Review - TOP-201 Super Mini 720P HD IP-Cam (The Cheapest IP Cam So Far !!)

[Waldmensch]

The camera chip delivers 720p native. All other resolutions have to be scaled down. This is done to save bandwidth on network. It shouldn't be a problem to take the snapshot from native stream.

 

[Bradley Parsons]

Here are some answers to recent questions here from the manufacturer of these Network IP Camera boards/cameras

Why is Wi-Fi failing when upgrading hardware version 6510 of these Network IP Boards/Cameras to the latest firmware versions?

Answer:

The 6510 hardware version never officially supported Wi-Fi and therefore the newer firmware no longer contains any Wi-Fi drivers.

My notes: I think this might also be related to FCC part 15 certification requirements, here in the U.S. as another reason why formal Wi-Fi support was dropped for the 6510 hardware version of these Network IP Boards/Cameras.

I say this because there are two ways to certify Wi-Fi equipment under FCC part 15 ("In the U.S."). As a system or as component. But one or the other certification by the FCC must take place in the U.S. prior to being allowed to sell said equipment in the U.S.

I don't think the manufacturer ever formally certified the 6510 Network IP Board/Camera and a RT3070 Wi-Fi daughter board with antenna as a system nor do I think that the RT3070 Wi-Fi daughter boards being used with the 6510 Network IP Board/Cameras were ever FCC certified alone as a component. More details about FCC part 15 certification:

http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php/1297-IP-Camera-set-up-without-internet?p=11007&viewfull=1#post11007

Here is a link to the last working firmware version that does support Wi-Fi for the 6510 hardware version of these Network IP boards and cameras:

http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php/1812-Review-TOP-201-Super-Mini-720P-HD-IP-Cam-(The-Cheapest-IP-Cam-So-Far-!!)?p=39726&viewfull=1#post39726

Any 6510 hardware version Network IP Board/Camera can upgrade to the most current version of firmware but you will lose any Wi-Fi ability by doing so. Currently one can downgrade to the last version that supports Wi-Fi ("See link above") but this may not always be the case in the future.

Personally, as time moves forward. I would worry about compatibility issues with CMS, VMS and other utilities supplied by the manufacturer, if one remains on the last working Wi-Fi firmware, for a long period of time.

Why when I use Alarm Input to get images sent via FTP am I getting two images per alarm vs. one image per alarm?

The Network IP Boards/Cameras send one image when the alarm period starts and one image when the alarm period ends when Alarm Input takes place.

When will the Network IP boards and cameras support pulling snapshots using a URL like http://mycamera/snapshot?

There are no plans to support this feature

Don

Thanks Don for the update, did they mention if there Is another wifi module that they will support in the future in its place? Not that big of deal for me as cat6 runs are just about done and all my model 6510 cameras will be hard wired.i do have a few model 1510 cameras that use the same wifi module and I presume they will be in the same boat sooner then later.

 

[tstalzer]

It shouldn't be a problem to take the snapshot from native stream.

Hello
Do you have any information about the protocol? I would be interested in extracting JPG images from the stream

Regards

Thomas

 

[Waldmensch]

I tried a lot including grabbing images from RTSP with motion on a raspi - no way. The stream isn't MJPEG. With motion the raspi CPU goes up t0 permanent 99% and the grabbed images are crap. Only chance to get regular snapshots for website purposes is to fire the alert input with an Arduino and let the cam upload to FTP. Unfortunately you get a low res image with a wrong aspect ratio. That's why I use a python script to bring things in the right order.
Finally I'm not really satisfied with this cam. I had expected that a 720p cam is able to deliver 720p images by http call or regular upload to FTP. Both is not possible. So I'm further looking for a camera modell which is able to do that. I believe I'll land on a raspicam finally

Hello
Do you have any information about the protocol? I would be interested in extracting JPG images from the stream

Regards

Thomas

 

[Waldmensch]

I've used TCP, better "motion" compiled with ffmpeg and RTSP support does it by default. Maybe the Raspi1 CPU is simply to bad for such grabbing stuff. But I'm not willing to use an i7 near to the cam to let it do a job which can be done by the cam nativly - generate snapshots. Other cams have the http snapshot functionality, so it's just a question of firmware or less payed developers. Using IE to taking high Res Images is also not an option. I'm on linux normally and have to use the Windows Notebook from my wife for each configuration. :sad2:

 

[Bradley Parsons]

Does anyone have there top 201 connected to a Hikvision DS-7108N-SN/P I'm looking at ordering one but wanted to make sure these cameras work on it.

 

[Ghosty]

Hello,

Thank you all for this great forum. It was very helpful so far
Anyone who has a camera with Hi3516C board could confirm the resolution of the image sent via FTP or e-mail?
I own two of the 3518 but they are only able to send ~700x500 (PAL or NTSC) image, but not 720p images.

