What outdoor security cameras are compatible with using Windows phones as a viewer ?

[GKL]

What outdoor security cameras are compatible with using Windows phones as a viewer ?

I have tried researching this, and it can be confusing trying to be sure which outdoor security cameras are truly compatible with using a Windows phone as a viewer. (We have home WIFI which our phones connect to also, as well as a data plan for when away from home)

I found an app on the Windows store called "IP CENTCOM" that says cameras that use ONVIF should be compatible but when I search online for ONVIF based cameras (like on Amazon) the description will only mention being android and IOS compatible.

I'd like to find an outdoor security camera that:

Is compatible with using my Windows phone as a viewer
Is priced under $100
Has night vision preferably to at least 50 feet
Has decent reviews so I can feel it will be worth getting

An added bonus would be if it also could be accessed thru a Roku too !

Any suggestions on any such cameras is appreciated !

Gary

 

[mat200]

What outdoor security cameras are compatible with using Windows phones as a viewer ?

I have tried researching this, and it can be confusing trying to be sure which outdoor security cameras are truly compatible with using a Windows phone as a viewer. (We have home WIFI which our phones connect to also, as well as a data plan for when away from home)

I found an app on the Windows store called "IP CENTCOM" that says cameras that use ONVIF should be compatible but when I search online for ONVIF based cameras (like on Amazon) the description will only mention being android and IOS compatible.

I'd like to find an outdoor security camera that:

Is compatible with using my Windows phone as a viewer
Is priced under $100
Has night vision preferably to at least 50 feet
Has decent reviews so I can feel it will be worth getting

An added bonus would be if it also could be accessed thru a Roku too !

Any suggestions on any such cameras is appreciated !

Gary

Hi Gary,

Windows Phones represent less than 1% of the market, and thus developers are reluctant to work on apps for it, and there bosses reluctant to spend any money on testing or certifying products work with windows phones.

I would look to the microsoft windows phone app store and see if there are apps which can work with ONVIF cameras, vs looking for cameras which are made by companies who are willing to take the time to test that their cameras work for windows phones.

 

[Roger]

Hi Gary,

Windows Phones represent less than 1% of the market, and thus developers are reluctant to work on apps for it, and there bosses reluctant to spend any money on testing or certifying products work with windows phones.

I would look to the microsoft windows phone app store and see if there are apps which can work with ONVIF cameras, vs looking for cameras which are made by companies who are willing to take the time to test that their cameras work for windows phones.

Hikvision's iVMS-4500 is supported on windows phone. There is also a Blue Iris app still available. Using Blue Iris means that your camera choice is much broader.

 

[GKL]

Hi Gary,

Windows Phones represent less than 1% of the market, and thus developers are reluctant to work on apps for it, and there bosses reluctant to spend any money on testing or certifying products work with windows phones.

I would look to the microsoft windows phone app store and see if there are apps which can work with ONVIF cameras, vs looking for cameras which are made by companies who are willing to take the time to test that their cameras work for windows phones.

Thanks, and I had found that app at - Get IP CENTCOM - Microsoft Store

My confusion comes from finding ONVIF cameras (like on Amazon) that don't specify compatibility with Windows phones, but only specifies compatibility with android and OIS which makes you think that not all ONVIF cameras will work on Windows phones even with the above app.

 

[GKL]

Hikvision's iVMS-4500 is supported on windows phone. There is also a Blue Iris app still available. Using Blue Iris means that your camera choice is much broader.

Thanks, I'll research that brand further, and also "Blue Iris" which I am not yet familiar with.

 

[fenderman]

Thanks, and I had found that app at - Get IP CENTCOM - Microsoft Store

My confusion comes from finding ONVIF cameras (like on Amazon) that don't specify compatibility with Windows phones, but only specifies compatibility with android and OIS which makes you think that not all ONVIF cameras will work on Windows phones even with the above app.

none of these apps (except the blue iris mobile app, which requires a blue iris server at home) will allow you to review recorded video...
it would be easier to bite the bullet and switch to an android based phone.

 

[GKL]

none of these apps (except the blue iris mobile app, which requires a blue iris server at home) will allow you to review recorded video...
it would be easier to bite the bullet and switch to an android based phone.

