that's it.
I know some smiling, others are always arrogant in front of those people who try to advance and share friendly their work.
So let's consider v 5.2.8 is a new Challenge and will generate curiosity for some.
And as I know every new firmware revision introduces some minor changes, will be interesting to know more about and generate some workaround.
Thanks for reading.
- CBX who spend around 1 hour connected to this Chineese cam version and fixed the reboot issue (and for FREE : thanks a lot and works correctly)
- networkcameracritic, who shared his work in public for all interested people
- All others for their contribution in the topics providing "5.2.5 zip", "xxx, tar.gz files" and their working approach methods
- and this one who is the initiator of my curiosity with it: http://www.arden.ie/?p=319
But all this is only for personal use: Not for profits, not for reseale, not to disturb the resealers and vendors.
Just Hobby and curiosity, educational purposes : Work around as Hik allows that opening back doors.
Hik decided to play both sides allowing grey market to grow and improve their sales.
Now, this is the reverse of the medal and why these posts around FW existed.
I'm the 1st one to be surprised and see we can buy a cam half the price and used it whit some workaround correctly for our personal use.
Thanks to the forums and topics and people who shares the same passion.
We don't want to break resellers buisness in USA as some claimed in other topics and forums.
Here in my region, we cannot simply buy series 2 from Hik reseller or from Hik directly.
They decided not to go with series 2 range as they are too cheap and will disturb the regular pricing face to other models and vendors in the market.
So no support from CS and no warranty, normal.
They know perfectly a parallel world exist through Ebay/Aliexpress but they don't care about as these models are not officially proposed in my region.
So free to us to buy from anywhere and play with around a group of people who shares the same passion.
Just think, forums are International and we can see people from different Country sharing their passion.
This is that the forums...
And Honestly: which profesionnal will spend time here and propose these "series 2" to their customers?
This is just for DIY home security, that's it.
I know some smiling, others are always arrogant in front of those people who try to advance and share friendly their work.
So let's consider v 5.2.8 is a new Challenge and will generate curiosity for some.
And as I know every new firmware revision introduces some minor changes, will be interesting to know more about and generate some workaround.
Thanks for reading.
Last edited by a moderator:
I received a Hikvision 2332 purchased from one of the Chinese sellers on Aliexpress today. The camera had 5.2.8 firmware and it demonstrated the exact same problem as the 5.2.8 2332 I received last week, that I mentioned on this topic. It is also rebooting every 4 to 5 minutes, I've had to downgrade to 5.2.5 firmware and again I'm stuck with a chinese Language web interface. So frustrating. I will have to get CBX to do his magic on Thursday.
Hi Phillip,
You have 3 alternatives here :
a) Going back to 5.2.5 and find on topics how to make it English (but not full English as OSD still shows Chineese somewhere) and if it's fails, only solution is to do TFTP to recover FW.
Works and request some kwnoledge on how to do it....
b) Go through CBX to have the cam full multilanguage with 5.2.5
c) Go through CBX to have it 5.2.8 but Chineese as also works
These are my conclusions today about possible issues for moment.
Or maybe some one have a better solution today...
But don't forget, settings where only made once at installation process...
Once working, you forgot it and doesn't matter if the camera FW is Indian, Chineese, Portugues, Spanish, etc....
You just need to have one in English, then you compare the place of options and settings using the browser, so easy than that.
Personnally, I decided to stay with my last one in full Chineese, after CBX magic touch, just to check if I find some improvements comparing to other ones in English as there is anywhere comments about improvements/corrections/bugs between 5.2.3/5.2.5/5.2.8.
Hope this helps
You have 3 alternatives here :
a) Going back to 5.2.5 and find on topics how to make it English (but not full English as OSD still shows Chineese somewhere) and if it's fails, only solution is to do TFTP to recover FW.
Works and request some kwnoledge on how to do it....
b) Go through CBX to have the cam full multilanguage with 5.2.5
c) Go through CBX to have it 5.2.8 but Chineese as also works
These are my conclusions today about possible issues for moment.
Or maybe some one have a better solution today...
But don't forget, settings where only made once at installation process...
Once working, you forgot it and doesn't matter if the camera FW is Indian, Chineese, Portugues, Spanish, etc....
You just need to have one in English, then you compare the place of options and settings using the browser, so easy than that.
Personnally, I decided to stay with my last one in full Chineese, after CBX magic touch, just to check if I find some improvements comparing to other ones in English as there is anywhere comments about improvements/corrections/bugs between 5.2.3/5.2.5/5.2.8.
Hope this helps
Last edited by a moderator:
So I bought several cameras that were labeled 5.2.8 on the label. However, they were showing an older Revision of 5.2.3 when I logged in. So I decided to update one of them to the latest 5.2.3 that was available. That turned out to be a huge fail. Recovered to 5.2.5 and with networkcameracritic's instructions, I now have the English language available on the 5.2.5 firmware. My only issue is that the day of the week in the OSD is still in Chinese. Not a big deal, since I can just not display that field.
Now, my bigger question since my OCD wants all of my cameras at the same FW revision.
Do the cameras cache or persist the actual firmware anywhere on them so that I can extract the alleged "5.2.3" firmware from a good camera and TFTP it to my update botched 5.2.5 camera so they are all the same?
Now, my bigger question since my OCD wants all of my cameras at the same FW revision.
Do the cameras cache or persist the actual firmware anywhere on them so that I can extract the alleged "5.2.3" firmware from a good camera and TFTP it to my update botched 5.2.5 camera so they are all the same?
S474N
Getting the hang of it
- Feb 18, 2015
- 148
- 11
I bought cams and on package was 5.2.8, inside of cam is 5.2.3. I upgraded it and only chinese :-( I use networkcameracritic's and this YT video instructions. Now will be everything ok.
But have questions:
- what number is chinese region?
- how they make to English? Each pack open up and hacking?
But have questions:
- what number is chinese region?
- how they make to English? Each pack open up and hacking?