What Dashcam should I buy for my new 2017 Tacoma

[SK323i]

I have been looking at Vicovation Opia2 or MF3

This will be the first of multiple.

Current budget $300 USD or less.

I want seamless record in parking mode.
Best resolution/video quality possible.
No cigar charger - hardwires to backup battery unit device?
128 Gig+?

No need for GPS right now.

Anyone know a good place to mount in Tacoma?

I think I may go with Opia2 to start.

Eventually I want camera in the cab of the truck. I have an OEM rearview camera. I can hack it to be always on but it is not recording.

I want seamless record on rear too.

What is good for multi channel?

Will I be able to upgrade the VicoVation setup to multi-channel one day as I acquire new cameras?

 

[SK323i]

 

[jokiin]

Will I be able to upgrade the VicoVation setup to multi-channel one day as I acquire new cameras?

no, these are stand alone single channel models

 

[Dashmellow]

I drive a Tacoma (Access Cab, not the 4 door) and have four cameras in the cab which provide full 360 degree overlapped coverage, a SG9665GC mounted just to the right side of the rear view mirror and three Mobius cameras. There are two "C2" lens models on the top of the window frames on the rear windows and a Mobius "B" lens cam mounted on the headliner just above the center of the rear window. I use power banks to run all four cameras full time when away from the truck. See THIS link for a sample of what gets recorded from inside a Tacoma cab using this method.

 

[SK323i]

Looks great! I see you like to protect your Tacoma! Me too!

May I ask if the MF3 or Opia2 would be better than your Mobius because of the processor?

What type of battery power banks are you utilizing?

I am just learning about camera technology. Do you have a build thread or know of any good ones?

I Do Not want to utilize the cigar unit in my cab.

I was thinking that a dual battery system would be nice -- since it seems like any battery bank would fatigue a battery overtime have a dual one ensures no drain -- especially if i'm going to be running a LED lighting setup of 20K lumens off of it too.

What is the capacity of your SD cards in each one?

Is there any reason to have onboard DVR or live streaming via wifi for camera system? It would be nice to view the cameras remotely via a phone app when the car is in motion. I assume thats a much more expensive investment that is not possible with these cameras. Maybe they have the ability to be upgraded to something like that though?

 

[Dashmellow]

The two portable battery banks I use are lithium-ion and I plug them in manually when I park my truck. The banks will run all four cameras all day if I wish and I often just leave them running rather that do a lot of plugging and unplugging. I do use the two front cigar lighter ports to power my cams because of this method. Hardwiring is an option as is a secondary 12V battery but you'd need a specialized charging system for it and a battery protection system to prevent excess drain. On a pick-up truck unless you can find a place in the engine compartment for the second battery I'm not quite sure where you could put one.

I find 64GB memory cards work well for me but others have differing opinions about how much footage they feel they need to store before the camera writes over older footage.

 

[SK323i]

The two portable battery banks I use are lithium-ion and I plug them in manually when I park my truck. The banks will run all four cameras all day if I wish and I often just leave them running rather that do a lot of plugging and unplugging. I do use the two front cigar lights to power my cams because of this method. Hardwiring is an option as is a secondary 12V battery but you'd need a specialized charging system for it and a battery protection system to prevent excess drain. On a pick-up truck unless you can find a place in the engine compartment for the second battery I'm not quite sure where you could put one.

I find 64GC memory cards work well for me but others have differing opinions about how much footage they feel they need to store before the camera writes over older footage.

Do you know if there are any good threads on this site about dual battery setup or battery protection or automatic battery bank charging?

Do you mount your battery banks somewhere special?

I want my setup to be as cleanly installed as possible, with no need to do anything manual. Just constant 24/7 powered video on 128GB cards running on 3 Opia 2 cameras mounted like yours in the cabs and maybe an MF3 for the dash.

I dont think battery banks are going to be an option for me -- the heat in Phoenix reaches 121 sometimes and its possible they would fail right?

 

[Dashmellow]

Heat is an issue for lithium-ion batteries so I place the batteries under the seat during hot weather and crack the windows a bit. Otherwise I just put them in the storage compartment of the console. Then again, I live in New England. They are not "mountable" per se.

I am not aware of too many people who use the secondary car battery method here on DCT (there are a few) but some internet searching will enlighten you about the specialized chargers available for that purpose. They are popular with RV owners.

As for battery discharge prevention devices see THIS DCT page.