Thanks, our windows phones are not that old (we had switched from android) but since I'm not concerned about viewing recorded video on the phone, just live video, it is not a big deal, I figure there should be a way to see the recorded video from my laptop.

 

[Roger]

@fenderman, I have the iVMS-4500 on my Lumia 950XL and it does have the capability to play back recorded video if it is on the SD card in the camera. As for the generic IP camera apps, I would suspect that is the case, but have only played with a few of them.

 

[fenderman]

@fenderman, I have the iVMS-4500 on my Lumia 950XL and it does have the capability to play back recorded video if it is on the SD card in the camera. As for the generic IP camera apps, I would suspect that is the case, but have only played with a few of them.

Generic apps cannot replay video.... Since ivms runs on Windows which is news to me the op pecan limit himself to Hikvision cameras and use it...

 

[GKL]

Generic apps cannot replay video.... Since ivms runs on Windows which is news to me the op pecan limit himself to Hikvision cameras and use it...

I'm fairly new to this ip camera stuff so I appreciate all the info.

The app I mentioned Get IP CENTCOM - Microsoft Store seems to support recoding video according to the description IF I am understanding it right, but I'm not sure if it is considered a generic app or not.

 

[fenderman]

I'm fairly new to this ip camera stuff so I appreciate all the info.

The app I mentioned Get IP CENTCOM - Microsoft Store seems to support recoding video according to the description IF I am understanding it right, but I'm not sure if it is considered a generic app or not.

You cannot use an app like that to record on your phone that you use all day.... It would consume all your battery and data....

 

[GKL]

You cannot use an app like that to record on your phone that you use all day.... It would consume all your battery and data....

Good point, I would likely just use the phone just for a "live" view, and maybe see if there's a way I could have any video recorded to my computer if motion is detected.

 

[Roger]

You are describing Blue Iris now. My only complaint with the BI app on Windows Phone is, that in my case at least, it doesn't actually play back the clips. I don't hold out much hope that it will get fixed since WP is dead officially now. But if you stick with HikVision cameras and iVMS app you can do this by recording to an SD card in the camera.

 

[GKL]

You are describing Blue Iris now. My only complaint with the BI app on Windows Phone is, that in my case at least, it doesn't actually play back the clips. I don't hold out much hope that it will get fixed since WP is dead officially now. But if you stick with HikVision cameras and iVMS app you can do this by recording to an SD card in the camera.

As far as my windows phone, I'd be fine just having a dependable live view, especially with the night vision. I'll have to see which might work better, the Hikvision app or the Get IP CENTCOM - Microsoft Store app, or maybe have both. I do have a large sd card if I ever did want to occasionally record though.

 

[GKL]

I forgot to mention -

My Windows phone is a Nokia Lumia 1520 running Windows phone 8.1 update
My wife's Windows phone is a Microsoft Lumia 640 LTE running Windows phone 8.1 update 2

 

[GKL]

@fenderman, I have the iVMS-4500 on my Lumia 950XL and it does have the capability to play back recorded video if it is on the SD card in the camera. As for the generic IP camera apps, I would suspect that is the case, but have only played with a few of them.

Roger, you said you use iVMS-4500 on your Lumia 950XL windows phone, do you use it just on WIFI or also access your camera remotely thru a data connection ?

If you do use iVMS-4500 to remotely view your live camera feed, how do you have it setup as far as your router settings, do you access it thru a VPN server on a router or some other way like Hikvision P2P ? (I realize some say avoid P2P, but I'm just asking so I know how you do it)

If you do access it remotely thru a VPN, what router model do you use and with what settings ?

Sorry to ask so many questions, and I know other members have been very kind in offering ideas, but when I saw your post again I figured why not ask someone who is actually using a windows phone and iVMS-4500 how they have their set up.

Do you use the iVMS-4200 on your computer ?

Thanks !

Gary

 

[Roger]

Roger, you said you use iVMS-4500 on your Lumia 950XL windows phone, do you use it just on WIFI or also access your camera remotely thru a data connection ?

If you do use iVMS-4500 to remotely view your live camera feed, how do you have it setup as far as your router settings, do you access it thru a VPN server on a router or some other way like Hikvision P2P ? (I realize some say avoid P2P, but I'm just asking so I know how you do it)

If you do access it remotely thru a VPN, what router model do you use and with what settings ?

