Troubleshooting single camera view freeze on Hikvision 7608NI-E2

[Jason J.]

Hi Everyone,

Apologies for so many posts but I am trying to hit my issue from different angles.

I have installed the following system for a client: 6 Hikvision DS-2CD2032-I Cameras and an DS-7608NI-E28P2T NVR.

Everything works good, but I have issues with switching from a multi-camera view to single camera view. When switching to single camera view, the stream is switching from sub stream to main stream and freezes. Sometimes the stream starts playing, but usually it just stays frozen indefinitely, until switching back to multi-camera view. It used to be much more random, but it definitely seems to affect two cameras much more than other cameras now (camera 4 and 5). I have reset and factory defaulted all the cameras several times as well as upgraded to the latest firmware.

The other weird thing is on the HDMI output of the NVR itself, when switching from multi-view to single view, there are no issues. Only using the client. I have tried 4 different computers as well. I have also tried setting the bitrate, I-frames, FPS, to about every combination you can think of. In some cases turning these settings lower sometimes makes it worse.

I have attached some videos I recorded of this happening. The first video is of the freezing issue. The second video is if the stream actually works, after watching it for a while there are a ton of artifacts in the video, as if no I-Frames are being sent. No other cameras do this besides the ones that have freezing issues.

I have read about other people coming across this issue, but nobody seems to know how to fix it or what is causing it. Hikvision's tech support was less than helpful in troubleshooting. They tried to blame everything they could but their system. Hours spent with them on the phone got me nowhere. Anybody know how to fix this, or at least mitigate it some?

 

[nayr]

are you using h264+?

 

[Jason J.]

Honestly, I'm not sure, I'm not sure how to tell within the client software. If I have to log into the camera directly, then I'm going to have to wait until I go to the client's premises.

 

[nayr]

it'll be in the encoding settings on the camera its self; iirc thats typically the culprit... its a unique hikvision specific video codec trying to save disk space and it causes client issues trying to cope with non-standard video encodings.

 

[Jason J.]

Someone else mentioned the H.264+ setting as well in another thread. I'm sure if it's Hikvision's proprietary extension to H.264, and I used Plug and Play, then it's probably enabled.

I will definitely check this out next week. To access the cameras directly, do I need to plug into one of the camera ports? Fortunately I happen to have an open port. I don't have a PoE switch, and I know that the NVR puts the cameras in a .254.0 subnet or something like that, and I'm sure it doesn't perform packet routing, so I'm just curious the best way to get into the camera config.

Thanks again for the suggestion buddy!

 

[nayr]

you can proabibly set the encoding type on the NVR

 

[alastairstevenson]

Did Hikvision query you about the firmware version on the NVR? They should have, there are many internal changes between versions that do not show in any release notes.
If the freezing is only via the web GUI, and you've confirmed it's doing this on more than one PC, it may be useful to explore the version of webcomponents.
I did find the older versions were prone to erratic behaviour.
If you want to experiment with an update, the newest version of webcomponents seems to be 3.0.6.8 in that various NVR firmwares 3.4.91
It does seem to be downwards compatible with older firmware web environments.

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<FileVersion>
<Platform name='win32'>
    <npWebVideoPlugin.dll>3,0,6,8</npWebVideoPlugin.dll>
    <WebVideoActiveX.ocx>3,0,6,8</WebVideoActiveX.ocx>
    <PlayCtrl.dll>7,3,1,61</PlayCtrl.dll>
    <StreamTransClient.dll>1,1,3,4</StreamTransClient.dll>
    <SystemTransform.dll>2,5,1,8</SystemTransform.dll>
    <NetStream.dll>1,0,5,39</NetStream.dll>
    <AudioIntercom.dll>1,3,0,5</AudioIntercom.dll>
</Platform>
</FileVersion>

Here is a copy of the installer :

 

[Jason J.]

It happens with the web client, and iVMS. The problem is that it is freezing when trying to switch from sub stream to main stream. In multi camera view you are seeing sub streams, and when you double click to bring up single camera view, it should switch to the high res main stream, but it just freezes on the sub stream view. When using the web client, if you have the sub stream pulled up and try to switch it to main stream, you get a grey box, no video comes up. At the time when I called Hikvision tech support, the cameras and NVR were on the latest firmware, which they confirmed.

If you watch it on separate computers/clients at the same time, the main stream freezes/unfreezes/stutters on all the clients at the same time. I would think it is the camera, but at the NVR itself, it doesn't seem to do this. I thought it was a faulty NVR and got a replacement, and it does the same thing.

 

[alastairstevenson]

NVR were on the latest firmware

That version depends very much on where in the globe you are ... what version is it? We are on 3.4.91
Worth checking, in my view, is the version of webcomponents in use. If downloaded to clients from the same NVR, it will be the same version.
Historically it's been less than perfect, and has seen lots of updates. I've seen no problems with the 3.0.6.8 version.

 

[Jason J.]

I'm in the US. I download everything from Hikvision's website, not the NVR. I also really never use the web client, I always use iVMS. I only used the web client for troubleshooting, but I'll look into it. See the above video of the video freezing in iVMS. The NVR is on firmware 3.4.3_160822

 

[alastairstevenson]

I download everything from Hikvision's website, not the NVR

Are you saying for the browser access you downloaded webcomponents from the Hikvision website? If so, that's an old, broken version.
Normally, with the browser access (and I have to admit I don't know how iVMS works for handling the video stream as I've never used it), the 'plugin' ie webcomponents is prompted to be downloaded from the NVR or camera that you have connected the browser to. And it nags you if the PC is running an older version than is available in the camera or NVR.
So it might be interesting to see how the browser access to the Live View screen behaves in terms of switching between substream (multi view) and main stream (single view).