 

[Kip]

I think the term you're looking for is split charging, I found this page quite an interesting read:

http://www.12voltplanet.co.uk/split-charging.html

Seems to be a lot of different ways of adding an extra battery.

EDIT: Forgot the link!

 

[SawMaster]

With the older vehicles an auxiliary battery is easy, but with today's computer-laden cars you might have to use a more sophisticated system to ensure that the vehicle is always getting the power it needs first My huge old van has plenty of space underneath so I'm eventually going to fabricate a heavy steel box for a second battery there. Not good having battery fumes inside the passenger compartment If you mount a tool box in the bed that makes a great place for the second battery

Phil

 

[Vic2r]

With $300 budget I would recommend you to review Korean made dashcam (they call it blackbox). They all come with advanced parking mode, very low power consumption and automatic power cut in order not drain your battery. Unless you park more than 12 hours you don't need to worry about your battery.

 

[SK323i]

Why do you think Blackbox would be better than the VicoVation MF3 or Opia2?
Yes, I park at the airport sometimes for 3-10 days at a time. So yes, I think I need a pretty good battery solution.

 

[kamkar]

3 - 10 days parking guard will need several additional car batteries in your car, and you will need a almighty large memory card if you are using anything but G-sensor triggered events.

Blackbox is just a general term for dashcams in Korea

 

[SK323i]

you dont think a 12v dual optima split charging battery system would last 10 days? off a full charge?
Parking mode for 24/7 on a Opia2.

How much would a high grade 128G card hold? 5 days?

 

[Dashmellow]

How much would a high grade 128G card hold? 5 days?

https://dashcamtalk.com/recording-time-calculator/

 

[kamkar]

I just ran a test with my mobius 2 camera at lowest bitrate ( 4 mbit ) 24 hours of footage was only 42Gb on the 128GB card i have in the camera ATM
And while 4 mbit is way too low for footage while driving i feel its adequate for surveillance use where walking speed is the max.

Only problem is the Mobius 2 camera are no way near dialed in not least for low light footage, and i am not sure most other dashcams can drop that low in bitrate as they are meant to record moving stuff and so will have a higher birtate.

But those 24 hours of mine are off course just constant recording, if you use G-sensor to trigger recordings, then the camera just sit there idling and only record to the memory card if your car get bumped.
And if you do that and you are not parking on a demolition derby track then 128 Gb will be plenty for weeks of parking.

And you should use something like G-sensor, cuz if you record all the time and if you could fit all those days onto your memory card, then when you get back to your car and find it dented you will have to look over all those days of recordings to figure out who and when your car was dented.
And in 1:1 preview speed of that footage it will take a long time to narrow down when it happened, using G-sensor it will date/time tag the event file, and there will only be as many files as the G-sensor have detected while parked.

Using G-sensor you will only see recording when something have actually happened, okay if you set it really sensitive then a big truck driving by or a bus might trigger a event recording, but so should the guy next to you if he yank his door open and put a parking-lot dent into the side of your car.

Recording all the time is only a option to me if your camera dont have proper parking guard, and you park for a short time like a few hours.
But then you still have to look over your car when you get back to it to detect any dents, or discover them 2 days later when you wash your car and the file that had the event is deleted now as it was a regular recording file and as such not protected from automated overwriting.

 

[Dashmellow]

The Mobius at a low bit rate might be an interesting solution for long term parking mode.

It would be worth experimenting with the dedicated low light setting along with the variable exposure settings to see if there is a way to optimize the camera for low bit rate night time recordings without totally blowing out daytime capture. There may be a balance point. The thing many people don't seem to "get" about the Mobius is that even if the AGC manifests a lot of noise in low light the camera tends to still have good acuity within the "graininess". Grain increases acuity and in traditional photography high speed grainy films were known for the enhanced acuity the grain lent to low light images. A certain amount of digital noise from "some" cameras, like the Mobius can have the same effect.



FWIW, the DCT Recording Time calculator claims almost 73 hours on a 128GB card at 4 Mbps.

 

[jokiin]

Only problem is the Mobius 2 camera are no way near dialed in not least for low light footage, and i am not sure most other dashcams can drop that low in bitrate as they are meant to record moving stuff and so will have a higher birtate.

.

most Korean cameras are only 6 to 8 mbit, that's why their video while driving is never great, plenty for parking though, they seem more concerned with how cameras work when parked than actually driving, what their market wants perhaps