I have had Reolink poe cameras for about 2 years now and have watched video after video and have never got them integrated into Home Assistant. I must of always missed something. In your video, IT Worked, I followed your steps and it worked. Thanks, I don't know anything about Synology but would like to see more. I now want to learn more on the custom Reolink integration Thank much for the time you invest in your teaching videos. Good job.
Thank you Ron! I still plan on doing video on Reolink custom component - it keeps changing and getting better and better. This is really excellent implementation for Reolink cameras. Glad you got it working! In regard to Synology, if all goes as planned, I'll be doing series of video on them, how to use, why, sam pitfalls etc... But for that, I need new device - hopefully early 2021!
One thing I must say before I forget, the video detail is great, as this detail is always lacking on HA website for any sort of documentation. If you ever have a how to cast HA lovelace interface to cast enabled devices I would love that video as I haven't seen anyone do a technical video on how to do that
This is planned. I have still 2 videos I want to do - one is related to stream to cast devices, and some possible uses and scenarios, while other one will be in regard to Reolink custom component. And thank you very very much for your comment! It really means a LOT!
I have a similar setup with Reolink PoE cameras running on Synology Surveillance Station. A video about improving the HA integration would be much appreciated :D
Thanks for a nice walkthrough of options. Subscribed. Please do add a video about how to optimize HAs camera integration with surveillance station (if you haven't already?). I'm a HA newbie looking for the optimal setup of both HA and cams on a Synology NAS so need to check if you have some insighte to share in this regard as well... ought it be docker based (?) - so many varieties / options with HA installation that it seems quite overwhelming in spite of the explanations I've found. Thanks!
I was able to complete all the steps with my 10 reolink cameras. Great Job. BTW in some of your first videos you setup HA on a Synology. Is this still your setup? If not what are you using.
That's great!! What integration are you using? Synology or did you opt for Reolink custom component? And yes, I'm still torturing my Synology - although I'm running it now as SynoCommunity package. Makes it easier to install add-ons.
Robert - that's an excellent question. I have to be honest and say that I'm using 2 types of the integration - one is Synology Surveillance station, but best in terms of functionality is still HACS custom integration - github.com/fwestenberg/reolink_dev/
Thanks :-) another great tutorial! I would love to see a the HACS surveillance card set up please. Which integration have you found gives you the best real time view of your cameras? Best I have found was just using the 'Webpage Card Configuration' and using Motioneye Embed URL. Its great but I wish that card had the same functions as 'Picture Glance Card'. Picture Glance Card gives me a 5 to 10 seconds delay, even when 'live' is selected. Cheers
Sorry for a very late reply. I'll be doing some more videos and one of them will include this card too. In regard to your other question. That = can't tell you as for me it depends on the camera I'm using and resolution of the image. rtsp/Reolink custom component are a bit better then Surveillence station integration. MotionEye was worst for me (but that's because my testing system is very limited in resources). Zone Minder also gave me good results during tests.
Excellent question! If I compare some really cheap cameras from AliExpress and more expensive cameras I had from before, I would definitely say that these two models I've tested would be best buy - price is not too high, but quality of image and options is very good. You just have to be careful as not all models from Reolink support rtsp stream - models I've tested do support it.
hey thanks for the video! Did you use NVR to connect these two cameras? If not are there any advantages of using NVR compare to reolink custom component?
For custom component, not - it connects directly to camera. But one of the integrations I used was with Synology surveillance station. If you use NVR, you have easier recording and recording management among other things. Also it should put less stress on the system if motion detection and any additional video triggering is done by NVR then on Camera itself.
@@BeardedTinker thanks for the reply! So you mean that if id like to record videos and save them somewhere locally or in the cloud this may be problematic with a custom component? Im very new to video recording and integration in HA. Just got a couple of reolink cameras and NVR and thinking whether i should return the NVR. As currently not sure what value it brings in?
Ok, firs thing, no, you can use NVR and custom component - that's how I have it setup. NVR I use for event and continuous recording. And by adding custom component, I get feed into Home Assistant and also ability to turn off/on motion detection on camera and also IR. So, I use both because one makes sure I have recordings. and other one I can se feed in HA.
Have you ever been able to stream the camera streams to a google casting device like google nest hub or a chromecast device? I've had mixed results using the synology dsm module to stream the content to my casting devices.
Yes, sure. It depends on the type of the camera you had, but since version 0.116.4 it should be available to same cameras that had problem with that before. I've tested all my cameras with patch before it was added to 0.116.4 and even one DLink camera that didn't work with Chromecast, now works.