Sorry to ask so many questions, and I know other members have been very kind in offering ideas, but when I saw your post again I figured why not ask someone who is actually using a windows phone and iVMS-4500 how they have their set up.

Do you use the iVMS-4200 on your computer ?

Thanks !

Gary

Hi Gary,
I use a simple PPTP connection to connect to my netgear 3700 router running dd-wrt. Think it is a pretty standard setup. I guess I don't care if someone watches my front door or my cat. Previously I set up some port forwards on random ports and accessed it directly with domainort. It is a bit slow over PPTP and I usually go to the substream to view data but I can play back what is stored on the storage card from iVMS.

Roger

 

[GKL]

Hi Gary,
I use a simple PPTP connection to connect to my netgear 3700 router running dd-wrt. Think it is a pretty standard setup. I guess I don't care if someone watches my front door or my cat. Previously I set up some port forwards on random ports and accessed it directly with domainort. It is a bit slow over PPTP and I usually go to the substream to view data but I can play back what is stored on the storage card from iVMS.

Roger

Thanks Roger, when you say slow over PPTP is the live camera feed choppy ?

I'm new to VPN and PPTP stuff, but I looked up your router and saw it did not seem to have a VPN server, just passthrough. So when you use PPTP a VPN is not required ? I read that port forwards are not secure, but I guess PPTP is safer than port forwarding.

I'm not very familiar with dd-wrt either, is it a must for your setup or just what you choose to use ?

I'll have to research how to set up my router to use PPTP, hopefully my model router is capable of using PPTP, it is an ASUS RT-ACRH13 and the spec sheet is at this link - RT-ACRH13 | Networking | ASUS USA

Being new to networking ip cams I was probably not fully understanding everything I read in this forum, I had the impression that any setup that did not use a VPN was extremely unsafe, but you seem to be okay with PPTP. Yes I would prefer to use VPN but since I can't afford right now to pay over $200 for a business class router that has the "L2TP / IPsec" VPN server that is needed to be compatible with the windows phone VPN client I have to find another solution, and if my router is capable of being setup like yours with PPTP then that might be the next best solution to VPN.

It seems like it would be so easy to use Hikvision P2P to connect, but others have indicated it could be unsecure, any thoughts on that ?

 

[Roger]

Hi Gary,
Using PPTP to view the main stream exhibits both lag and shop. Sub stream seems to be acceptable. And on a phone screen they look almost the same.
To tell you the truth, I don't remember what it took to set up PPTP. I believe it is supported in dd-wrt natively. There is a good discussion of it here. PPTP is also easy to implement in the Windows OS.
I use dd-wrt on most of my routers out of habit. Not sure I am using 1/20th of the capabilities that it has. Did a router search in the DB and your device does not support dd-wrt.
You might also look at SoftEther VPN Project - SoftEther VPN Project. It provides VPN server that can get through your router.

Roger

 

[fenderman]

Thanks Roger, when you say slow over PPTP is the live camera feed choppy ?

I'm new to VPN and PPTP stuff, but I looked up your router and saw it did not seem to have a VPN server, just passthrough. So when you use PPTP a VPN is not required ? I read that port forwards are not secure, but I guess PPTP is safer than port forwarding.

I'm not very familiar with dd-wrt either, is it a must for your setup or just what you choose to use ?

I'll have to research how to set up my router to use PPTP, hopefully my model router is capable of using PPTP, it is an ASUS RT-ACRH13 and the spec sheet is at this link - RT-ACRH13 | Networking | ASUS USA

Being new to networking ip cams I was probably not fully understanding everything I read in this forum, I had the impression that any setup that did not use a VPN was extremely unsafe, but you seem to be okay with PPTP. Yes I would prefer to use VPN but since I can't afford right now to pay over $200 for a business class router that has the "L2TP / IPsec" VPN server that is needed to be compatible with the windows phone VPN client I have to find another solution, and if my router is capable of being setup like yours with PPTP then that might be the next best solution to VPN.

It seems like it would be so easy to use Hikvision P2P to connect, but others have indicated it could be unsecure, any thoughts on that ?

pptp is an old way of implementing vpn and is not secure...in many ways it worse than port forwarding because a vulnerability will expose your entire network. Buy a 50 dollar android phone and sell the windows phone...all your problems will be solved.