Good app to view 4MP cameras on Amazon Fire box?

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Blue11

n3wb
Mar 15, 2018
22
4
Looking for a decent app to use on the Amazon Fire box to display my cameras.

I downloaded, installed, and paid for IP Cam Viewer, but it has been disappointing. It has problems with displaying higher resolution (4MP) images in general, and at anything near the set frame rates. If I set my cameras at constant bitrate instead of variable, it falls apart even with 2MP cameras. I contacted the developer, and was informed that I had to lower the resolution, or the data rate, or the frame rate, or all three. That solution is not even vaguely acceptable.

My Amazon Fire boxes are hard wired to my router, so there's tons of bandwidth available.

I'm using NVMS7000 on my Android phone and tablet, and that works great over wi-fi, much better than I expected. So I tried it on the Fire box, and could not get it going - it needs to be in portrait mode for the setup (to display the menu icon), and I can't put my 65" TV into portrait mode.

And the iVMS-4200 client on my desktop is also fine.

But I need something for the Fire boxes that works with my installation.

Suggestions for something else to try?

Thanks.
 
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I use iVMS-4500 on my Android devices—is this available on Amazon’s device?
 
Unfortunately not. I can side load it on the Amazon Fire, but like all HIKvision apps, it needs to be in portrait mode for the menus to appear for setup and for use, and there's no way to put the Fire box/TV into portrait mode. I've tried all sorts of things and have been unsuccessful in getting them to work on the Fire box.
 
On android there's an app called ivms-4500 HD. Try that it actually only works in landscape so you should be good to go.
 
Lowvoltage said:
On android there's an app called ivms-4500 HD. Try that it actually only works in landscape so you should be good to go.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestion. You are correct that in runs in landscape mode. However, it will not respond to the Fire's remote (nor to a mouse connected to the Fire's USB port) to enter any configuration info - it just wants a touch screen.

I thought about trying a USB keyboard, but even if I do get the configuration info entered, if it won't respond to the remote to do things like change from single view to multi view, I can't use it.
 
Lowvoltage said:
On android there's an app called ivms-4500 HD. Try that it actually only works in landscape so you should be good to go.
Click to expand...

For HD 10, I can load Google Play store without rooting (google it). However, under ivms-4500 HD, I can configure a single camera access my wifi, displays live view of that camera with time ticking away, but app locks up, displaying "..starting live view" and app eventually closes by itself.

Any suggestions?
 
After looking a round a lot, I settled for IP Cam Viewer from the Amazon store. It was $4, and I have it on both my Fire boxes. It's adequate. Slow refresh rate (I have the cameras set around 22 frames/sec, the app displays them around 10-12). Cumbersome and somewhat unintuitive interface for an app that mature. There's a free version to try.

I finally just McGyver'd my setup...I had old coax running to both TVs where I wanted to see my cameras, so sent the HDMI from the NVR to a converter that made HDSDI out of the signal and sent it down the coax, then on the other end I had an HDSDI to HDMI converter and fed that to an input on the TVs, and I can see the cameras by switching inputs on the TVs. Not for everyone, but worked for me, and it's much faster than switching to the Fire box and calling up the app. Total cost buying the various converters/splitters from Monoprice and eBay was about $100 to feed two sets. My wife really prefers being able to just hit the Input button on the TV remotes to see the cameras.

The downside is that the view is whatever you have set up on your NVR - you can't call up individual cameras (although I'm working on that). The IP Cam Viewer app allows individual cameras or multiple views to be called up.
 
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