Buffered Parking mode

[Airborne]

TonyM-

You are right...when I bought my dash cam, it was claimed to have buffered parking and g-sensor parking modes. - - And like OzAdam, I do more research than most when I make a purchase... It was after doing all that research that I decided on Viofo.

And then when I was told by Viofo that they would fix my "unexpected problem" with the g-sensor in parking mode by the end of August, I believed what they told me... my bad! So now, almost 3 months later it looks like the problem might possibly getting solved....???

But for the guys here saying these "parking features weren't part of the deal" when I bought my camera, they are 100% wrong ...otherwise, if the a129 didn't have those features, I probably would not have purchased it.

I realize like OzAdam says, it's more a less a crap shoot when making some purchases... I too have many Samsung products because normally they're great quality. Btw Adam, I'm still hanging onto my S8+ as I think it's as good as anything Samsung has made since... I'll change it out, most likely for another Samsung, when I feel a new model is better...

I gave an account on another thread that while driving, the a129 works fine; if the G-sensor in parking mode finally gets resolved, that would be great.

I have to agree, the reason I purchased the 129 was it has buffered parking and G sensor period. I. Am not concerned about camera not being clear or it is jumping frames etc. I purchased the camera strictly for parking and I would rather have the G more sensitive then not. One just needs to go in and view footage and keep what is necessary. So I do hope it is more sensitive. No complaints here, I just need parking peace of mind. I am looking forward to the firmware update VIOFO. Once the company gets this right I will brag my head off on how good a dashcam camera it is.

 

[Airborne]

One more thing, I am watching this thread but I do not get any heads up that there are new postings. Maybe something on my end?

 

[Airborne]

One more thing, I am watching this thread but I do not get any heads up that there are new postings. Maybe something on my end?

I went in and checked some boxes on my account to receive email notice. Like I mentioned it is probably on my end

 

[gabilondo77]

@viofo Yes exactly.


Consider adding spoken voice alerts like Thinkware and Blackvue. Example “Dashcam is recording”, "SD Card Problem", “Parking mode G Sensor has detected 2 events”, “Parking mode has detected 3 motion events”. Best to add via a menu with ability to turn off voice alerts if people don’t want it. This is one thing I miss from my Thinkware / Blackvue cameras.

I think this will not be possible because A129 doesn't have a speaker,it have a "beep beep" buzzer like PC motherboards.

 

[jokiin]

I think this will not be possible because A129 doesn't have a speaker,it have a "beep beep" buzzer like PC motherboards.

has a speaker, wouldn't play the musical tone at startup otherwise

 

[Nigel]

has a speaker, wouldn't play the musical tone at startup otherwise

Is that music? I thought it was just lots of electrons filling up the super capacitor!

 

[jokiin]

Is that music?

not something you can dance to, it's not a beep though

 

[Nigel]

not something you can dance to, it's not a beep though

Not sure it is capable of intelligible speech though, need a speaker that can produce all speech frequencies for that.

 

[jokiin]

Not sure it is capable of intelligible speech though, need a speaker that can produce all speech frequencies for that.

it can do spoken notifications, how legible they are based on whatever speaker they've used though is an unknown

 

[EGS]

It is not a piezoelectric buzzer like the ones on computers for beep notifications and alarms. It has a very flat voice coil speaker capable of reproducing voice notifications. The quality of the sound? That is questionable. It may end up sounding too tinny...

 

[AusMat]

So is anyone actually using the updated firmware?

After posting the other day, i've had some more time with it and heres what ive found.

1: So the other day i mentioned it not "switching" to parking mode quickly after key off with a properly wired 3-wire kit (switching back fine).
Seems its only switches after about 3 minutes, which imo is way too long. 5-10 seconds maybe? Like it used to be.
I currently need to sit in the car with the key off to make sure it actually switches modes and starts recording........which leads into

2: Switching modes seems to be a little unreliable.
Couple times (before i started sitting and waiting for it to change over) ive come back to the car with the record like flashing and the camera not recording.
Pushing the record button makes it start recording....

3: Theres still an issue with SDCard space, multiple times when its switched between modes it comes up with "SD full, all data will be deleted yes/no" and sits at the screen until the user does something.
Not good if it pops up after 3 minutes when you've already left the car.....(does it when switching to driving mode also). I guess its still something to do with it splitting space in the car between driving and parking modes?