Thank you,
Tib

 

[Ghosty]

Hello, this is correct. Please see this:

http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php/1812-Review-TOP-201-Super-Mini-720P-HD-IP-Cam-(The-Cheapest-IP-Cam-So-Far-!!)?p=39877&viewfull=1#post39877

Don

Thanks Don,
you just saved me some money
It's a shame that the full HD camera can only send D1 image by it's own :-(
Just found the datasheet for the Hi3518A and Hi3516C has the same CPU. So as you mentioned, it must be a resource problem.
There is one called Hi3516 (without the C) and it has ARM Cortex A9, that should give it some boost.

 

[Waldmensch]

In my opinion the best way is to buy a raspberry with camera and a dummy housing to build the raspberry in.
@Don: is there any chance to get the Firmware SDK or modification kit to build own firmwares?

 

[Roy Cormier]

I haven't read this whole thread, so maybe someone has already posted something similar. But I've written some scripts to do various things to the cameras such as trigger alarms, reboot, change the IP address settings, etc. Then I wrote a separate application that listens for log messages from the cameras to record snapshots, video, and a few other things.

This one is just an example, you could easily change it to execute whatever commands you want:

#!/usr/bin/env python
# Roy Cormier - roy@roycormier.net - 04/01/2015
# This script will trigger a motion alarm on the camera
# Usage: ./filename.py <ip address>


import getpass
import sys
import telnetlib

host = sys.argv[1]
user = "put your username here"
password = "put your password here"

tn = telnetlib.Telnet(host,"9527")

cont=0
attempts=0
while cont<1:
try:
tn.write("\n")
response = tn.read_until("name:", timeout=3)
print response
attempts=attempts+1
except EOFError as e:
print "Connection closed: %s" % e

if "name:" in response:
tn.write(user + "\n")
print "Sent username "+ user
tn.write(password + "\n")
print "Sent password *"
cont=1
else:
if "admin$" in response: #already logged in
print "Already logged in"
cont=1
if attempts > 5:
cont=1

cont=0
attempts=0
while cont<1:
try:
tn.write("\n")
response = tn.read_until("admin$ ", timeout=3)
print response
except EOFError as e:
print "Connection closed: %s" % e

if "admin$" in response: #already logged in
print "Succesfully logged in"
print "triggering motion alarm"
tn.write("alarm -t m\n")
cont=1
else:
print "Failed."
tn.write("quit\n")
print "Logged out"
tn.close()

 

[VorlonFrog]

@Waldmensch : I built a fully-featured busybox 1.23.2 executable that works from an NFS share for now. Here's a download link for my Hi3518E firmware backup, which includes the busybox executable.
http://www.sendspace.com/filegroup/bHzj3Z9fWdh9tx3OWlnQ6g

Courtesy of http://nemon.org/ipcam-ipr1631x/ here's the SDK 1.0.7 download link:
https://mega.co.nz/#!69tXHCAD!spJmcKzH3WUmOOyTMVxIc07N4m6Bu8m3ziDhURaKjgM

It requires a bit of twiddling to get fully setup, but there's a readme_en.txt file embedded which helps.
I had to add a line SHELL=/bin/bash to the top of the Makefile to get the pushd and popd commands to work.

Courtesy of http://www.gadgetvictims.com/2014/05/outdoor-ip-camera-amovision-am-q6320.html here's a Dericam CGI reference document:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9kFXSWngqLWRDAwU0pMOUJPZ3M/edit?pli=1

 

[VorlonFrog]

@TheUberOverLord : Previously, I believe you asked about a picture of the USB signals coming from the 8-hole edge connector on some Hi3518 boards. Courtesy of this AliExpress page here is a photo of a similar Hi3516 camera board, showing the USB connector on pins 1-4 of that connector. From another of that same supplier's AliExpress pages, here is the pinout:

1 GROUND
2 USB Data Positive
3 USB Data Negative
4 +5 Volts DC
5 Audio Output
6 Audio Input
7 Audio Ground
8 No connection

These appear to be the connectors for that 8-hole cluster.

 

[VorlonFrog]

username:admin
password:
login(admin, ******, Console, address)
admin$ snap -h
snap -s show snap status
snap -d 0 set debug status[0] or [1]
snap -p path set debug path
snap -g chn path get a pic
admin$

So, Roy's Python script could also issue a 'snap -g 0 /tmp/snap.jpg' command to generate a snapshot file. Then it would be a matter of retrieving the snapshot file from the /tmp directory, if possible.

 

[Waldmensch]

What resolution is used on "snap"? Is it 720p or the lowres stream?

