FIXED: Missing notifications - G1 on firmware 5.6.x

[rompik]

I used older firmware (I think it was 5.5.80) and recently upgraded to 5.6.2 on all cameras as recording to NAS drive was finally fixed.
However I no longer get Events notifications on my mobile from any camera. I do get Motion notification but this is the only type of event that triggers notification. Anything else: PIR, Line crossing, Intrusion detection does not notify me.
1. Pictures do get recorded (Storage Settings > Capture > Capture Parameters > Enable Event-Triggered Snapshot)
2. Footage is also recorded (I changed recording from Continuous to Event and I see that recording is triggered).

But no notifications (unless I set basic Motion detection > only those seem to work).
I did set up "Notify Surveillance Center" in Linkage Method.

Anyone else saw the same problem? (I dont use NVR, just invividual IP3 cameras (DS-2CD2455 and DS-2CD2555)

 

[fullboogie]

Did you set up Notify Surveillance Center in the smart events pages as well? Check all your notification settings. I've had certain settings go to default after upgrading firmware, so they may be botched.

 

[rompik]

Of course I marked "Notify Surveillance Center"

Small correction - I do get smart event notifications but they are very very rare (probably once every 500 events). When I switch dumb motion events they come every time (this happens on all 4 cameras I have) so it looks like some bug in firmware. I will try to remove and re-add cameras to HIK-Connect to see if this fixes the problem.

 

[fullboogie]

Of course?
Good luck.

 

[rompik]

Ok, it looks like I'm not the only one and FM 5.6xx simply broke Smart Events. I see this has been already mentioned on this forum:

Downgrading firmware on G1 from v5.6.0 to v5.5.83

I recently updated the firmware on my G1 DS-2CD2025FWD-I from v5.5.83 to v5.6.0 build 190507. I'm trying to revert back to v5.5.83. I'm unable to do it via the webGUI (version mismatch error) or TFTP (completes transfer but never confirms update). Has anyone managed to downgrade successfully?

www.use-ip.co.uk

What is worse - it is impossible to downgrade now back to working version as HIK also confirmed that with the message "...sorry for the inconvenience".

@Phil, Dan - any chance to escalate this to Hikvision?

 

[StewartM]

At recent Hikvision roadshow I asked if they would allow downgrading in future revisions and the answer was no. The latest firmware v5.6.3 is working great, smart events too. In my testing, multiple concurrent events (motion/intrusion) are not totally reliable triggering alerts synchronously. Try setting one smart event, say line crossing and test with a high sensitivity. Check the camera has the time zone and date format set correctly. Same with Hik-Connect on the mobile app - by default it does not auto detect the correct time zone or enable alert notification. If you still have issues, remove and re-add the cameras to Hik-Connect. Perhaps the local config file on your mobile has not updated since the firmware change.

 

[rompik]

@StewartM - THANK YOU for help!
I have 3 cameras on 5.6.2 and one camera on 5.6.3. All of them have the same issue with very unreliable smart events. Do you use NVR? I don't (i record directly to NAS) so maybe that's why smart events work correctly in your set up???

What I did:
1. I reset all cameras to default 2x or 3x times and repeated config
2. I set Line Crossing detection on Camera_1, Intrusion Detection on Camera_2 and 3 and PIR on Camera_4. No improvement.
3. Event Schedule is set 24/7, Notifications are enabled in HikConnect (without any schedule so they should always come). Linage Method is set to "Notify Surveillance Center"
4. Timezones are set correctly in all cameras and in HikConnect.
5. I removed one camera from HIK Connect and re-added. It helped a bit (now i got about 6 notifications today from that camera in HikConnect for about 25 tests). That is an improvement (earlier i didn't get anything at all from that camera); now about 20% success rate.
Sometimes I did wait about 1 hour between walking into the room (I know that multiple events in quick succession are suppressed) but long gap doesn't change anything.

Now, the thing is:
1. It's not like I don't get any events - I do get them but very, very rarely (strangely re-adding one camera to HIK connect improved things). I'm lucky if I get any event form any other camera once a day.
2. I believe smart events are triggered as I set to take pictures when those events are triggered. I can see those pictures. And i enabled one of the cameras to sound the alarm and it does make noise through its internal speaker - always (just no notification via HikConnect)
3. When I set dumb Motion Detection event it does trigger notifications correctly - always!.
4. I do have very good / fast internet connection.

So it looks like there is something wrong with either (or combination of) HikConnect / Smart Events / no-NVR in my setup / recent firmware that doesn't trigger notifications.
The last option is that maybe the router can potentially block some connections (camera > Hik servers) that are perceived to be untrusted or something similar. But since i do get dumb motion detection events that is rather unlikely.