4: Kinda wish if there was movement on screen, it would just keep recording in parking mode rather than stopping and restarting/doubling up videos.
I mean my old A119 managed to this properly, but i guess its something to do specifically with the buffered parking setup. That said, its very regular for gaps of 10-15 seconds to show up between the videos.
I can deal with the overlapped video, but i cant deal with missing footage!

5: And finally, a few times i've had the issue of the camera just not dumping videos to the SDCard even thoughit physically shows its recording.
Today for instance i parked somewhere at 10:15am, lots of movement around car, i went to the car multiple times, i didn't leave until about 3pm, but i've just checked the footage and it recorded events fine up until 11:05am, after that, nothing (100% looked to be recording, not frozen, not stuck, it would stop recording then id wave my hand infront of it and it'd start as it should but no saved footage).
Looking at the directory file sizes it seems the parking mode directory is maxed out on size so maybe its failing too overwrite old videos still? Which was the original problem.
I use a 64Gb card, so 32Gb in parking mode. More testing is probably required though

Again, still a step in the right direction, im going to test the 5th issue a little more then flash back and leave it on low bit-rate until the next update. (though, i really like event mode, it makes it easy to see if/when someone or something has gone near the car rather than hours of footage of nothing, its just too unreliable atm)

 

[Finger]

I've given up on buffered parking mode. I just don't think the unit is up to the task. Yes sometimes it will work flawlessly for maybe 1-2hr tops then it just stop recording altogether. Sometimes movement will continue in front of the camera but it won't start a new recording. It'll stop and then 10 Mins later start working again. There is just too many bugs and they'll never get it right. Low bit rate is the only way to go.

I've come to accept the short comings of the device. For what it's worth it's still a great bang for buck dual dash cam.

Sent from my SM-N975F using Tapatalk

 

[Dashcamuser567]

Last time I was on here it was August/Sep? And from what it looks like still no progress on fixing the g sensor on parking mode. Oh well, at least my camera is still working fine otherwise...

 

[jdct]

I've given up on buffered parking mode. I just don't think the unit is up to the task. Yes sometimes it will work flawlessly for maybe 1-2hr tops then it just stop recording altogether. Sometimes movement will continue in front of the camera but it won't start a new recording. It'll stop and then 10 Mins later start working again. There is just too many bugs and they'll never get it right. Low bit rate is the only way to go.

I've come to accept the short comings of the device. For what it's worth it's still a great bang for buck dual dash cam.

Owners may not have much choice but to accept the the shortcomings of the A129 because its problems may never be adequately addressed, even though it seems like Viofo is probably trying its best. When the low-voltage output problem with the HK3 hardwire kit was found, Viofo acted responsibly and replaced them for owners experiencing problems, and also got the updated HK3 into the sales channel quickly. But whomever at Viofo is responsible for the firmware (containing all the operating code for the dashcam including parking mode) does not seem to be as effective.

Last time I was on here it was August/Sep? And from what it looks like still no progress on fixing the g sensor on parking mode. Oh well, at least my camera is still working fine otherwise...

Don't worry... Parking mode will work properly on the upcoming A139 Super Pro Plus coming soon! [/sarcasm] I have tried other dashcams and at least some of them do what the manufacturers say they will -- today, not tomorrow. (And Viofo was even one of them back when the A118C was current -- and maybe also the A119.) I think it is possible that Viofo just got too ambitious, promising more than they can reasonably deliver with the resources they have available. Though continually having to promise fixes and then not delivering on them is a certain recipe for dissatisfied customers.

As an aside, who among us really need to record at 4K instead of 1080p, because our memory cards will only fill up that much sooner. Most dashcam users are not making feature movies; we're simply trying to better protect ourselves from unexpected damage, false claims and financial liability. I hope that 1080p and even 720p recording options will always remain available for people who prefer more stored recording time over capturing additional details we might not really need. (Who really cares if the the leaves in the trees are more or less pixelated?! I can read most license plates just fine at 1080p, and those are smaller US plates with awful colors.) Personally, I just want a camera that records when it should, and not disappoint me when trying to retrieve a recording that I want or need.

