Hikvision DS-7108N-SN/P - NVR greymarket apparently

[DaveFromPeg]

I bought this DS-7108N-SN/P several years ago off of Amazon when I first got home surveillance cameras..
I had no idea there was such a large greymarket out there particularly with hikvision. Anyway this nvr ran flawlessly for the past five years until a couple of months ago.
I reset it to factory defaults and when it came back online the local interface was all in chinese. The Gui allows me to login but even resetting all the hikvision cameras they will not connect (language mismatch)
The Amazon third party seller was long gone so no luck there for the correct firmware.
For weeks I tried different digicap.dav firmware versions, many of which claimed to be for this exact model and specifically to change chinese back to english but no luck.
Finally a couple of weeks ago I used the hik batch config app and a 10.1.18 firmware that worked.. the local interface came up in english and 5 hik, 2 mini ptz, and 1 inesun ptz cams all came back online
Bang.. thought I was back in business. The inesun didn't allow me to config through the nvr much but at least it came online and allowed me to record to the nvr. All other cams were fully functional.
There seemed to be some lag between viewing the cams through the nvr web gui so i thought now that i have working firmware I'll just reset to factory and work on the lag issue with only a single cam or two..
Well I almost had the big one when I reset this 7108 and it came back online with chinese on the local interface. dam
Does anyone out there have a working config for this DS-7108N-SN/P? thanks in advance

 

[alastairstevenson]

Does anyone out there have a working config for this DS-7108N-SN/P? thanks in advance

A couple of years back I bought a 'spares and repairs' DS-7108N-SN off eBay.
It was in a bootloop.
The seller had attempted a firmware update with the stock EN/ML firmware.

After a bit of exploration, I used the serial console and the 'update' command to apply a 'hacked to English' version of the V3.0.13 build 150503 firmware supplied by a well-known forum member.
This worked OK and gave English menus.
I re-sold the NVR on eBay.

Attached is the firmware that I used, and also a copy of the Hikvision tftp updater.
You may be able to avoid connecting up to the serial console if you can apply the firmware using the tftp updater, generally that works OK.
The tftp updater works best when both PC and NVR are wired as normal to a switch or router, as opposed to being directly connected.

Good luck!

 

[DaveFromPeg]

A couple of years back I bought a 'spares and repairs' DS-7108N-SN off eBay.
It was in a bootloop.
The seller had attempted a firmware update with the stock EN/ML firmware.

After a bit of exploration, I used the serial console and the 'update' command to apply a 'hacked to English' version of the V3.0.13 build 150503 firmware supplied by a well-known forum member.
This worked OK and gave English menus.
I re-sold the NVR on eBay.

Attached is the firmware that I used, and also a copy of the Hikvision tftp updater.
You may be able to avoid connecting up to the serial console if you can apply the firmware using the tftp updater, generally that works OK.
The tftp updater works best when both PC and NVR are wired as normal to a switch or router, as opposed to being directly connected.

Good luck!

Thank you very much.. worked like a charm via tftp, a reload a few times with same result.
As far as you know would a reset to factory still return with an english menu?

 

[alastairstevenson]

That sounds like a good result.
Sorry, but I don't know for v sure if a reset to defaults would result in Chinese menus.

My guess is that it would not, as the tftp update process does an inherent reset anyway, and it's the firmware as opposed to the configuration data that's giving the EN menus.

 

[tigrrr]

A couple of years back I bought a 'spares and repairs' DS-7108N-SN off eBay.
It was in a bootloop.
The seller had attempted a firmware update with the stock EN/ML firmware.
......

Good luck!

Thank you very much!!!
It's working!!! For 2 years I struggled with Chinese firmware!!!

 

[DaveFromPeg]

That sounds like a good result.
Sorry, but I don't know for v sure if a reset to defaults would result in Chinese menus.

My guess is that it would not, as the tftp update process does an inherent reset anyway, and it's the firmware as opposed to the configuration data that's giving the EN menus.

It appears that when the DS-7108N-SN/P is reset to factory it comes back in English at the local interface with this firmware, thanks again ;0
One thing I noticed is that the three ptz cameras I have return an "operation failed or no permission" error when you try any of the ptz controls
These worked with the previous firmware 3.0.7 I think, as crappy as it was.
Any thoughts.. I'm almost ready to retire this nvr and get another

 

[alastairstevenson]

Well, a good result up to a point.
It's not the newest model around.
You would probably be impressed with an upgrade to a current model.