Sweet! LTS is releasing an ONVIF compatible doorbell with SD card slot and 940nm IR

Bitslizer

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Anyone found this 180515 firmware to be less stable than the 171219?
 

Bitslizer

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HELP... had to factory reset to update my Wifi configuration, but I can't login to the webportal and my NVR can't access it anymore. How do I re-activate it to set a new password?
 

alienatsf

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HELP... had to factory reset to update my Wifi configuration, but I can't login to the webportal and my NVR can't access it anymore. How do I re-activate it to set a new password?
there is a reset button on the side after taking off the front cover. hold and press it for a few seconds until it starts to blink red. once it is reset, the username is still admin, you can setup your own password on phone app, or leave it without setting it, the default password is admin plus verification code on the sticker. so if verification code is ABCDEF, then password is adminABCDEF. you can reset your password later using ivms-4200 or web GUI interface. good luck
 

Bitslizer

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Many thanks, the default password worked, wish that was documented somewhere! I googled half the night for it
 

danmichele

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I am having a hard time getting this camera to continue working... I have the laview version with firmware 180515 installed. The camera is continually dropping it's IP address even though the router and wifi extender both see the camera's MAC address connected. I followed the recommendation of a previous user to put a 2.4ghz wifi extender very near the doorbell to alleviate any connectivity issues. I don't think its dropping wifi, just the IP somehow.

Has anyone found a way to do a static IP address on this unit? When I do a DHCP reservation for the camera the entire camera freezes and refuses to connect at all. I am happy with the video quality of the camera but very unhappy about the stability so far.
 

alienatsf

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I am having a hard time getting this camera to continue working... I have the laview version with firmware 180515 installed. The camera is continually dropping it's IP address even though the router and wifi extender both see the camera's MAC address connected. I followed the recommendation of a previous user to put a 2.4ghz wifi extender very near the doorbell to alleviate any connectivity issues. I don't think its dropping wifi, just the IP somehow.

Has anyone found a way to do a static IP address on this unit? When I do a DHCP reservation for the camera the entire camera freezes and refuses to connect at all. I am happy with the video quality of the camera but very unhappy about the stability so far.
i personally tested this 180515 on a RCA brand. i also have the laview brand but i didn't test that on it. the 180515 to me is unstable. it consumes more power. every time the ring button is pressed the doorbell gets rebooted and hence dropped out of network. i only tested it during day time. i can't imagine how bad the firmware is at night time when the IR is turned on consuming even more power.

i measured continuous voltage across the camera at regular load and max load at night. i found at night when the IR was turned on, the voltage dropped by 1 vac. when the speaker was also used to announce the wifi is connected, the voltage dropped even more, like 2 to 3 vac. when it dropped below the threshold voltage (i assume 12 to 10 vac) the doorbell camera rebooted.

so for your case i would think downgrading the firmware back to 171218 is the best option. laview has 171218, LTS has 171219. i guess they are the same.
 

Bitslizer

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I am having a hard time getting this camera to continue working... I have the laview version with firmware 180515 installed. The camera is continually dropping it's IP address even though the router and wifi extender both see the camera's MAC address connected. I followed the recommendation of a previous user to put a 2.4ghz wifi extender very near the doorbell to alleviate any connectivity issues. I don't think its dropping wifi, just the IP somehow.

Has anyone found a way to do a static IP address on this unit? When I do a DHCP reservation for the camera the entire camera freezes and refuses to connect at all. I am happy with the video quality of the camera but very unhappy about the stability so far.
i personally tested this 180515 on a RCA brand. i also have the laview brand but i didn't test that on it. the 180515 to me is unstable. it consumes more power. every time the ring button is pressed the doorbell gets rebooted and hence dropped out of network. i only tested it during day time. i can't imagine how bad the firmware is at night time when the IR is turned on consuming even more power.

i measured continuous voltage across the camera at regular load and max load at night. i found at night when the IR was turned on, the voltage dropped by 1 vac. when the speaker was also used to announce the wifi is connected, the voltage dropped even more, like 2 to 3 vac. when it dropped below the threshold voltage (i assume 12 to 10 vac) the doorbell camera rebooted.

so for your case i would think downgrading the firmware back to 171218 is the best option. laview has 171218, LTS has 171219. i guess they are the same.
That was my suspicions as well, thanks for confirming
 

danmichele

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i personally tested this 180515 on a RCA brand. i also have the laview brand but i didn't test that on it. the 180515 to me is unstable. it consumes more power. every time the ring button is pressed the doorbell gets rebooted and hence dropped out of network. i only tested it during day time. i can't imagine how bad the firmware is at night time when the IR is turned on consuming even more power.

