General rule of thumb is if the cameras are working for your needs, don't fix what ain't broke. Too many instances we have seen people update for the sake of updating (I want them all on the same firmware) and then something happens. Especially now with all the different chipset differences companies have had to use, it may work great on one chipset and be problematic on another chipset for the same camera model.
Here are issues I have seen people report here where they were upgrading just for the sake of upgrading:
- A Dahua Z12E that someone updated and then constantly reboots comes to mind.
- The Dahua 49225 and 49425 PTZ that loses autotracking with an update come to mind - yes Dahua intentionally eliminated autotracking with a firmware update.
- The Hikvision DS-2DEA425IW-DW PTZ that loses autotracking with an update comes to mind - yes Hik intentionally eliminated autotracking with a firmware update.
- A Hikvision ANPR camera losing half the FPS and loses the ability to read US plates - those are big deals to have happen.
- A Hikvision ANPR DS-2CD4A26FWD camera that lost all ability to read plates - kinda makes the camera useless.
- A Hikvision camera that the user lost ability to control the LED light function at night.
- A Hikvision wifi camera that loses the ability to use wifi after a firmware update - yes they intentionally deleted the ability to use wifi.
- Hikvision iVM4200 v3.8 - loses the free ability to use the computer as storage.
- Dahua IPC-HFW1320S that started phoning home using 60MB/hr and costing someone thousands of dollars in data overages.
- Dahua 5442 that will not allow playback of the SD card.
- Countless other instances where the camera or NVR simply bricked and became useless.
- Countless examples where the camera or NVR went into Chinese.
DO NOT AUTO UPDATE THEM - in fact they shouldn't even be touching the internet.
With that said if you decide to update them, the firmware from Andy will be better than the firmware from Dahua as we provide suggestions that they then make but don't push out to their website. Andy's firmware will have SMD3.0 and Smart IR.
Here is where Andy puts out the latest firmware. Usually the first post and is updated there, but sometimes they may be further back, so if it isn't on the first post, then go to the last and work backwards.
Dahua products
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