 

[Fruit]

Try to turn off auto-change stream type so it'll stop switching streams when you go from multi to single, also enable hardware decoding might help. The hardware decoding feature might not be in some older version

Can you try watching all of them in a multi-view AND set to substream for all at the same time? you can right click the folder under Live View and just do Main stream for all the channels.

IF you can post your video setting once you are directly logged into one of the camera it should help, and screenshot for Main Stream (normal), Main Stream (event), Sub Stream. If its something wrong with the Main stream that can't be fixed by firmware they should replace the camera for you.

 

[Jason J.]

Here's an update: I went to the premises, plugged in my laptop into a free port on the camera input. I set my IP so that I was on the same subnet as the cameras. I was able to hit the camera directly via webpage. I downloaded the plugin from the camera, and restarted Internet Explorer. I logged into the camera, and went to the settings to change the encoding method for the video. Unfortunately when I click the drop-down to change the encoding method, H.264 was the only codec available. So I'm guessing it is not on H.264+, and there was no MPEG4 option like the instruction manual said there will be.

However here's what I found, when viewing the camera in live view, there is no delay what so ever between switching from sub stream to main stream, no cut outs at all... so I'm at a loss. Somewhere between the camera and the client (NVR) something is going wrong. We decided the next step is to return this unit, and get the slightly better version N7608-I2. I'm hoping that there is more processing power or something that solves this issue because I'm getting sick of replacing NVRs =)

Thanks again for the suggestions guys!

 

[TaxExempt]

I am having this same problem too with my 7608NI-E2/8P running version v3.4.3 with the desktop software iVMS-4200 running version v2.5.1.7

 

[Wm5761]

I have this same issue with my 5 camera + NVR setup. Its a DS-7608NI-K2 8 Port, 5 cameras (2x DS-2CD2142FWD-IS, 2x DS-2CD2155FWD-IS, 1x DS-2CD2442FWD-IWS) My cameras don't connect directly to the NVR, they are reached via the switch. The issue for me is worse on the 4MP 2142 models however its happened on a newer 5MP 2155 model also. The problem occurs only with IVMS 4200 client as you say and demonstrate. The problem is when you double click a smaller 'thumbnail' in tiled view to full screen, the freeze occurs. This is actually ivms switching from SubStream to MainStream. It appears this is the process that sometimes doesn't work out well. I added the IP camera on its own to IVMS, rather than via NVR (i'm able to do this as all my cameras have their own IP) - this resolved the issue. So it appeared to only occur if viewing via its NVR connection. I do not know what the fix is. As of 30th July 2018 I have updated the 4MP cameras to 5.5.0 and the NVR to the latest, and it still does it. The version of IVMS doesn't matter either. The workaround to this problem (sadly it may not be great if you have a high volume of cameras), is to disable the auto switch ability of IVMS, therefore making the thumbnails/previews in multiscreen view all high resolution MainStream. From the menu, goto System Configuration>Image> Untick Auto Switch Stream. Also, you may wish to enable Prefer hardware support, this may increase performance / reduce CPU load if you have a good GPU. Again, with 16 cameras, i'm not sure if this would be great for bandwidth, however this time when you double click a thumbnail/preview the switch to full screen is instant, as there is no reconfig needed of the stream.

Hope this helps.

WORKAROUND: In IVMS 4200 goto System Configuration>Image> Untick Auto Switch Stream. Also, you may wish to enable Prefer hardware support

 

[Parley]

I have to use H.264 with both the DS-7608NI-I2/8P and the DS07608NI-E2/8P. If I go to H.264+ or H.265 mine will lock up going from SubStream to MainStream. This going from the multi picture to the single picture.

 

[Parley]

"WORKAROUND: In IVMS 4200 goto System Configuration>Image> Untick Auto Switch Stream. Also, you may wish to enable Prefer hardware support"

I tried that but my CPU maxed out and things ran in very slow motion. I had to put it back to where it was.

 

[Wm5761]

I have to use H.264 with both the DS-7608NI-I2/8P and the DS07608NI-E2/8P. If I go to H.264+ or H.265 mine will lock up going from SubStream to MainStream. This going from the multi picture to the single picture

All mine are on H264, so i'm not sure what else it can be, in terms of CPU maxing out, indeed quite possible under certain conditions, especially if there's more cameras than me.

 

[Parley]

All mine are on H264, so i'm not sure what else it can be, in terms of CPU maxing out, indeed quite possible under certain conditions, especially if there's more cameras than me.

I am running 15 cameras with a 16 picture screen. I am not sure what the "prefer hardware support does". I looked at the manual and I could not see where it mentioned it.

 

[Wm5761]

I am running 15 cameras with a 16 picture screen. I am not sure what the "prefer hardware support does". I looked at the manual and I could not see where it mentioned it.

Yes I expect that would need alot of processing power. as for the prefer hardware support, I can only guess that it uses GPU rather than CPU as software rendering will cause the CPU to max out under certain conditions. Do you have a high end video card ? I have a Nvidia GTX970 / i7 3770K / 16GB RAM, not sure if it could handle 16 cameras on a main stream though, or the network for that matter! in the absence of a high end card it'll mostly all be rendered by CPU, which in the case of intel also has basic video in built these days.