i measured continuous voltage across the camera at regular load and max load at night. i found at night when the IR was turned on, the voltage dropped by 1 vac. when the speaker was also used to announce the wifi is connected, the voltage dropped even more, like 2 to 3 vac. when it dropped below the threshold voltage (i assume 12 to 10 vac) the doorbell camera rebooted.

so for your case i would think downgrading the firmware back to 171218 is the best option. laview has 171218, LTS has 171219. i guess they are the same.
Do you know where I can get a download of 171218? I am searching through the hikvision europe site that I downloaded 180515 from and I cannot find it. Thanks for your help!
 

danmichele

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Do you know where I can get a download of 171218? I am searching through the hikvision europe site that I downloaded 180515 from and I cannot find it. Thanks for your help!
Quick update on this... I downloaded 171219 from LTS and it was unable to downgrade. It keeps getting update failed right after the upload finishes.
 

Pilot04

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Interesting observation on the power consumption with 180515 and wondering if that was what bricked my RCA variant doorbell unit. May hold off on upgrading to 180515 when I get my new unit delivered next week until some positive results are reported by other testers. When I called Nelly support the other day, they said the units in their office were running fine with 180515 and their user reports were positive as well. LTS build 171219 was solid for me for 5 months and wife wanted the update that removed "no subscriber" message which made 180515 attractive to us.
 

alienatsf

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Quick update on this... I downloaded 171219 from LTS and it was unable to downgrade. It keeps getting update failed right after the upload finishes.
when i tried to downgrade from 180515 back to 171219 from LTS, i also got update failed error on the web GUI. i then downloaded ivms 4200 from hikvision to downgrade it, and it worked.
 

alienatsf

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Interesting observation on the power consumption with 180515 and wondering if that was what bricked my RCA variant doorbell unit. May hold off on upgrading to 180515 when I get my new unit delivered next week until some positive results are reported by other testers. When I called Nelly support the other day, they said the units in their office were running fine with 180515 and their user reports were positive as well. LTS build 171219 was solid for me for 5 months and wife wanted the update that removed "no subscriber" message which made 180515 attractive to us.
I am not sure how Nelly testers set up the environment to test the doorbell. here is my observation so far.

most of people have a mechanical chime with an old transformer when the house was first built or upgraded. these old transformers over the years have degraded in performance, meaning the output voltage drops quite a lot under full load. also voltage drops more with smaller diameter cable (bigger gauge number) over longer distance (due to wire resistance). say if you have 18 gauge wire over 10 feet distance, 16 volt ac normally drops 0.8% to 1% volt with 1amp current. at 2 amp current, it drops 1.6% in voltage with 10 feet distance. so the more current the device is drawing the more voltage drop you would see.

i had had one single doorbell camera for more than 3 month and it was working fine in every aspect. but when i bought a 2nd doorbell camera and hook it up to the rear, both cameras rebooted endlessly at night. now i disconnected the rear one and the front one still rebooted if i turned the speaker volume to 7 out 10 when intercom conversation happened. when i lowered the speaker volume down to 1 or 0, it worked fine. it was working fine with volume 7 for the first 3 month. this tells me my transformer has degraded even more since i put 2 doorbell camera on full load.

i also tested two doorbell cameras hooked up to a regular 3-prone plug-in transformer with 16 vac and 24 VA (watts) output with very short distance wiring (about 3 inches) . both "problematic" doorbell cameras behaved extremely great in every aspect. so this tells me most of the problem are due to the chime transformer. each doorbell camera is rated 16vac to 24 vac with max 12 watts consumption. i would personally buy a transformer with 30VA (watts) output to make it work great.

unfortunately i can't find my chime transformer. i traced it in the basement and the wires went thru the basement ceiling and flooring. i heard buzzing sound behind a wall with the chime mounted on the first floor. so i guess the transformer was installed between stud inside the wall. so whoever built the house and installed the transformer i gotta fxxk him for doing this that i have no way to replace the transformer.
 
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danmichele

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when i tried to downgrade from 180515 back to 171219 from LTS, i also got update failed error on the web GUI. i then downloaded ivms 4200 from hikvision to downgrade it, and it worked.
Thanks for this idea! I might try it tonight.