 

[VorlonFrog]

@Waldmensch: I believe the "chn" channel argument specifies whether it takes Channel 0 (hi-res stream) or Channel 1 (lo-res stream). Here's the snapshot file to my shared drive via NFS:

vf@DEBIAN810:/nfs_export/Hi3518E$ ls -la *.jpg
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 49502 Aug 5 06:50 snap.jpg
vf@DEBIAN810:/nfs_export/Hi3518E$ file snap.jpg
snap.jpg: JPEG image data, JFIF standard 1.01, aspect ratio, density 1x1, segment length 16, baseline, precision 8, 704x480, frames 3

 

[jstrom]

Hi!

I found this great information resource during investigating the TOP-201 cameras. I just bought 2 for fun, and after some experiments I got them partially working. My goal is to be able to get these working without using a Windows computer, and especially not any ActiveX (who could *possibly* come up with the idea to use a solution requiring ActiveX??).

Some random notes, from testing the devices individually:
During setup they where connected to fully isolated networks (with no internet access at all, unless explicitly opened in my network firewall. My test laptop had access to port 80/tcp and 554/tcp towards the device). A Mac lapop was used, with Safari to test with.

The first unit responded to ICMP (ping) on 192.168.1.10, but did not respond on port 80.
The unit tried to lookup the domain secu100.net (54.72.86.70).

The unit repeatedly tried to send a UDP packet to port 7999 on a few different IPs, such as 112.124.0.188, 76.73.118.194 and 54.72.86.70.
The payload of the packet seems to be the device serial ID.

This was also sent to port 8000 on 54.72.86.70.

Allowing up port 7999 on these IPs did not do anything. Opening up port 8000 did however; the host replied, and the device in turn sent a larger UDP packet which also seemed to include the firmware version.
After this little remote handshake, it seems the device woke up, and the web interface can now be accessed. If I now block port 8000 and reboot the camera, it still seem to work. Thus, it seems this is a one-time thing?
The web interface shows something which looks look like a Login prompt. I say "looks like", since everything is in Chinese.

---
Now for the second unit, visually identical but some light scratches on the back (refurb?). This seems to be able to startup without every talking on port 8000 (it was re-blocked). Web UI accesible.

---
(Back to the first unit, but the second seems to behave the same way, at least the basics)

The device has a sticker with the text "User: SUPER, Password: " on it. This did not work in the web interface, but the username "admin" and blank password, as seen on other images & in this thread, did work.
After doing some investigative work, I managed to find the version info from the UI: Build Date:2014/10/23 16:54:2, System: V4.02.R12.0q0006510.10010.1407.

After identifying the "play" button, the quicktime video started to play, with approx 1.3 seconds of delay (filming a subsecond timer ticking on screen, looking at it with the video browser). On the right hand side I seem to have some pan/zoom/tilt controls which does nothing (surprise!).

Telnet access on port 9527 was possible without issues. I managed to change the time, and the IP using the following commands:

$ time -s 2015-08-05 23:23
$ netitf -ip 192.168.1.11 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.1


Then I reconnected to the new IP, and tried to save the config (yes, pure guessing here):


$ cfg -p
First Config File Path:/mnt/mtd/Config/Json
Second Config File Path:/mnt/mtd/Config/Json

Custom Config File Path:/mnt/custom/CustomConfig
$ cfg -g NetWork /mnt/mtd/Config/Json

NetWork: Write change to file /mnt/mtd/Config/Json/NetWork.custom OK!
$ reboot

After reboot, it came up on the old IP. It had apparently not changed.

Questions
So, as a new owner of these, I've got a few questions, which I hope someone here might be able to help me with, or give me some pointers on where to dig for further info
1. Does your device have a high-pitch buzzing noise coming from them? Both of my devices have a steady buzz at power up, after approx 30s the device has completed booting (I guess) and the steady buzz is changed to more of a...frenzy buzz...which seems to vary a bit, especially with load (i.e. starting video).

2. Any idea on how to save the network configuration from the telnet interface?
3. Any idea on how to change arbitrary config fields?
4. Any idea on how to change the camera name? 'cfg -d AVEnc 0' dumps a JSON struct where the key at VideoWidget.ChannelTitle.Name contains "CAM01", which is embedded in the video..
5. Or how to change the language? The embedded video timestamp has 3 Chinese characters after the seconds marker. What does it say in english?
6. Any luck with the "shell" command ("Linux shell prompt!" in the help)? It gives me a blank prompt, and when pressing enter i only get ": not found"... Only way to exit is power-cycle camera.

Thanks!

 

[VorlonFrog]

As a Windows user, I was forced to use Internet Exploder to execute the ActiveX (who in this day and age uses it and WHY?!?) maintenance routines. I also found the (again, Windows tool, but GNU license) OnVif Device Manager (ODM) tool to be quite helpful.

