How to view IP camera remotely when connected to router via POE switch?

nbjelland

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Hello, as you probably can tell from my question, you'll find that I'm a newbie at IP cameras. Here's what's connected today:

3 x IP cameras (2 x Dahua and 1 x Hisilicon) are connected to a POE switch. The switch is connected to a Raymarine GPS in my boat. For the cameras to work with the GPS I have the following settings:
  • DHCP enabled
  • ONVIF disabeled

Here is what I want to do:
  • Connect the cameras to a 4G router/modem (TP-Link Archer MR-600)
  • View the cameras remotely over internett

What I (think) I understand so far:
  • I connect the router to the POE switch with at ethernet cable
  • I setup a static IP to the computer I'm forwarding the ports to
  • I login to the camera and setup HTTP and RTSP ports.
  • I login to the router and set up port forwarding.

Q#1: Does this make sense?
Q#2: As I understand, the IP adress for the cameras are assigned by the POE switch if there is no router, but will be assigned by the router if I connect the POE to the router, correct?
Q#3: If my assumption above is correct, I'm afraid my GPS will have problems detecting the cameras again since IP address has changed. Is there a way to connect this without changing the current IP of the cameras?

An answer would be much appreciated:)
 

mikeynags

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A#1 - You are mostly on the right track. Sounds like you want to access remotely over a 4G connection. Not sure why the concern that the cameras need to work with the GPS, maybe you could explain that more.
A#2 - DHCP is typically handed out by the router and not the switch. I'm a big fan of statically configuring all of these devices which would give you one less thing to worry about.
A#3 - More detail on the GPS again - but another item would be not to open ports but to configure a VPN on the router if it is supported or you could set up a raspberry Pi running OpenVPN which would be cheap to do and it's much safer/secure than opening up ports.
 

Mike A.

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Looks like that router does have OpenVPN support built-in some way. That would be the better way to go than forwarding ports.
 

nbjelland

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A#1 - You are mostly on the right track. Sounds like you want to access remotely over a 4G connection. Not sure why the concern that the cameras need to work with the GPS, maybe you could explain that more.
A#2 - DHCP is typically handed out by the router and not the switch. I'm a big fan of statically configuring all of these devices which would give you one less thing to worry about.
A#3 - More detail on the GPS again - but another item would be not to open ports but to configure a VPN on the router if it is supported or you could set up a raspberry Pi running OpenVPN which would be cheap to do and it's much safer/secure than opening up ports.
First of all, thank you for taking time answering my questions! Much appreciated!

Q#1: Yes, I want to access remotely over a 4G connection. The cameras a primarily there for use with the GPS (Raymarine ES128 using Lighthouse III operating system), as I can watch the engine bay, rearward facing docking camera and front facing top camera while at sea (the GPS has a built in video app). Since this is 3rd pary cameras and not Raymarine cameras, there have been some compatibility issues, and I dont want to mess up anytning now that I finally got it working).
Q#2: Sorry, I meant to say that the IP adress is handed out from the GPS (Raymarine has it's own range of IP adress that it uses, something like 10.xx.x.xxx). So If I connect the modem/router to the POE switch, wich device will give the cameras an IP adress? The GPS or the router? Is this dependant on wich device that is first powerd on? For remote viewing (4G) the cameras the GPS will be powerd off. Can I configure the router to use the same IP adress as the GPS?
Q#3: When I connect the POE switch to my computer with ethernet cable, I type in the cameras IP adress (ex: 10.22.1.172) and I get to login to camera web page. For remote viewing a would need to add the port i configured at the end of the IP address. But since this now will be going trough the router, I would need to use the routers IP adress and port, correct? Or is all this not applicable if I use OpenVPN?
 

mikeynags

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First of all, thank you for taking time answering my questions! Much appreciated!

Q#1: Yes, I want to access remotely over a 4G connection. The cameras a primarily there for use with the GPS (Raymarine ES128 using Lighthouse III operating system), as I can watch the engine bay, rearward facing docking camera and front facing top camera while at sea (the GPS has a built in video app). Since this is 3rd pary cameras and not Raymarine cameras, there have been some compatibility issues, and I dont want to mess up anytning now that I finally got it working).
Q#2: Sorry, I meant to say that the IP adress is handed out from the GPS (Raymarine has it's own range of IP adress that it uses, something like 10.xx.x.xxx). So If I connect the modem/router to the POE switch, wich device will give the cameras an IP adress? The GPS or the router? Is this dependant on wich device that is first powerd on? For remote viewing (4G) the cameras the GPS will be powerd off. Can I configure the router to use the same IP adress as the GPS?
Q#3: When I connect the POE switch to my computer with ethernet cable, I type in the cameras IP adress (ex: 10.22.1.172) and I get to login to camera web page. For remote viewing a would need to add the port i configured at the end of the IP address. But since this now will be going trough the router, I would need to use the routers IP adress and port, correct? Or is all this not applicable if I use OpenVPN?

OK -
A#1 - very good on the GPS.
A#2 - it's not a good idea to have more than one DHCP server on a network. You will run into a race condition where both the GPS and the router will try to respond to a DHCP discover packet. It's totally doable to have the GPS continue to hand out DHCP addresses and connect the router to the same network. You would just need to disable the DHCP server on the router. You probably will need to spend some time and document/map out this network so you have some to refer to when troubleshooting - or even share here when someone asks for more info about your network :)
A#3 - I'll answer the 2nd half 1st. With a VPN, you wouldn't need to specify any port information at all. You would connect as you normally do by IP. If you decide to go the route of opening ports, you would need to port forward on your router and configure an individual port per camera for the forwarding. My recommendation would be the VPN. It's a little more work upfront but easier in the long run not to mention more secure. You could build an OpenVPN server on a Raspberry Pi for not a whole bunch of $$$ which would do the job.
 

nbjelland

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OK -
A#1 - very good on the GPS.
A#2 - it's not a good idea to have more than one DHCP server on a network. You will run into a race condition where both the GPS and the router will try to respond to a DHCP discover packet. It's totally doable to have the GPS continue to hand out DHCP addresses and connect the router to the same network. You would just need to disable the DHCP server on the router. You probably will need to spend some time and document/map out this network so you have some to refer to when troubleshooting - or even share here when someone asks for more info about your network :)
A#3 - I'll answer the 2nd half 1st. With a VPN, you wouldn't need to specify any port information at all. You would connect as you normally do by IP. If you decide to go the route of opening ports, you would need to port forward on your router and configure an individual port per camera for the forwarding. My recommendation would be the VPN. It's a little more work upfront but easier in the long run not to mention more secure. You could build an OpenVPN server on a Raspberry Pi for not a whole bunch of $$$ which would do the job.
Hi, and thanks againg for taking your time to reply! I have learned now that one should keep the Raynet sperate to other newtworks on the boat. As you say, a Raspberry Pi could be a solution, setting up two seperate networks and removing the default routes for the Raynet to avoid traffic interference. This would be way above my level of competence, so instead I'll probably buy a seperate survailance camera and connect it to the router, leaving the Raynet "untouched".
 
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