When you replace a faulty camera with a new one, your previously recorded footage does not automatically appear on the replacement device. This occurs even if the new camera uses the identical name, IP address, and model, and connects to the same server. This article explains how you can manually restore that footage.

How to assign the archive of one camera to another

To perform a manual migration, identify the unique identifiers (physical IDs) of both devices, move the recorded files between folders, and reindex the archive.

For details on identity generation, see How does the VMS identify a Camera/Video Resource?

Step 1: Identify both Physical IDs

1. Connect both cameras to the server.

2. Rename the cameras in the client (for example, Faulty and Replacement) to make the folders easier to identify.

3. Retrieve your device list by sending the following request:

   GET https://<serverAddress>:7001/rest/v4/devices?_with=name,physicalId

4. Note the physicalId value for both cameras.

The desktop client does not display the physical ID. The Camera ID shown on the Camera Settings → General tab is a different value - the camera's internal id. For most cameras the Physical ID matches the MAC Address on that same tab, but this is not guaranteed, so do not rely on it.

Step 2: Locate the archive folders

To find your storage paths, navigate to Server Settings -> Storage Management in the desktop client. Inside your main storage directory, the server creates hi_quality and low_quality folders, which contain subfolders named after each camera's Physical ID.

Depending on your operating system, the default paths use the following structures:

• Windows: 

  <drive>:\HD Witness Media\<server_id>\hi_quality\<physicalId>\
  <drive>:\HD Witness Media\<server_id>\low_quality\<physicalId>\

• Linux: 

  /opt/networkoptix/mediaserver/var/data/<server_id>/hi_quality/<physicalId>/
  /opt/networkoptix/mediaserver/var/data/<server_id>/low_quality/<physicalId>/

Step 3: Move the video files

1. Open the folder hi_quality/<physicalId>/ for the Faulty camera.

2. Select all year folders (such as 2025, 2026) and move them into hi_quality/<physicalId>/ folder for the Replacement camera.

3. If the operating system prompts you, merge the folders and choose to overwrite conflicting filenames.

4. Repeat this process for the low_quality folder.

Do not move or overwrite the info.txt file. Each camera folder contains a unique info.txt file that handles identity verification during indexing. Leave the replacement folder's original info.txt file in place.

Multisensor cameras

Multisensor cameras organize each channel into a separate folder suffixed with the channel number:

<physicalId>_channel=1
<physicalId>_channel=2

Move the contents of the folders channel-by-channel (for example, move the contents of old channel 1 into new channel 1). Mapping channels incorrectly displays your footage on the wrong camera stream.

Step 4: Reindex the archive

The camera archive is in place, so the server's archive index must be updated.

1. Right-click the server that hosts the Replacement camera and select Server Settings.

2. Open the Storage Management tab.

3. Click Reindex Archive.

The reindexing process scans your storage drives and rebuilds the video chunk database. This process can take from a few minutes to several hours depending on your archive size. You must run this process on every server where you modified files.

When the indexing finishes, the old video footage appears on the Replacement camera's timeline.

You can then rename the Faulty camera name to the desired camera name.