When a certain company with very well supported dashcams, even though slightly more expensive, and a representative frequenting this forum finally releases its version of an IR enabled dashcam, I'm in!

 

[Hsolver]

who among us really need to record at 4K instead of 1080p

IMO, 4K - not good solution in practice at this time:
1) Insignificant resolution growth (only 2х per side), - similar readability;
2) Increased heat (early temp auto shut off);
3) Increased current power (early batt exhaustion);
4) Increased SD memory size and SD cost;
5) Much smaller pixel size leads to blur (by slower shutter speed);
6) Difficulties with players;
7) Low tech reliability in whole.

 

[Nigel]

As an aside, who among us really need to record at 4K instead of 1080p, because our memory cards will only fill up that much sooner. Most dashcam users are not making feature movies; we're simply trying to better protect ourselves from unexpected damage, false claims and financial liability. I hope that 1080p and even 720p recording options will always remain available for people who prefer more stored recording time over capturing additional details we might not really need. (Who really cares if the the leaves in the trees are more or less pixelated?! I can read most license plates just fine at 1080p, and those are smaller US plates with awful colors.) Personally, I just want a camera that records when it should, and not disappoint me when trying to retrieve a recording that I want or need.

Resolution does not determine how fast your card fills up, it does define the maximum distance at which you can read a number plate, with 4K giving twice the distance of 1080, and that does significantly improve your chances of reading a license plate, especially if you want to report someone for dangerous driving or hitting someone else rather than actually hitting you, because if they hit you then they did get quite close.

The thing that determines how fast your card fills up is purely the bitrate, and you can use the same bitrate for 4K as for 1080. To get the same quality per pixel you need 4x the bitrate, but to get the same quality per image you only need the same bitrate. Using the same bitrate while storing higher resolution does mean something else has to get lost, but the compression algorithms do sort that out fairly well.

IMO, 4K - not good solution in practice at this time:
...

1) Insignificant resolution growth (only 2х per side), - similar readability;
- plates visible at 2x distance is significant.
2) Increased heat (early temp auto shut off);
- good cameras are designed to cope with the extra heat, unless you live somewhere that is often right on the limit then you won't notice a difference. Of course not all cameras are good.
3) Increased current power (early batt exhaustion);
- this is true, you need a bigger battery for the same amount of parking mode, doesn't make any difference when driving.
4) Increased SD memory size and SD cost;
- Just covered this, you only need more memory size if you want to store more info, I'm finding that double the memory is perfectly adequate, and double the memory has a similar cost as half the memory did for the last generation of cameras. Of course you can use more memory if you want to make movies and want movie quality. Also note that in low bitrate parking mode, the A129 Pro 4K actually uses the same bitrate as the A129 Duo 1080, it is sufficient, and it can read a plate at 2x the distance, and the image quality actually appears to be better.
5) Much smaller pixel size leads to blur (by slower shutter speed);
- You only get that motion blur if the camera actually uses a slower shutter speed, and every time I have measured the 129 Pro 4K against the A129 Duo 1080, the 4K camera has had the faster shutter speed, only by about 10% which isn't really significant but I predict the next generation of 4K cameras will be clearly beating the 1080 cameras on shutter speed.
6) Difficulties with players;
- People are always having difficulty with players and not having the required codecs, recently Apple devices seem to have been playing the 4K H265 better than the 1080 H264! You do need a faster, more modern device, but most people buying a 4K camera today seem to already have 4K capable devices and there are less issues with codecs than there were when 1080 was standard.
7) Low tech reliability in whole.
- Not sure what you mean by this, the 4K cameras have the latest and highest tech, generally they perform better and more reliably, for example the wifi on the A129 Pro 4K is 5-10x faster than the wifi on the A129 Duo 1080.

 

[jdct]

Resolution does not determine how fast your card fills up, it does define the maximum distance at which you can read a number plate, with 4K giving twice the distance of 1080, and that does significantly improve your chances of reading a license plate, especially if you want to report someone for dangerous driving or hitting someone else rather than actually hitting you, because if they hit you then they did get quite close.

The thing that determines how fast your card fills up is purely the bitrate, and you can use the same bitrate for 4K as for 1080. To get the same quality per pixel you need 4x the bitrate, but to get the same quality per image you only need the same bitrate. Using the same bitrate while storing higher resolution does mean something else has to get lost, but the compression algorithms do sort that out fairly well.

