ON THIS PAGE

  • PoE deployment guide
  • Powering PoE device
  • Check connector
  • Initial Connection
  • Debugging
  • Runtime
  • Debugging
  • Next Steps
  • PoE Extender
  • WiFi Bridge
  • Video streaming with OAK
  • Factory reset

PoE deployment guide

Power-over-Ethernet (PoE) allows ethernet cable to be used to both power a device and give it connectivity with 1 Gbps bandwidth full-duplex at up to 100 meters (328 feet).
1

Powering PoE device

You will need a PoE switch or Injector to power the PoE device (see Powering PoE devices).After powering the device, the power LED on the switch/injector should turn on, as on the GIF below.
2

Check connector

Make sure to properly tighten the connector - either ethernet gland for RJ45 PoE cameras, or the M12 connector - to make a good seal. This ensures that the device meets its IP rating.
3

Initial Connection

DepthAI library will look for all available devices inside the same LAN. If the camera is not on the same LAN, you can manually specify the IP address of the device. If DHCP server is not available, the camera will fallback to a static IP 169.254.1.222.The best way to test your device is by running the DepthAI Viewer. It's a GUI application that allows you to easily evaluate the camera by visualizing its output in real-time. If it finds the device and starts streaming frames, then the connection is working properly.

Debugging

If you are getting an error like RuntimeError: No available devices, it means that DepthAI couldn't find any PoE device on the same subnet. Make sure that the camera is powered on and connected to the same network as your computer. See the tabs below for debugging steps.We recommend using the latest depthai version before any kind of troubleshooting.
Different Subnet
Multiple interfaces
No DHCP
Firewall
Network equipment
VPN
4

Runtime

After successfully connecting to the device and uploading the pipeline, the connection should be stable, there should be minimal latency (below 1sec), and the bandwidth should be 700 Mbps.

Debugging

Connection drop
Low speed / High latency
5

Next Steps

After successfully deploying the device, you can use the following resources to learn more about the software ecosystem (DepthAI):
  1. DepthAI Software docs
  2. DepthAI "Hello World"
  3. DepthAI code examples

PoE Extender

We have tested the power/communication with this PoE extender. It's a 1Gbps extender that accepts PoE+ (30W) and has 2x PoE (15W) port outputs, so you can connect two OAK PoE cameras to it.We were able to stream a video from both devices simultaneously.

WiFi Bridge

One option to connect the PoE device to the network is to use a WiFi bridge. This is useful when you don't have a PoE switch or injector, but you have a WiFi network available. The bridge will connect to the WiFi network and provide an ethernet port (connectivity) to your OAK PoE device. We have tested the Vonets WiFi Bridge and it works as expected.You first need to connect to the WiFi bridge (eg. via your phone) and configure it to connect to your WiFi network. Then you can connect the OAK PoE device (via PoE injector) to the bridge.
This WiFi bridge accepts 5V for power, you can use either USB-A connector (we connected that to a powerbank), or a standard barrel connector.

Video streaming with OAK

Because an OAK PoE camera is connected to the network, it can stream video feed directly to a computer. Here are some video streaming demos that use Script node (only supported on OAK PoE cameras) and can be run in Standalone mode:Below are some demos which stream video feed from OAK camera via XLink to the host computer and then stream it from the host computer to another computer/server, which can also work with any other OAK camera (even USB OAK devices):

Factory reset

In case you can ping the device but can't connect to it in any way (search for the device, specifying IP), you should do a factory reset as the device might have been soft-bricked. This usually happens with older bootloader versions. Note that only OAK-D-PoE and OAK-1-PoE have a USB-C connector, while OAK-D Pro PoE has USB connectivity via M8 connector.
Series 1 PoE devices
Series 2 PoE devices