However, after reading Pilot04's comment about power consumption I decided to upgrade the transformer as others have mentioned in the thread. After the upgrade to 24v 20va (my previous was 16v 10va) the doorbell is very stable. Everything from pings to video quality has vastly improved. I couldn't find a 30VA or 40VA transformer as some have suggested, but the 20VA has been a massive improvement for me.
 

bookemdano

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I have a pretty recent 16V 10VA transformer, but I think I'm going to upgrade it before installing my RCA.

I see options for a 16V 30VA and also a 24V 20VA. Are those essentially equivalent for the purposes of powering these doorbells? Wouldn't the 24V be less prone to voltage drop over my high-gauge doorbell wire though?

The 24V is $10 cheaper, so just wondering if there's something I'm missing that would make the 16V 30VA a better buy.
 

awsum140

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Take a lesson from the power companies. When they need to transmit a lot of power they use higher voltages. Their motivations are a little different but the same principal applies.
 

alienatsf

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I have a pretty recent 16V 10VA transformer, but I think I'm going to upgrade it before installing my RCA.

I see options for a 16V 30VA and also a 24V 20VA. Are those essentially equivalent for the purposes of powering these doorbells? Wouldn't the 24V be less prone to voltage drop over my high-gauge doorbell wire though?

The 24V is $10 cheaper, so just wondering if there's something I'm missing that would make the 16V 30VA a better buy.
you need to look at the voltage requirement on your chime too. if its rated 16VAC you may have a problem using 24 Vac on it.
 

drachen

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*Possible IR solution*

So I took my RCA branded doorbell apart today to clean the inside of the dome lens and while I was in there I discovered two connectors that I believe are for the IR LEDs (see attached image). By disconnecting these two wire pairs, that should eliminate the IR ever coming on. It's not an elegant solution but if you are like me and just want the IR disabled permanently, this may be one way to do it..

Waiting for tonight to see if my modification was successful.

Also, the RCA security app was recently updated and seems to be a lot more stable for me than the prior version and other branded versions of the app for this camera.
 

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Pilot04

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*Possible IR solution*

So I took my RCA branded doorbell apart today to clean the inside of the dome lens and while I was in there I discovered two connectors that I believe are for the IR LEDs (see attached image). By disconnecting these two wire pairs, that should eliminate the IR ever coming on. It's not an elegant solution but if you are like me and just want the IR disabled permanently, this may be one way to do it..

Waiting for tonight to see if my modification was successful.

Also, the RCA security app was recently updated and seems to be a lot more stable for me than the prior version and other branded versions of the app for this camera.
I did see those jumpers when I opened up mine to check capacitor/etc when mine bricked from upgrading FW. Which jumper(s) did you disconnect? JP14 or JP15 or both jumpers in that picture. Also, was there a change log for the latest RCA Security app? I haven't used the RCA app since initial setup back in Jan as Ezviz and Hik's app were better in my mind at that time. I have LED front porch light that is auto-on/off at dusk/dawn so IR stays off but this manual disconnect power leads workaround should work.
 

drachen

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Both jumpers, as it looks like there are two IR leds in the ring around the dome of the camera.

No changelog that I saw, just noticed that the UI had changed substantially from when I last loaded the app a few months back.
 

alienatsf

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Both jumpers, as it looks like there are two IR leds in the ring around the dome of the camera.

No changelog that I saw, just noticed that the UI had changed substantially from when I last loaded the app a few months back.
let us know if the IR will turn off. this would be a great discovery. the RCA security app updated two weeks ago with new UI and color white theme. it's stable but i hate it always asks me to log in without saving the password so i have to re-enter the password every time. another bug for this update RCA security app is on IOS the number shown on the icon indicating number of new motion trigger message always counting up without resetting back to zero. now it's 70 on my ios even though I marked all messages as read every time. the number reset to zero every time when i marked all messages as read but then when the screen was locked and unlocked back in minutes later, the number on the icon came back with big number. the RCA security app does not have this number on the icon on android app as i have another phone using android.

the RCA security app also took away the add new device with "online devices" feature so it cannot see which device comes online. the hikvision connect app also got updated without UI change.

i have to use RCA security app for some reason that the 2nd RCA brand doorbell camera could not get app notification in either hikvision or laview app when motion is triggered. only the RCA security app can do it. but my first RCA doorbell camera can get notification in any app. weird
 
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