 

[StewartM]

Getting events to trigger reliably and with minimum false alerts takes a lot of tweaking. I have spent hours pulling a dog sized box through intrusion zones and across line detection markers to prevent false alerts for animals. I understand your frustration.

Out of interest what settings are you using for the cameras? Bit rate, frame rate, codec (H265 / H264). Please post a screen capture of the main stream settings page. Also, do you have WDR on? DNR setting? All of these may effect event triggering.

Some last resort ideas:
Large attachments might be a factor . Try drop the capture resolution.
Try the iVMS-4500 mobile app and see if it makes a difference.

Try using a alternative hik-connect server in platform access:
dev.us.hik-connect.com
dev.eu.hik-connect.com
dev.hik-connect.com
litedev.eu.hik-connect.com
litedev.us.hik-connect.com

Keep us posted.

 

[rompik]

Thanks StewartM! I appreciate your suggestions.

I didn't know you can choose different servers - I will try that first.
I will also try to lower video parameters (currently 6MPix on H265 @8192kbps constant bitrate with WDR and DNR settings set to medium) and I will post screenshot of settings pages.

Many thanks!

 

[rompik]

@StewartM, @Dan, @Phil
I did manage to resolve the issue but I think it's a bug in recent firmware. Would be good if somebody tested the same and if this could be reported to Hikvision.
In short: Notifications via HikConnect work when you enable Email notifications. Without e-mail, notifications don't work properly.

I followed all good recommendations from StewartM. Lowered resolution, tried different bitrates, different codecs (H264, H265, H265+), different picture settings (WDR on/off, BLC...) etc. In all cases events did trigger actions like: saving picture to NAS/SD Card, triggering recording, audible alarm, but never sent notification to mobile (or extremely rarely).
I also tried different hik-connect servers but none of them (apart from automatic) worked. The cameras were reported as offline and when I removed one of them from HikConnect and tried to add it was always waiting to connect the camera to network.

And then out of desperation I thought maybe I could at least have email notifications until it is resolved. Tried that on one camera and got both: email and HikConnect notification. Set up the same on all other cameras and my mobile was beeping continuously as I was passing near each camera.
Then I removed tick box to sent email in smart event and notifications stopped too.
I tried line-crossing, intrusion-detection, PIR and they all work reliably only when Email is ticked.

Dumb motion detection works without emails correctly.
So it looks there is some problem with all events except Motion Detection.

 

[fullboogie]

Smart notifications work fine for me without email notification.

 

[rompik]

Do you use NVR? I think notifications would be processed via NVR in that case which would be different than camera firmware.

 

[fullboogie]

Yes, an I-series.

 

[StewartM]

I'm thinking out loud to a degree - so don't take the following as gospel.
From what I've read, when event alerts are triggered on your camera it notifies the 'Surveillance Center', be it to the NVR, Hik-Connect or iVMS-4200 via Hikvision's websocket API. The alerts, or push notifications, are sent via the websocket protocol piggy-backing on HTML (also a protocol). The Hik-connect service specifically needs to establish a connection to port 443 on the hosting server via a ephemeral port locally.

Email alerts sent via the camera use SMTP - which is also a push protocol. By default most routers/firewalls allow SMTP traffic, which explains why your email alerts work. Check your router/firewall allows ephemeral ports to be opened between 32000 and 61000 (roughly). Hik-connect requires these short-lived, temporary ports in order to communicate with the Amazon Web Services servers.

 

[Dan]

Smart notifications work fine for me without email notification.

I see the same, we have tested push notifications on their own both before v5.6.xx firmware and after and we haven't seen any issues. I would recommend looking into the router/firewall idea that @StewartM has brought up as that is the only thing I would think could be an issue.

 

[rompik]

@Dan, did you try that with just the camera (no NVR)?

Anyway, what @StewartM says makes a lot of sense. I haven't looked into router logs yet (this will take me a while) but I did try something else. I kept E-mail notification ON but changed email settings to dummy values so that camera cannot connect to my GMAIL account. And HikConnect notifications stopped coming.
So it looks very plausible that HikConnect notifications sort of piggy-back on connection opened for email notifications.

I only wonder why they worked before cameras firmware update. I didn't update router firmware for very long time so it is strange the router started blocking them now.

Thank you @StewartM and @Dan.

 

[Dan]

@Dan, did you try that with just the camera (no NVR)?

I have a 7716 I-series NVR setup on the Hik-connect app and I was getting notifications from both a camera directly connected to the NVR and a camera connected remotely to the NVR via a separate PoE switch. Both cameras are running v5.6.xx firmware and the NVR is running v4.22.000 firmware. One camera was a 5MP Mini Bullet and was set to motion detection, the other was an 8MP Turret set to line crossing.