Is anyone successfully getting snapshots from an IP8M-T2499EW

[ghctim]

Is there any resolution here?

[ghctim]

i lowered my snapshot quality from 6 to 4 and it's working via API now!

[sidamos]

On my IP2M-841B-V3, I have to set the sub stream to H264 (not to MJPEG), otherwise snapshot.cgi does return HTTP 500 most of the time.
It is odd, that this relates to the problem because the snapshots are being taken from the main stream.

[kywildcat]

Update: After playing around with a bunch of things I've discovered that the problem is related to video resolution. If I set the resolution on the main stream (which also sets snapshot resolution) to 2304x1296 or lower, then snapshot retrieval works. Anything higher and it fails. So lowering the resolution is at least a workaround to the problem if not a solution.

I have a theory that the problem is related to motion detection, maybe an O(N^2) or worse algorithm? If I look at the event logs I see from the time stamps that motion detection takes at least 30 seconds, sometimes much more. I tried disabling all motion detection related settings but I still see the events in the log so apparently there is no way to disable the motion detection process

Yep, same issue. Anything above 2304 res = no screenshots, below 2304 = most screenshots (not exactly all). Screenshots worked great for couple of months, then just stopped working. Hopefully Amcrest can fix this with a firmware update soon.

[DanTappan]

Update on this issue.
1. WRT to some of the responses above: I am using HTTP GET to retrieve the snapshots, using the URL discovered through ONVIF. I wouldn't be surprised is snapshots saved to SD, FTP or EMAIL behave differently, but that's not the configuration I'm using.

2. As noted on March 27 I was able to get snapshots to work by reducing the resolution. Recently I found that there was a new firmware release for the camera : V2.622.00AC000.0.R on 10/22/20
I tried installing this firmware to see whether it addressed the problem. Unfortunately it seems to have made the problem worse. Using this firmware I cannot reliably use HTTP GET unless I reduce the resolution to 1080P. Makes the 8M advertised for the camera pretty laughable. As before the failure mode is that most of the time it returns a 400 error. Not always, depending on the resolution it works occasionally, with higher failure rates as I increase the resolution.

3. It turns out that I seeing the same problem on other recent Amcrest models.
- an IP4M-1055E purchased in November from Amazon. This is interesting because other IP4M-1055E purchased earlier do not exhibit the problem
- an IP4M-1051B with "Updated Javascript Firmware, Version 2" purchased in December directly from Amcrest

It seems probable that all of their latest firmware has some version of the bug. Seems like a serious customer issue to me.

[DanTappan]

Another point to add to this: The problem is somewhat intermittent, depending on the configured resolution. For example, my IP8M-T2499 configured at 2688x1520 ran fine for awhile this morning, and then started failing solidly, with the 400 errors. I'm wondering if the problem is related to motion detection, since there's a lot more activity around the bird feeder this time of day.

Mon Dec 28 12:02:35 2020 - birdcam : HTTPErr 400 Client Error: Bad Request for url: http://birdcam/onvifsnapshot/media_serv ... &subtype=0
Mon Dec 28 12:02:47 2020 - birdcam : HTTPErr 400 Client Error: Bad Request for url: http://birdcam/onvifsnapshot/media_serv ... &subtype=0

reduced the resolution to 2304x1296 and it's currently working

[DanTappan]

Just to add some additional information to this thread. I discovered through some googling that Amcrest cameras are rebranded Dahua models (any maybe also some other manufacturers?); the IP8M-T2499 in particular is a Dahua model.
I got hold of a Dahua 8MP Zoom camera ( DH-IPC-HFW4631H-ZSA, running firmware from 2017) and tested it out in my setup. It turns out that

• The Dahua, with original Dahua firmware works somewhat better, in that it is sometimes able to retrieve 8MP snapshots

• BUT the Dahua seems to have intermittent similar issues. The main difference is that when it gets into the failure mode it returns "500 Server Error: Internal Server Error for url: ...", and it recovers after a few minutes. As with the "Amcrest" camera, reducing the resolution to 4MP makes the problem go away (or at least very infrequent)

So the conclusion is:

• some version of this problem was likely in the original firmware Amcrest got from Dahua

• this is a longstanding issue with the camera firmware

• Nobody should hold their breath expecting it to be fixed

• if someone needs reliable 8MP snapshots they'd have to find a manufacturer that is totally independent of the Chinese Dahua/Amcrest/??? ecosystem. It's not clear who that would be

Note: it is apparently possible to install Dahua firmware on the IP8M-T2499. I haven't tried it. Based on this test I wouldn't expect it to fix the issue, but it might improve the behavior a bit. If someone want to try it, see this thread: https://ipcamtalk.com/threads/how-to-up ... res.44864/

[Revo2Maxx]

Just keep in mind anyone that uses any FW outside the Amcrest Family of FW will loose any support from Staff and will void any warranty that is left if any from Amcrest as well. While some have made this work there are a few that have bricked their cameras trying..

[staffax]

If you're interested I can give you a python script I use. Takes some hand editing to set up the URLs and user/pwds but it works pretty well for grabbing a snapshot every second from 1/2 dozen cameras - other than for cameras with buggy snapshot support like this one.

Dan, can you send me the python script? I've been trying to do the same thing with a python script but get stuck on solving the user/login part of the URL.

[kspearrin]

Also having this same problem. Registered so I could subscribe to this thread for any future updates.