A119 stopped recording suddenly after working for 8 years

[apavel]

Hi there,

Can anyone please help me? A piece of ice flew off a truck today and destroyed my car. The license plate number and entire incident was recorded today on my dashcam that I had for 8 years.
However when I looked there are no recordings after December 2nd, 2021 (recorded August to December).. I honestly have not touched it since I installed it in 2015.

Is there anything I can do? does it store it in memory? Why did it stop recording suddenly? it makes no sense. Any help would be appreciated.

SD card is lexar 300x 32gb.

 

[StrayCam]

Sorry to hear your car got destroyed in a terrible accident! Hopefully no one in your car was injured. Perhaps a nearby business or another motorist has video footage of your accident... ?

Unfortunately, many dashcam users have come to the same realization that you did: their dashcams failed them when they needed them the most!

If your dashcam video hasn't been saved to your sd card, there is nothing you can do to retrieve it. It seems somehow your dashcam and/or sd card definitely malfunctioned!

Btw your sd card was very small (32gb)... I guess back when you got it, that was more normal size. Currently, since they have become less expensive it is recommended to have at least 128gb and maybe even 256 gb if your dashcam can accommodate those sizes.

It is also recommended that dashcam users reformat their sd cards once a month. And I suppose their is some recommendation about replacing and/or rotating their sd cards regularly.

SD cards are the Achilles heel of dashcams so one needs to take whatever precautions they can to ensure their dashcams are properly recording.

Again, hopefully no one got injured in your accident, and sorry to hear your car was destroyed! Hopefully your car insurance helps to get you back on the road.

 

[apavel]

Hi there, thank you very much for your reply. Thankfully no one was injured, and the piece of ice did not go through the windshield.

After evaluating the card, you are correct, the SD card seems to have become read-only, and there is no way to unlock it.

Question: does the A119 support 256 and 128? I know some devices only support smaller SD cards. Also, any SD card brands you would recommend?

Thanks!

 

[StrayCam]

Glad to hear no one got hurt. - I'm sure the A119 will accommodate 128 gb cards... I'm not sure about 256 cards though. - But there are many knowledgeable Viofo users on this forum who could confirm size restrictions as well as card manufacturers.

I have a Viofo 129 Duo as well as a Blackvue 750x LTE Plus. I use a 256 gb Samsung Evo Select card in the BV, and I have a 128 gb card in the Viofo.

The guys here will steer you in the right direction for cards for your A119. - Good luck!

 

[Nigel]

It might manage 256 with a firmware update, but unless someone can confirm, I suggest sticking to 128GB cards. That will also let you go for a longer life card, which maybe a good idea if you only check it every 8 years!

 

[apavel]

How do you know the lifespan of a card? Do lower capacity cards have a longer lifespan?

 

[Nigel]

How do you know the lifespan of a card? Do lower capacity cards have a longer lifespan?

Look up the specification for "write cycles", the higher the better.

The word "endurance" is supposed to indicate long life, but some brands (Sandisk) seem to cheat on that!

What type of micro SD card for large amount of write cycles?

The Dash Cam I use will record all the time when driving and probably when standing still too. That results in a massive load of videos and therefore a massive writing onto the micro SD card. Should I get a specific type of micro SD card, one that can handle more writing to each storage sector...

dashcamtalk.com

 

[LateralNW]

How do you know the lifespan of a card? Do lower capacity cards have a longer lifespan?

Lower capacity cards will wear out faster.
Every Bit of memory will be written to over and over again. The memory has a finite life span and with many read-write operations, it will become unreliable over time.
How long is the tricky bit.
I use Samsung 128GB Evo's in my dash cams. A119 V2, A119V3 A129 Duo, T130
Once setup including the first format I don't format the cards again and let them completely overwrite the entire memory as the way Viofo adds new files means that the oldest file is always deleted first.
This means I am getting the files to be written to the oldest location first.
In theory at least, this should prolong the life of the memory card. Less read writes in the same spot over time.

Samsung has updated their memory cards and they are now white with blue print which is similar to the Evo version and they have also a Blue with white print they call their endurance card.

• Up to 130MB/s transfer speed (New release) Read & write speeds up to 160MB/s & 120MB/s, respectively. (New Release) Older Samsung memory card. (Being decommissioned)

 

[Nigel]

Lower capacity cards will wear out faster.

That has not really been the case, until the jump to 3D cards.

The bigger cards have less writes to each cell when used, but the cells are smaller, and smaller cells last for less writes.

 

[LateralNW]

The bigger cards have less writes to each cell when used, but the cells are smaller, and smaller cells last for less writes.

Nigel, are you referring to the electrons? Not a gotcha question just want to be on the same page as you.
MLC, TLC, QLC VNand Strings?

 

[Nigel]

Nigel, are you referring to the electrons? Not a gotcha question just want to be on the same page as you.
MLC, TLC, QLC VNand Strings?

As the capacities increased, the cards stayed the same size, so they made the electronic cells smaller, which made them wear out faster. The result was that the lifetimes of the cards didn't change much. When cards were small capacity we could get SLC cards, then we had to have MLC, then they changed to TLC for all the cheap cards. TLC cells are smaller than MLC cells which are smaller than SLC cells, but even within just MLC cells they gradually shrank as capacity increased. Then 3D NAND arrived and you can't really predict anything now, need to look up the specifications for write cycle life, which some of the manufacturers try to hide because their cards are not very long lasting!

 

[viofo]

Lower capacity cards will wear out faster.
Every Bit of memory will be written to over and over again. The memory has a finite life span and with many read-write operations, it will become unreliable over time.
How long is the tricky bit.
I use Samsung 128GB Evo's in my dash cams. A119 V2, A119V3 A129 Duo, T130
Once setup including the first format I don't format the cards again and let them completely overwrite the entire memory as the way Viofo adds new files means that the oldest file is always deleted first.
This means I am getting the files to be written to the oldest location first.
In theory at least, this should prolong the life of the memory card. Less read writes in the same spot over time.

Samsung has updated their memory cards and they are now white with blue print which is similar to the Evo version and they have also a Blue with white print they call their endurance card.

• Up to 130MB/s transfer speed (New release) Read & write speeds up to 160MB/s & 120MB/s, respectively. (New Release) Older Samsung memory card. (Being decommissioned)

View attachment 59876View attachment 59877View attachment 59878

We recommend using the red EVO card.
We confirmed there is a compatible issue with the blue text with a white background card.

 

[apavel]

Thanks everyone, that's really helpful. Will get the Evo 128.