Hi,

I was trying to connect multiple Oak cameras to a switch and use one or two PCs to run each of the cameras separately with various Python scripts. This is my objective.

I have three switches, as listed below:

Initially, I connected 6 cameras to 6 ports on the second switch, and the 7th port to my PC. All the cameras’ lights turned green, which I believe indicates that the connection is fine.

That’s the background.

When I tested with a shorter cable on the switch, everything worked well. I tested with 2-3 cameras, changed the IP addresses to connect to them individually, and ran them on separate scripts using their MxID.

Since it worked, I decided to implement it on a larger scale.

I connected 6 ports to 6 cameras and the 7th one to my PC, using longer cables—not too long, just a decent length that should still be effective.

I simply tried to run one script. From my understanding, it should automatically pick any camera and start it. It did pick a camera, but then I received the following error:

$$
plaintextCopy code[2024-08-23 18:42:46.248] [depthai] [warning] [14442C10018036D200] [169.254.1.222] Flashed bootloader version 0.0.26, less than 0.0.28 is susceptible to bootup/restart failure. Upgrading is advised, flashing main/factory (not user) bootloader. Available: 0.0.28

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "c:\Users\xxx", line 123, in <module>

with depthai.Device(pipeline) as device:

RuntimeError: Failed to find device after booting, error message: X_LINK_DEVICE_NOT_FOUND
$$

The camera was picked up, but then it crashed. Why did this happen? How come it worked with shorter cables and 2-3 cameras but failed when I added more cameras and used longer cables?

Could the issue be with the switch? It’s a PoE switch with a total budget of 63W, and each port can provide up to 30W, I believe. Please refer to the links for more details.

What steps can I take to troubleshoot this issue?

Thanks,