For all those that just purchased the F800 I hope this helps. Here's my tips after many many hours of frustration using the android mobile app dated 8/10/17 and 1.00.04 firmware, which is the latest as of today. My setup is hardwired and takes advantage of all the features of the dashcam.
1. The instructions included with the dash cam will leave you frustrated. You will think you are doing the right thing, but settings will not save properly.
2. The wi-fi does not work as stated. You have to use your phone as a hotspot and always be connected to the internet. Here's some things you need to do to make sure the hot spot will work. I wish that Thinkware would fix this so that if I only want to connect to the dash cam without a hotspot that I could.
1. The instructions included with the dash cam will leave you frustrated. You will think you are doing the right thing, but settings will not save properly.
2. The wi-fi does not work as stated. You have to use your phone as a hotspot and always be connected to the internet. Here's some things you need to do to make sure the hot spot will work. I wish that Thinkware would fix this so that if I only want to connect to the dash cam without a hotspot that I could.
- Click on your phone settings on your S7 Galaxy and select Mobile Hotspot and Tethering.
- Click on the words "Mobile Hotspot", not the slide bar to turn it on, but it can be on if you wish. You will need to click on the words to get to the next screen that shows you your version SSID and password.
- Now you will notice 3 vertical dots in the upper right hand corner. Click on the dots and then click on "Configure Mobile Hotspot".
- Now click on "Allowed devices only" and make sure that is turned off. When it is turned on the F800 will not be able to access the hotspot because it uses the MAC address for access. After you get the dash cam to connect you can go back to allow only the dash cam to connect and it will save it's MAC address, but we are getting a head of ourselves here. For now make sure it is off.
- Go back to settings and turn on Mobile hotspot. NOTE: Every time that you want to use the f800 phone app you will need to manually turn on the mobile hotspot from your settings...it doesn't turn on by itself, which is fairly annoying.
- Click on the words "Mobile Hotspot", not the slide bar to turn it on, but it can be on if you wish. You will need to click on the words to get to the next screen that shows you your version SSID and password.
- You should have already downloaded the Thinkware F800/F800 Pro app off of the play store and installed it.
- Open the app and once you get to the dashcam connection is required screen, turn on mobile hotspot from your phone settings, then click on dash cam connection is required >>. Again, the app doesn't really turn on the mobile hot spot, so you will have to do it or check that it is on manually every time that you use the phone app. I think that is pretty much it, you should now be able to access all the functions and settings, which brings us to our next can of worms.
- Changing and saving settings. Even though you change the settings in with the the app and it told you that settings were changed, don't believe it. Once you change settings and it tells you that it saved , power off the dash cam BEFORE you do anything else with the phone app. Now turn the dashcam power back on. Your settings should be saved.
- Please note that when you select "LIVE VIEW" it is NOT really a live view. It is actually a 2 second delay of what is really happening. I'm surprised that Thinkware labels the feature as though it was a real Live View...I can see people trying to trust it as a live view believing there is no latency and using it with a rear camera to help make driving decisions in real time. Thinkware should change the app label title from "Live View" to "2 second delay view", or better yet, make it a real LIVE VIEW. I think this could be a law suit waiting to happen.
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