Clearly I am not going to bother testing this myself, but you seem to have a firm handle on the operation of the camera system. Is not the raw data output rate of a 4k sensor at 3840x2160 pixels, four times greater than the raw data output rate of an HD sensor at 1920x1080 pixels, when configured to capture the same number of frames per second? Is it really possible to compress and encode four times the amount of data into at exact same output bitrate (and therefore same resulting file size) of an HD camera sensor and still maintain the benefit of twice the resolution of the 4k camera sensor in each dimension into the saved video output file?

Without any form of objective proof, I tend to believe many of the benefits of that increased 4K sensor resolution will be lost in the compression and encoding process, unless the output bitrate is also raised higher than the HD output bitrate (therefore resulting in greater file sizes). Is there something I have overlooked?

 

[Nigel]

Clearly I am not going to bother testing this myself, but you seem to have a firm handle on the operation of the camera system. Is not the raw data output rate of a 4k sensor at 3840x2160 pixels, four times greater than the raw data output rate of an HD sensor at 1920x1080 pixels, when configured to capture the same number of frames per second? Is it really possible to compress and encode four times the amount of data into at exact same output bitrate (and therefore same resulting file size) of an HD camera sensor and still maintain the benefit of twice the resolution of the 4k camera sensor in each dimension into the saved video output file?

Without any form of objective proof, I tend to believe many of the benefits of that increased 4K sensor resolution will be lost in the compression and encoding process, unless the output bitrate is also raised higher than the HD output bitrate (therefore resulting in greater file sizes). Is there something I have overlooked?

If you have the same bitrate and you store 4x the resolution then something else has to go, you have to make a compromise, but you are already making a compromise for the 1080, the difference with the 4K is that if the resolution is the most important then you can choose to compromise elsewhere. Do you really need more colour info than for the 1080 image? You don't need high resolution colour info to read a plate, do you really need more detail in the clouds than you had with 1080? There is nothing sharp and detailed about clouds, they are fuzzy things whatever the resolution. For most aspects of the image, it is just like the frame rate, the 4K video does not need 2x the framerate to be usable, although for proper movie quality 4K you do really want 2x the frame rate so that the number of pixels of motion blur per frame stays the same instead of doubling, why have a nice sharp image that returns to normal 1080 sharpness as soon as there is movement?

So ideally for your movie quality 4K you do want 2x the frame rate and 8x the bitrate, but you can make plates more readable than 1080 with the same bitrate, and any extra bitrate you use is an improvement. For dashcam video that 8x bitrate is not necessary, even 1x is an improvement any increase is a further improvement, you certainly don't need to go as far as that Red digital cinema camera costing $5 figures can provide.

 

[jdct]

So ideally for your movie quality 4K you do want 2x the frame rate and 8x the bitrate, but you can make plates more readable than 1080 with the same bitrate, and any extra bitrate you use is an improvement. For dashcam video that 8x bitrate is not necessary, even 1x is an improvement any increase is a further improvement, you certainly don't need to go as far as that Red digital cinema camera costing $5 figures can provide.

So is what you are saying now that we don't really need 4K? Where can I find this $5 camera you mentioned? I want to sell the dashcams I have and install ten of them in my car instead -- with one pointing directly up towards the sky because I happen to like clouds. They're calming and soothing...

 

[Nigel]

So is what you are saying now that we don't really need 4K?

I'm saying that 4K delivers a much better chance of reading license plates, whatever the bitrate as long as it is not less.
For good quality cameras, 1080 is adequate, 2K is good compromise, 4K is very desirable. 1x bitrate is adequate but not desirable, 2x bitrate is OK, 4x and over bitrate is desirable for movie making but really not required for dashcam use.

Where can I find this $5 camera you mentioned? I want to sell the dashcams I have and install ten of them in my car instead -- with one pointing directly up towards the sky because I happen to like clouds. They're calming and soothing...

Red have a range of cameras with 5 figure prices:

RED Digital Cinema | DSMC2

The camera BRAIN is the primary building block of the RED system, housing the image sensor and advanced computing components.

www.red.com