Unable to add third Hikvision camera to Blue Iris

[Rob37]

Hi. I've been using blue iris for a number of years with very cheap IP cameras and it has been working well for what I need. Recently one of my cheap Foscams began to act flaky and I replaced it with a cheap Hik DS-2CD2442FWD-IW camera. I found that I had to configure the Hik for 1920x1080 but it was still much clearer than the Foscam and had much better night time vision.

I decided I'd replace a couple of the cheap cameras I still had with 2 new Hik cameras. I was able to set up the two additional cameras ok and could watch video by directly logging into the cameras with IE browser. I also set these up for 1920x1080 video.

I was able to add the second camera to blue iris with no problems. However when I tried to add the third camera it would not connect with a no signal error. I could still see the video in the IE browser. Eventually I found that if I disabled one of the other two cameras, the third camera would show video once I restarted it. Playing around I found that I could have any combination of the two Hik cameras - along with the other 3 cheap IP cameras I still had connected. Video on all 3 Hik was always visible thru IE browser.

Any ideas on what to try to overcome the limitation I seem to have with the Hiks? All cameras are connected via wifi as is the Blue Iris server PC.

Thanks

 

[fenderman]

Hi. I've been using blue iris for a number of years with very cheap IP cameras and it has been working well for what I need. Recently one of my cheap Foscams began to act flaky and I replaced it with a cheap Hik DS-2CD2442FWD-IW camera. I found that I had to configure the Hik for 1920x1080 but it was still much clearer than the Foscam and had much better night time vision.

I decided I'd replace a couple of the cheap cameras I still had with 2 new Hik cameras. I was able to set up the two additional cameras ok and could watch video by directly logging into the cameras with IE browser. I also set these up for 1920x1080 video.

I was able to add the second camera to blue iris with no problems. However when I tried to add the third camera it would not connect with a no signal error. I could still see the video in the IE browser. Eventually I found that if I disabled one of the other two cameras, the third camera would show video once I restarted it. Playing around I found that I could have any combination of the two Hik cameras - along with the other 3 cheap IP cameras I still had connected. Video on all 3 Hik was always visible thru IE browser.

Any ideas on what to try to overcome the limitation I seem to have with the Hiks? All cameras are connected via wifi as is the Blue Iris server PC.

Thanks

Sounds like you are overtaxing your Wi-Fi... Or you might have an IP address conflict...

 

[Q™]

you might have an IP address conflict

+1...check to make certain that two (2) of the cameras don't have the same IP address, eh?

 

[Rob37]

Thanks for the replies. It is not an ip conflict. I assigned the 3 cameras each a different static ip. I am also able to use IE browser and view all 3 cameras simultaneously there while 2 will show up in Blue Iris. It is pretty consistent that only two will stream in Blue Iris. It is also consistent that if I disable one, the other two are ok. I did hook the server up directly to the router thru ethernet cable and no difference.

 

[looney2ns]

Avoid wifi for security cams and study this>> cliff notes.

 

[SouthernYankee]

What type of pc are you using for bi?
Is it standalone ?
What is the cpu load ?
What is the frame rate for the cameras?
Are you using a nas for the bi storage ?
Temporary hardwire the cameras does the problem occurred ?

 

[fenderman]

Thanks for the replies. It is not an ip conflict. I assigned the 3 cameras each a different static ip. I am also able to use IE browser and view all 3 cameras simultaneously there while 2 will show up in Blue Iris. It is pretty consistent that only two will stream in Blue Iris. It is also consistent that if I disable one, the other two are ok. I did hook the server up directly to the router thru ethernet cable and no difference.

Did you try hardwiring the third camera? its not a blue iris issue..we all have more than 3 cameras.

 

[Rob37]

Short version: user error.

Long version: I set up a second pc and installed bi from scratch. Connected PC and cameras hardwired to router. I added each camera one at a time and made sure they worked. I moved all the pieces to wireless and everything still worked ok. Did a side by side comparison between the original PC bi configs and the working PC's configs. Turns out the original PC had two cameras that had the use RTP/UDP ports box checked and were using the same port. What must have happened is that I inadvertently checked this box on one of the cameras and then used that profile to add the third. Since that's not a setting I've used before, I didn't notice it on the original pc. Unchecked the boxes on the original bi config and everything works fine - even on wifi.

Thanks again to all for the helpful suggestions.