Seeking recommendations…easy setup ip camera.

[Rick Simonton]

I have 3 hikvision ip cameras which seem to require a masters degree in computer science to configure. Im not using a dvr or nvr. Is there a brand or line of cameras out there that are simpler and more user friendly? Thanks in advance!

 

[wittaj]

Most of us here know that the Dahua and Hikvisions of the world do not cater to the "consumer" market - their target audience is professional installers, so we are considered "prosumer" and we are fortunate to get our hands on these types of cameras and NVRs instead of consumer grade junk and not having to go thru professional installers to get quality gear. Now the downside is we get them at a discount and without manuals and Dahua and Hikvision support and thus are on our own to figure it out. And we are just fine with that because of a forum like this!

If you are looking for simpler and more user friendly system, that is what the consumer grade cameras sold at Best Buy and Walmart are for. Those would be the Arlos, Reolinks, Ring, Nest, etc. and they have customer support you can call and they can jump onto your system if you cannot figure something out.

Arlos you just hang them up and scan a QR code. A kit of 3 cameras and a base can be installed in under 10 minutes.

Now the downside to these consumer grade cameras are very poor night performance. You will be able to tell the police what time something happened, but probably not be able to provide useful video that can capture a clean picture of who did it.

What issues are you having? Maybe list the model names and what trouble you have and see if someone here can help provide guidance on what to do.

 

[Rick Simonton]

Well that explains a lot! Thank you for that! And presents a 3 way dilemma, use junk with crappy image, sit with it for weeks trying to figuring it out, or hiring a pro to set it up for me. The 3rd option has not panned out because i could not find a pro who knows both hikvision, and macs. In a perfect world he would know Open VPN also, as when i had my first camera it was online and got hacked. Kids no doubt, they closed the camera iris about 4 stops, changed the title to “hacked”, and changed the password for good measure.
The good folks at this forum, got me through that, and strongly suggested i use a VPN. But i could not get it to work so i keep the cameras only on my LAN these days.

My current problem is my third camera ( ds-2cd2232-i5 ) does not have internal sd slot, like my other two, so im trying to record directly to my mac. (OS X 10.11.6) But i cant get the camera via web interface to recognize the drives on my mac.

 

[mat200]

Well that explains a lot! Thank you for that! And presents a 3 way dilemma, use junk with crappy image, sit with it for weeks trying to figuring it out, or hiring a pro to set it up for me. The 3rd option has not panned out because i could not find a pro who knows both hikvision, and macs. In a perfect world he would know Open VPN also, as when i had my first camera it was online and got hacked. Kids no doubt, they closed the camera iris about 4 stops, changed the title to “hacked”, and changed the password for good measure.
The good folks at this forum, got me through that, and strongly suggested i use a VPN. But i could not get it to work so i keep the cameras only on my LAN these days.

My current problem is my third camera ( ds-2cd2232-i5 ) does not have internal sd slot, like my other two, so im trying to record directly to my mac. (OS X 10.11.6) But i cant get the camera via web interface to recognize the drives on my mac.

Hi @Rick Simonton

1) As you know now, there really is not a perfect solution.
2) Consumer grade easier to setup cameras have numerous downsides .. one is typically they are cloud cameras.
3) IoT devices, will eventually get "hacked" / attached.
4) Either you need to take the time to learn to more to manage this better yourself, or hire someone, .. this is in effect what people do when they go Ring / Arlo / Nest - they are hiring someone to help manage the cameras.
5) Mac OS - you will have more limited options with this OS
6) Browser based controls - again, more limited options as some cameras no longer run a webservice out of box ( security and upgrade issues ).

Hikvision, check to see if they have config tools that run on a MAC to allow you to configure the cameras.

Otherwise, consider using Windows OS and Blue Iris or Hikvision's OEM software

 

[Rick Simonton]

Hi @Rick Simonton

1) As you know now, there really is not a perfect solution.
2) Consumer grade easier to setup cameras have numerous downsides .. one is typically they are cloud cameras.
3) IoT devices, will eventually get "hacked" / attached.
4) Either you need to take the time to learn to more to manage this better yourself, or hire someone, .. this is in effect what people do when they go Ring / Arlo / Nest - they are hiring someone to help manage the cameras.
5) Mac OS - you will have more limited options with this OS
6) Browser based controls - again, more limited options as some cameras no longer run a webservice out of box ( security and upgrade issues ).

Hikvision, check to see if they have config tools that run on a MAC to allow you to configure the cameras.

Otherwise, consider using Windows OS and Blue Iris or Hikvision's OEM software

Thank you for your insight.