@@BeardedTinker I just updated my Hass OS and HassIO to the latest version, and now it kinda works better, lol. the video for 4 out of my 6 cameras show, but wrong orientation, and only views on my google nest hub max, while it won't show on my cast enabled tv. 1 out of 6 cameras show properly on both devices, and the other camera just doesn't work. If you have ideas what I can do for troubleshooting to submit the bug that would be great. FYI i am using the SynologyDSM native plugin to view the cameras, instead of using the onvif and motioneye setup.
@@kintaroju you can check this issue that has been closed, but it also talks about some still open issues and problems with stream component. This is not directly realated to Synology DSM integration, but rather on standard or lack of standard in how cast devices interpret streams. (not a tech guy so this is how I explained this to myself). github.com/home-assistant/core/issues/41579
@@BeardedTinker Thanks for that tidbit, about the issue, as this is new to me, which is great. I've submitted a github response, hopefully it'll get some traction, glad I am not alone lol.
Is it still the MotionEye docker version from ccrisan you are using? bc. I have issue with the Mail notification "Notification email failed: character mapping must return integer, None or unicode!"
I don't use motionEye. It was just installed for testing. I use Surevillence Station on Synology. Also, I never used email for notifications (in any system) as I find it slow and unreliable.
All depends what you want to do. NVR is needed to record (centralised) and manage video recording. If you are ok with just SDcard as place for recording - you don't need it. Also, for just monitoring you don't need NVR. (I can't respond shortly) - but there are also options for you Tu use Zonemider, motionEye or Blue Iris as free/open source software NVR.
I see that you able to get a motion detection flag into HA which is great. Is there a way to enable/disable motion detection from HA (that can be assigned to an entity for automation)? I think I saw the control was available through one of the methods.
Thanks for the comment Marc! Yes, it possible. This integration (custom component) creates binary sensor that can be used to trigger automations based on motion and also switch to toggle motion detection on or off.
Thanks@@BeardedTinker Curious if you know whether there is a simple CGI command or some other URL mechanism I can use to either enable or disable motion detection or FTP upload?
@@mubute For FTP upload, I don't know, for Motion detection, if you use custom component, there will be a switch to enabe/disable it. I've seen here that there is option of REST command: community.home-assistant.io/t/reolink-poe-ip-camera-setup/122890/57?u=beardedconti You can try that one if you don't use custom component...
I can get the camera's on my surveillance station working in home assistant using the picture entity card and the 'auto' option like you used in your video. However you also show the 'live' option and that doesn't work for me. It just shows a play button and not the actual stream... Any clue what could be the issue? I would love more details on your surveillance station/home assistant integration. Do you manage to grab a picture when there's a motion event to send a notification to your mobile phone?
Wow, very late reply :) Thanks for the post and sorry I missed this. Yes, I do capture motion event image but I don't send them anywhere - not that it's not possible, I just don't have need for it now. But in my case, setup is a bit strange you may say. I use Synology to do motion detection. And in the case of event, it calls webhook on Home Assistant that is "Motion Automation". It then saves snapshot of the image localy and send's me (if notification is enabled) notification. But I also save event clip and event image to Synology. As for Live - not sure if this is due to the stream quality. Never had issue with it.
Fantastic work BT. I do have some Reolink cameras so will be trying this out using the HACS solution. However, I fell over at the first step. When using "github.com/fwestenberg/reolink" to add the repository, I get this error, any ideas? "Repostitory structure for main is not compliant"
Thank you very much Bob!!! In regard to the error, can you please check what version of HACS you have? Is it maybe 1.6.2.? Just guessing here. If it is, there was a quick patch last week or so to fix upcoming problem with 0.118 of HA. And I know that structure there changed (in HA), so maybe this is related. Also checked current (and closed) issues for reolink nothing there...
UPDATE: I just noticed this, so it's work in progress! github.com/fwestenberg/reolink/issues/1 @@BeardedTinker That's strange, today, with exactly the same settings, I got a slightly different error message "Repostitory structure for v002 is not compliant". I am on Integration version: 1.6.2, Frontend version: 202009091732 and have managed to install another custom repository OK. I'm not sure what the v002 refers to. It's fun this Home Assistant stuff, I'll carry on playing.
@@ansomeBob it has life of it's own. - HA. I've been looking at current issues and can't find anything that would give such an erroir. Some old ones ended up being fixed with complete reinstall of HACS. But those should have been fixed some time ago.
