Beta Testing for Wyze Cam v3 RTSP Firmware Now Available!

How does your time work on the cams when blocked? Mine would keep up pretty well for a while and then come up with some really strange jumps. Like a 10 hour difference behind. Not sure where they’re pulling that from. If you watch the traffic they generate you can see that they attempt to contact a bunch of time servers but they have no access so must be some sort of guess. Would be nice if Wyze gave us some more controls under the RTSP button to enter local time servers, gateways if wanted, etc. Probably would go a long way to ending the 3-5 minute drop/restarts.

Those were the two releases after the beta, which was 4.19.4.48. So all in all 3 releases. There is hope, but very little.

As far as I see it, at the time that the v2 RTSP FW was released, Wyze didn’t have so many products. So many products = much more firmwares to manage.

I expect there will be no particular priority put on the v3 RSTP fw, just like there wasn’t to release it.

As someone stated, and I am of the same opinion. Wyze isn’t making money off the lot that wants RTSP (myself included) but rather those that buy into their ecosystem and cloud service model.

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Not even remotely accurate. Of course they “ go through” the router. They simply don’t visit the web. Which means they don’t go through the modem…

There is no modem in many/most cases. The cams are connected to the WiFi interface of the router which is an internal interface to the local network. When blocked, the router doesn’t permit traffic from the cams to pass from the internal interface through it to the external interface and out beyond (to modem or otherwise). You could pull the Internet connection, modem where present, or set it to function as or replace with an AP with no routing functions, and the cams still would operate locally in the same way. The router simply enforces a rule not permitting traffic from that device through it and out over the external interface. Clear enough?

The problem isn’t related to the WiFi connection to the cams. It’s a known issue when they are blocked from accessing the Internet. If you have the ability to block one of yours, then you’ll see the same effect.

I use Blue Iris, so it’s the computer time. I only enable internet on power-up to prevent the cam from disconnecting every 3 minutes, then I disable the internet access. It works good as long there is no power outage.

Well that’s disappointing.

Mike, stop!
You are describing a cable modem with a built in router.
The router assigns each camera an IP address, etc.
The RTSP firmware essentially turns the cams into IP cams while maintaining app functionality (something Logitech was unable to do with the 4 Circle 2’s I own).
As a final note, if you have it all figured out, why do mine work and yours do not?

No, I’m describing a router. An on-premise cable modem in the way that you’re thinking does not apply in many cases. But the point remains the same in either case. Blocking the cam’s traffic from exiting the local network through the router is the cause of the issue of dropping off the network at a regular 3-5 minute intervals. It’s not a WiFi problem. It applies even in the case where the RTSP firmware is not used. Yours don’t because you probably don’t have them blocked. Mine don’t either if I flip the toggle to unblock them or, as above, if you let them out when they first come up and then block them. The Wyze cams appear to want to contact Wyze’s P2P network and other outside services on startup. You can see the continual retries when they can’t if you watch the traffic from the cams. After ~3-5 minutes they seem do some form of restart to try again. As I said, try blocking yours and let us know how that goes.

You guys are saying the same things and yet somehow arguing. :wink:

Stronger WiFi can improve things in many cases.

A cable modem doesn’t hand out private IP addresses. If it does, then it’s also a (DHCP serving) NAT router.

And as you note, there is no desired traffic outside the router - video is point to point from phone to camera – but housekeeping like authentication and time synch still tries to get out. I am sorry to hear that it halts things temporarily even when using RTSP. I get enough halts/restarts as it is (with regular ancient firmware and a good Internet connection).

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Thank you. I was trying to make it clear (not very well) that his idea that somehow he wasn’t going to go through his router was a nonstarter. No router no IP address. Not a good start for an IP camera.
I wouldn’t think that looking at the problem logically rather than bashing the firmware is more likely to produce an acceptable result.
As for the issue, I would start by isolating the cameras to a single IP connection on his network. Unregister the cams from the Wyze app, and even disable the app temporarily. For my system I would connect them to Apple HomeKit via the FFMPEG plug-in for Homebridge. If I still had the problem I would disable all router Qos functions (I do anyway), smart connect, etc. Find a solution instead of complaining that the free firmware upgrade isn’t good enough.Some of us bought cameras hoping Wyze would do this for us. They didn’t have to. I am very happy they did. Thank you Wyze.

I wasn’t “bashing” the firmware. I was explaining a known issue as has been reported here and elsewhere. That’s kind of the point of a beta release and this thread. I’ve done quite a bit of testing to determine the effects of blocking the cams and the cause of the issue, The solution is easy - don’t block them (at least at startup). But that’s not a great answer for many who will want to do so when running RTSP in a more closed environment. Have you tested what happens when you block yours yet?

I’m also glad that they released the RTSP firmware. I bought several V3 cams long ago hoping they would. Not very useful to me otherwise. I bought another this weekend. I would not have if they’d not released the firmware (even understanding various issues and limitations).

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Is anyone else having the RTSP streams crash thier router? It’s absolutely hammering my router, locks it up, and reboots if I view more than 1 stream at the same time. I’m not the only one either:

For those using the latest RTSP firmware - how well does the camera work? :
wyzecam (reddit.com)

Wyze Cams flooding network : wyzecam (reddit.com)

I have not experienced this issue. I have one v3 with RTSP, I do not see excessive traffic.
I have 5 other WyzeCams no excessive traffic issues there either. 4 of the 6 are outside about 120 feet from an AP-AC-M. All stable.

Still hoping to hear from someone about success with ffmpeg on Raspbian. :wink:

Not crash my router, But I have noticed that when I block Internet connection to the cameras some of them start acting weird connecting and disconnecting every few minutes and it all goes away after I enable Internet connection.

Is this normal behavior on RTSP cameras from Wyze or is there an issue?

It’s just weird how as soon as I enable Internet the issues go away, it’s like for some reason they don’t like to be without an Internet connection

What application are you using?

With Blue Iris for me this is normal, if they have internet access as well. I have been changing all sorts of things with no real luck.

Trying also AgentDVR (ispy) and find it doesn’t disconnect, but at the same regularity I guess weird artifacts in the video, like half the screen doesn’t draw, etc.

So, the RTSP implementation is pretty weak. If this is data related, then we end up with no ability to downgrade the quality of the video. ie. if you hit SD in the app, HD is still sent via RTSP.

I use Blue Iris

I have 2 x V3s in BI (no sound) and have no issue, they are pretty solid.

and you have blocked internet access via firewall rules?

I know the question was directed at someone else, but why would you want to? Doing so would kill all the Wyze app functionality. Besides the cameras being very limited function without internet access.

This is a known issue, it’s been discussed a few times here. V3 RTSP needs and internet connection on power up, if not, it will keep disconnecting every 3 minutes until you provide an internet connection. You can then disable internet but if you ever power cycle the camera, it will keep disconnecting again…
V2 RTSP does not do this, this is a V3 RTSP issue only.
This is a problem for me too because I want my security system to work without internet.

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