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Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

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Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#171

Post by stragies »

j_h_o wrote: post #15

Bosch, Hanwha, Axis, Ubiquiti/UniFi. I personally prefer Bosch and Hanwha cameras. Great optics, low light performance and solid firmware. Axis tends to be expensive and low light performance is not as good, for the price. UniFi Protect cameras are decent, but the standalone firmware is rather limited. I connect these cameras to Frigate[1] locally. Some example model numbers: Bosch Flexidome IP Starlight 6000 Dome Se…

Thanks, the HomeAssistant integration of frigate.video looks nice!

Do you happen to know a way to use the audio-backchannels of the to broadcast audio out of the cameras? And/or use them as "speakerphone" with SIP/xy? Somehow integrate them with pipewire?

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#172

Post by [deleted] »

EvanAnderson wrote: post #52
bradfitz wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another recommendation for Axis here. I've used dozens of them for almost 20 years now and they've been rock solid, technically and support-wise. But they're expensive. They do have cheaper models nowadays, though. In addition to explosion-proof ones: https://www.axis.com/en-us/products/explosion-protected-came...

Fun story re: the term "explosion-proof": I was given a tour of an industrial facility where conditions required explosion-proof equipment. The tour guide made a point of calling out the explosion-proof motors in one of the rooms. One of the other tour group members asked the question "Why would it matter if these motors survived an explosion?" I visualized the facility exploding in a fiery blaze and a motor, fully i…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#173

Post by stragies »

fabioyy wrote: post #73

A little off topic, i don´t know your use case, but you can use an old phone as webcam, they will be better in quality than any IP camera. A little example using my old galaxy s11. ( its connected to a pc using usb, airplane mode, no internet ) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CDE7PsLwzk

For this scenario I'd like to buy a device powered by POE, with USB-Eth, some free USB-Ports with PPPC, and some contraption, that goes through a hole in the back of the phone to the battery connector inside.

I had assembled something like that for my old SGS2 alarm clock out of a POE-5V splitter, an USB otg adapter, an Uhubctl-compatible USB-HUB powered by the POE-Splitter, and assorted cabling including a lead to the internal battery terminal with the top bar of an old battery (It contains some electronics). UGLY. Does anybody know a pre-made device like that?

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#174

Post by supergeek »

cameron_b wrote: post #110

I want to add a term that I haven't seen in this discussion so far. IP cameras can interoperate with Open Standard NVR systems using ONVIF. [0] ONVIF cameras, or cameras that support ONVIF are capable of communicating settings and streaming video to recording servers without intermediaries. RTSP or MJPEG are available as media layers ( not the only ones, but ones called out so far in the conversation as desirable for…

Additionally, Amcrest sells ONVIF compatible cameras that do have a web UI and can connect to any of those NVRs, or a wide number of ONVIF viewer apps on any device you want. They're a bit more expensive, but still dirt cheap compared to more reputable brands mentioned in this thread.

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#175

Post by bitwrangler »

Jeslijar wrote: post #61
rhysrhaven wrote: post #21

Dahua and Hikvision are the largest manufactures, with most companies rebranding them. Even if you don't use Synology, this is a handy list. https://www.synology.com/en-us/compatibility/camera

Pretty sure hikvision is suspected to have spyware in it. UK has banned it from government sites afaik. China of course denies. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-65307503 It is known to have major vulnerabilities https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/over-80-000-e...

Affected Hikvision cameras and firmware versions are listed here:

https://www.hikvision.com/en/support/cybersecurity/security-...

Precondition:

The attacker has access to the device network or the device has direct interface with the internet

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#176

Post by exhilaration »

atyppo wrote: post #155
kunwon1 wrote: post #6

I have worked professionally with access control and surveillance. I can give you two manufacturer recommendations: Axis and Geovision. Axis cameras are high end and expensive, but they will, in my experience, do anything an IP camera could reasonably be expected to do, and they will do it well. They are European in origin and are available from various retail outlets to ship this week. Geovision cameras are low end…

Geovision has had a ton of security incidents. Perhaps they're easy to set up, but they definitely aren't secure.

You shouldn't expose any of these cameras, high end or low end, to the internet. You shouldn't even trust them on the same VLAN as the rest of you computers or phones. That mitigates security issues.

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#177

Post by LeFantome »

dheera wrote: post #149
kunwon1 wrote: post #6

I have worked professionally with access control and surveillance. I can give you two manufacturer recommendations: Axis and Geovision. Axis cameras are high end and expensive, but they will, in my experience, do anything an IP camera could reasonably be expected to do, and they will do it well. They are European in origin and are available from various retail outlets to ship this week. Geovision cameras are low end…

RTSP streams never work, they always have several seconds of latency, and web browsers don't support them well if at all. Someone should invent a webcam that directly speaks WebRTC. Open a HTTPS connection and POST a SDP to get it started.

What? ONVIF is RTSP under the hood. Literally the entire professional surveillance industry is based on RTSP.

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#178

Post by kbar13 »

MegaDeKay wrote: post #152

You don't mention your use case but the ESP32-CAM gets you an ESP32-based wifi streaming camera for about $10 USD. No app. No account. Surprisingly powerful. https://randomnerdtutorials.com/esp32-cam-video-streaming-fa...

esp32-cam is just ok. the quality of the camera is generally very very low. it also can't do h264 meaning that certain integrations like streaming/recording/detecting motion in apple home will require you to do transcodes on some other hardware (which can get expensive).

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#179

Post by kbar13 »

i use yi home camera (4 pack on amazon for $72 currently) which runs over wifi and firmware via https://github.com/roleoroleo/yi-hack-Allwinner-v2. this bypasses the app and internet connection entirely. you will need some microSD cards to flash and run the cameras.

this exposes RTSP/ONVIF and also allows for local motion detection and recording capabilities.

i also use https://www.scrypted.app/ to handle MQTT for motion detection events from the camera and restream to apple home to take advantage of notifications on my phone, remote streaming, etc.

this works fairly well, the downsides are that the install process is probably more involved than it should be, and the stand it comes with is just /ok/ but the mounting bracket is such that you can 3d print your own fairly easily. 1080 stream quality is good enough tho i'm sure there are better quality cameras on the market.

Re: Ask HN: IP cameras that don't require an app or internet?

#180

Post by tapper »

ramesh31 wrote: post #25
lloydatkinson wrote: post #5

This is a very disturbing trend for sure. Given that these new cameras that need accounts sure aren’t showing ads on the feeds either, meanwhile an account being required must be important to the manufacturers in some way. I can only conclude that they must be selling access to feeds, because even the most incompetent agile product delivery manager type person isn’t going to simply suggest every camera needs an accou…

This is happening with routers, too. Just recently had someone give me a new Netgear Nighthawk for free, and I was stoked until it wanted me to download an app and create an account to manage my network. Straight to the garbage.

Well that was a dumb thing to do! You could of flashed it with OpenWrt and had a dam good router.
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