1. Nope, no buzzing noise from my Hi3518 camera module, but the processor chip certainly could use a heat-sink to dissipate that heat.

5. It's a drop-down that's only displayed in Internet Explorer, in the upper right-hand corner. It doesn't show up in Firefox at all.
6. I encountered the same strange reaction to the 'shell' command as you observed. Had to reboot the device to exit.

 

[jstrom]

As a Windows user, I was forced to use Internet Exploder to execute the ActiveX (who in this day and age uses it and WHY?!?) maintenance routines. I also found the (again, Windows tool, but GNU license) OnVif Device Manager (ODM) tool to be quite helpful.

1. Nope, no buzzing noise from my Hi3518 camera module, but the processor chip certainly could use a heat-sink to dissipate that heat.

5. It's a drop-down that's only displayed in Internet Explorer, in the upper right-hand corner. It doesn't show up in Firefox at all.
6. I encountered the same strange reaction to the 'shell' command as you observed. Had to reboot the device to exit.

1. The buzzing noise problem was solved by replacing the power supply.. I was using a switched 12VDC supply, which at least measured 12 VDC RMS, but something was apparently wrong with it. Using my linear lab supply it runs perfectly silent.

5. Yeah, noticed this when trying to fake user agent. nothing works unless the active X component is alive though.

If you intend to use a Chrome browser, then you will need to enable NPAPI plugins first.

https://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/

Once you have installed Apples Quicktime media player. You need to use this URL for non IE based browsers that will only be able to access this IP Cameras video streams:

http://192.168.1.10:/Login.htm

The above will simply use the Quicktime media player in HTML with RTSP.

One could review the HTML source code of Login.htm and modify a version to instead use VLC or ffmpeg or other media players as well.

I used Safari which has Quicktime by default, and yes that works fine out of the box! Also got the RTSP URL from the video element (web inspector), and it plays fine in VLC.

Edit: Actually no special URL was required on my device, just pointing the browser to the IP automatically selected the "basic" non ActiveX-version of the page. In Chinese.

You can use the manufactures CMS and VMS application ("On Windows systems") which coincidentally both use the ActiveX interface internally for what's called remote configuration with the cameras which show the same configuration screens as IE ("Internet Explorer") does when you access the cameras configuration settings.

The issue really is that the manufacturer uses a proprietary interface. Even their live video is a proprietary format when not accessing video from the camera using RTSP.

I gave up my telnet attempts, and first tried the Onvif Device Manager in a Virtual Box setup. It managed to talk with the device, but I couldn't do much. Tried to change timezone & time, without succeeding. I eventually gave up on that too, and went down the ActiveX road. Now I've got the IP changed, and time setup etc.

Because the cameras currently don't support any CGI like URL capabilities. There currently are no methods to use other Operating Systems if the manufacturer has not provided a application for it, like they do for iOS and Android. The manufacturer does have a SDK, but it also seems more geared toward Windows than any other Operating Systems.

Note: I do have a developers .zip file which I put together, that includes the manufacturers Windows .NET SDK for their cameras here:

http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php?1812-Review-TOP-201-Super-Mini-720P-HD-IP-Cam-(The-Cheapest-IP-Cam-So-Far-!!)&p=19499&viewfull=1#post19499

Don

I checked out the ZIP file, and in user-x-cramfs.img we can find bin/Sofia, which could probably be deassembled to figure out what the telnet CLI could do.. Not on my todo-list today though.

However, during use of the ActiveX component, I dumped the traffic on the port 34567 used by the proprietary interface. From an initial quick look, this seems to be a request/reply protocol, with some header which includes a 4-byte payload length field, and some actual payload. The payload is plain JSON with easy to read names. So, it is probably not that tricky to write a simple interface which can at least do the basic tasks such as set IP, timezone etc.


I've been running one of the cameras for the better part of the day using VLC, and I must say I'm quite impressed with the image quality (considering the price)! However, another issue came up now. Suddenly, the image had frozen (not sure when; the time was way of on this unconfigured camera). I tried to restart VLC, and it froze after 2 seconds again. The Onvif interface seemed to be able to receive the image though, at least for a while...
I tried a hard reboot of the camera, with no success. Left the power off for a few minutes, still same issue.. Weird! Making it more weird is that I tried VLC on another machine now, and it works perfectly fine.. Odd indeed, but probably not related to the camera then...

 

[Zorac]

do the firmware updates make these cameras any more stable? i find blueiris looses the signal of the cameras repeatedly over the course of a day.

 

[Tommmii]

I've been trying to go over (most) of the info in this huge thread, perhaps a separate subforum might be usefull?

Has anyone had luck with recording to a NAS, straight from the camera - without the need for any other software running?