video performance issues in the web UI

[natinadaka]

Camera is IPC-T5442T-ZEB with firmware V2.840.15OG00D.0.R, Build Date: 2022-08-18 (EmpireTech firmware).

I have 2 different observations that are performance related. I am not sure if they are symptoms of the same thing or two different things.

1. If I click on the "Sub Stream 2" button in the Web UI, I see the message "Resource is limited, open video failed!"
2. If I click on the "Main Stream" button in the Web UI, after < 10 seconds, I see a yellow message at the bottom of the video that reads "It has auto switched to substream for better video playing experience."

Settings for all 3 streams (main, sub 1, and sub 2) are defaults--I didn't change anything there.

Laptop is attached to a Netgear POE+ switch. Camera is the only other device attached to that same switch. Also tried Unifi POE switch, same thing.

My questions are: is the behavior above normal? If not, how can I debug what is going wrong?

I feel like the default stream settings should work without issue on the simple test setup that I have.

 

[natinadaka]

I wanted to report that I got a second camera, exact same model but did not update the firmware. And I get the exact same behavior mentioned in the original posting. Firmware on second camera is 2.820.15OG004.0.R, Build Date: 2021-07-29

 

[Griswalduk]

I wanted to report that I got a second camera, exact same model but did not update the firmware. And I get the exact same behavior mentioned in the original posting. Firmware on second camera is 2.820.15OG004.0.R, Build Date: 2021-07-29

First of all Welcome to the forum.

I remember having a problem similar to this when i was initially setting up my system consisting of an NVR and 8 cameras. I used an OLD laptop and a long Ethernet cable to line up and adjust the camera field of view and other settings. I was getting similar messages to yourself but persevered and got the system installed.

I access the system now with a more modern desktop and have not seen the messages since which tells me the cameras including firmware are fine. i would look at your laptop first of all, perhaps borrow another more powerful one or maybe use a desktop instead. I would be confident this is the problem.

It's always advised not to update camera firmware unless absolutely necessary.

Good luck

 

[natinadaka]

Thank you for that, Appreciate the response and am happy to be here.

Regarding the computer, I thought this might be the case. The laptop I am using to test is an i5-4300U (2 cores, 2.49 Ghz), 12GB RAM, built-in Intel graphics. It is probably 8 years old, so there are certainly faster machines. I will try something else. The ethernet cable shouldn't be the issue... it is less than 3 feet long and I have tried several.

One thing that would be nice to know is how the software (not sure if it is the camera firmware or the webapp running in the client browser that makes this decision) decides/what it measures to determine there are not enough resources for the stream. Perhaps that info is buried in some forum posting here. I will keep reading.

Regarding this:

It's always advised not to update camera firmware unless absolutely necessary.

I have seen that several times here. It is a bit counter-intuitive coming from a software background where the the push is to always keep software up to date. Additionally, I go 3 of these same camera, all in the last week, and all three have different firmware. I haven't deployed them yet, but it seems like from the point of view of deploying a system, you'd want everything on the same firmware as a baseline. And I took the comment "The update is mainly for Smart IR, New Security Baseline function, highly recommend to update, esp the 4K models." from @loony2ns in IPC-T5442T-ZE IPC-T5442TM-AS IPC-T5842T-ZE SMD 3.0 Smart IR Latest New Firmware From EmpireTech to suggest that updating was a good idea.

 

[wittaj]

Certainly a bandwidth/device issue somewhere in your system.

All of my 5442 cameras are on different firmware and I don't OCD over it lol. My cameras are isolated from the internet so security update doesn't apply to me and I run my cams in color so smart IR doesn't apply to me.

As always YMMV but if the cameras work for your situation no point updating and risk breaking something.

Someone must have hacked Looney's account lol cause he is the biggest supporter of not updating lol

 

[natinadaka]

Just for kicks, I tried 2 other computers, including one significantly faster than the laptop. It can play modern games. Anyway, same behavior.

i guess what really matters are any issues at the NVR, which is not in place yet and subject to change. We'll see...

 

[Flintstone61]

It isn't unusual to see UI3 streaming substreams as far as I know......I'm not super experienced at UI3 , but i have used it for awhile.

 

[Griswalduk]

Thank you for that, Appreciate the response and am happy to be here.

Regarding the computer, I thought this might be the case. The laptop I am using to test is an i5-4300U (2 cores, 2.49 Ghz), 12GB RAM, built-in Intel graphics. It is probably 8 years old, so there are certainly faster machines. I will try something else. The ethernet cable shouldn't be the issue... it is less than 3 feet long and I have tried several.

One thing that would be nice to know is how the software (not sure if it is the camera firmware or the webapp running in the client browser that makes this decision) decides/what it measures to determine there are not enough resources for the stream. Perhaps that info is buried in some forum posting here. I will keep reading.

Regarding this:



I have seen that several times here. It is a bit counter-intuitive coming from a software background where the the push is to always keep software up to date. Additionally, I go 3 of these same camera, all in the last week, and all three have different firmware. I haven't deployed them yet, but it seems like from the point of view of deploying a system, you'd want everything on the same firmware as a baseline. And I took the comment "The update is mainly for Smart IR, New Security Baseline function, highly recommend to update, esp the 4K models." from @loony2ns in IPC-T5442T-ZE IPC-T5442TM-AS IPC-T5842T-ZE SMD 3.0 Smart IR Latest New Firmware From EmpireTech to suggest that updating was a good idea.

