I recently bought the HWI-B140H-M from HIKVISION in order to test it on Linux. But the results were quite disappointing:
- You can access the cam via browser but for some features (e. g. configuring areas for motion detection) you need either their windows client software (iVMS) or you need an old browser (Chrome 44.x, Firefox 51.x or lower) with browser plugins. Fun fact: They don’t tell you which plugins are meant. So without windows, you have a hard time.
- Interestingly enough, the manual says that when the WebSocket function is activated, you could use all features in your current browser without plugins (which contradicts the information at the beginning). But there is no such function (in the windows client not either) although the most recent firmware is installed.
- I updated the firmware to the most recent version (V5.5.80 build 180911) using the windows client in a VirtualBox Windows VM. After the update, I could not access the web interface anymore. It turned out, that they are blocking my browser’s user-agent ID. How dare you! With the Firefox addon user-agent switcher and manager and an IE 11 user-agent the web interface is accessible again.
- My FritzBox router has a NAS function. So i set up a Samba (SMB) share and finally configured it in the web interface of the cam. It worked but the cam showed the Samba device as “uninitialized”. The cam’s manual instructs you to click on “Format” to solve this but it did not work. I tried several configurations, tested the Samba share on nautilus but I always got an error (permission blabla). Some folks had the same trouble in 2014 (cctvforum.com). No working solution, so I gave it up.
- The user manual of the cam is the worst manual I’ve ever seen. It contains contradicting informations (see above) and many sections only apply to a certain device but they don’t mention the device. Furthermore, it’s more a listing of features than explaining hands-on how to configure the device properly. “Here are the information, deal with it”.
My advice: Don’t buy it.