My laptop is way way older than that. I can't remember the processor but it runs XP ( downgraded from Vista back in the day ), has 2gb ram and very little room on the hdd. It was all i had with internet explorer.

Speaking of internet explorer what web browser are you using? Internet explorer is advisable. When you log on to the camera WebUI it downloads the required plugins from the camera. A few clicks and a short wait and it should be done.

 

[natinadaka]

I tried Firefox and Chrome on Windows, and Firefox on Linux.

I have seen mentions of Internet Explorer here, but I maybe thought those recommendations were out-of-date.., and I am not sure IE exists anymore? I think Edge has an IE mode or something, but I've avoided it thus far since it is another thing to look into... Maybe I will have to try it.

 

[Griswalduk]

A different browser might help things. I have only used internet explorer though so I'll let others recommend a suitable alternative.

btw Explorer should be available in Windows by typing explorer in start box thing bottom left

 

[wittaj]

Nope the Explorer recommendations are not out of date. Many cameras you can purchase today still rely on it. Edge with IE mode doesn't work for some cameras.

 

[natinadaka]

btw Explorer should be available in Windows by typing explorer in start box thing bottom left

Yes, you are correct. It does still exist.

I loaded the Camera UI in IE and was asked to download and install webplugin.exe. With the (valid) security concerns for cameras, it makes no sense to me to go through all the trouble to isolate them at the network layer with firewalls/VLANs/whatever but then install an arbitrary exe downloaded from the camera itself. Just can't bring myself to do it. Perhaps if I had a throw-away Windows install or a VM, but not the my current laptop.

 

[blargh]

Yes, you are correct. It does still exist.

I loaded the Camera UI in IE and was asked to download and install webplugin.exe. With the (valid) security concerns for cameras, it makes no sense to me to go through all the trouble to isolate them at the network layer with firewalls/VLANs/whatever but then install an arbitrary exe downloaded from the camera itself. Just can't bring myself to do it. Perhaps if I had a throw-away Windows install or a VM, but not the my current laptop.

If you're running a 'pro' version of win 10/11, you can run a windows sandbox which is a disposable windows vm. I use it a lot when I'm on a windows machine. Windows Sandbox

Edit: Just confirmed I can hit a camera on a vlan from my computer lan, and the plugin works fine in the sandbox version of edge. I didn't even use ie mode, but this is a newer cam (4kcolor-T)

 

[natinadaka]

Yes, good suggestion. Was aware it existed but haven't had the chance to try it. This may be a good real-world use-case.

 

[blargh]

Yes, good suggestion. Was aware it existed but haven't had the chance to try it. This may be a good real-world use-case.

I hope it works for you! Please post results. I find it helpful, and fairly easy to use vs spinning up a vm or a docker container

 

[natinadaka]

I hit a snag immediately since the laptop I was originally testing on had Windows 10 Home, and Windows Sandbox requires at least Windows 10 Pro.

I had another laptop with Windows 10 Pro and was able to install Windows Sandbox without issue. I started the sandbox, was able to run IE in the sandbox, access the camera, and install the plugin. When using IE with the plugin, I can confirm that I can watch the Main stream without issue and it will not automatically switch to the sub stream. Thus, the original problem that I posted about is resolved with the plugin.

Windows Sandbox was every easy to set up--almost too easy. What I mean by that is that it seems to make some simplifying assumptions for you that you might not want. For example, suppose you are on your main laptop which is connected to the internet via Wifi (suppose you have a 192.168.1.x address). You also have a wired ethernet connection (suppose that has a 192.168.200.x address) from your laptop to your POE switch which has your cameras on it. When you are in the sandbox, you can access the cameras at its 192.168.200.x address which is good, but the sandbox can also access the internet via the host's Wifi. In other words, the sandbox appears to have access to all of the networks available on your host. Of course, you can just disconnect your Wifi on the laptop temporarily, but it would be nice if you had more granularity to say, for example, only allow the sandbox access to the 192.168.200.x network. Maybe you can, but I haven't figured it out yet.

So, in summary:

• Windows Sandbox does work, and it would be even better if I could more granularly control which network access the Sandbox has.
• Running in IE and with the plugin is required for full functionality of the camera UI. This can be made even more confusing for the end user by the fact that they can appear to access a working camera UI using another browser, but a) certain functions just don't appear in the UI if you don't have the plugin and b) you can get messages implying that there is some sort of performance issue when the real problem is missing plugin
• One of my original questions was about accessing sub stream 2 and seeing "Resource is limited, open video failed!" I actually don't think this had anything to do with resource limitations NOR with the lack of the plugin. I actually think this was a very bad error message that was ultimately caused by the fact that sub stream 2 was not enabled in Camera->Video.
• It would be really nice if these cam UIs just worked without IE and plugins

 

[natinadaka]

Just an FYI if anyone uses this Sandbox approach, manual recordings you initiate via the camera UI are not stored locally on the camera's SD card, but they are stored on the client computer by the ActiveX plugin running in the browser. (see Manual Record not appearing in Playback) Thus, if you make a recording and then close the sandbox, your recording will not be accessible (it will be deleted when the sandbox terminates). So, you will need to transfer out the recordings before terminating the sandbox, or use a custom sandbox config so that the recordings are saved to a directory on the host computer.