A129 Parking mode stops working after ~2 hours

[Cozza]

OK, I remember you wrote this earlier or on another thread. So at 11.8V it’s been staying on?
My wife’s new 2019 Santa Fe needs to be set to 12V or it shuts off to quick. I think all the bells and whistles in the car can take a toll. My 2011 Sonata with a 2-3 year old battery can be set at 12.4V and I can leave the camera in parking mode for 8+ hours and it’s fine.

Yeah I wrote it earlier. VIOFO sent me the new/beta HK3 kit to resolve the high pitched noise problem. At 11.8V the camera does not stay on, it doesn't seem to make a difference what voltage I select.

On the previous kit the camera was able to run for a good 2 days without starting the car. I only once previously had the camera shut off due to low battery and the car noticeably struggled to start due to a low battery. The camera now shuts down and car starts strong and fast. But I also updated the firmware at the same time so can't 100% blame the new HK3.

When I find a chance I'll reconnect to the old hardwire kit to see if there's a difference.

 

[HonestReview]

Use 12.2 folks. 12.4 is a very high cut off (75%). And by god never use 11.8 unless you want to walk out to a dead car battery one day.

 

[CaptureYourAction]

Yeah I wrote it earlier. VIOFO sent me the new/beta HK3 kit to resolve the high pitched noise problem. At 11.8V the camera does not stay on, it doesn't seem to make a difference what voltage I select.

On the previous kit the camera was able to run for a good 2 days without starting the car. I only once previously had the camera shut off due to low battery and the car noticeably struggled to start due to a low battery. The camera now shuts down and car starts strong and fast. But I also updated the firmware at the same time so can't 100% blame the new HK3.

When I find a chance I'll reconnect to the old hardwire kit to see if there's a difference.

That is weird. Using same fuses?

 

[Cozza]

Use 12.2 folks. 12.4 is a very high cut off (75%). And by god never use 11.8 unless you want to walk out to a dead car battery one day.

I agree. In my context my cam is turning off after a couple of hours regardless of voltage that is selected.

That is weird. Using same fuses?

Yep, everything same same.

 

[CaptureYourAction]

I agree. In my context my cam is turning off after a couple of hours regardless of voltage that is selected.



Yep, everything same same.

I’d be inclined to downgrade the firmware, back to what you were using before, just to see if the camera then stayed on.

 

[HonestReview]

I agree. In my context my cam is turning off after a couple of hours regardless of voltage that is selected.



Yep, everything same same.

If the battery is in a weakened state, your camera will power off prematurely. I had mine set to 12.4 and it cut off after hour or 2. My battery was measured and came in at 76%. Meaning 12.4 (75 Percent Strength) was too high of a threshold. With 12.2 (50%), I've had no issues.

 

[Cozza]

If the battery is in a weakened state, your camera will power off prematurely. I had mine set to 12.4 and it cut off after hour or 2. My battery was measured and came in at 76%. Meaning 12.4 (75 Percent Strength) was too high of a threshold. With 12.2 (50%), I've had no issues.

I literally sat the battery on a charger, set the cutoff voltage to 11.8V and it still turned off.

If the HK3 was truly cutting voltage at 11.8V, the car would noticeably be sluggish to start. This is not the case, the car starts effortlessly.

 

[an1uk]

I'm getting recording with parking mode motion detection cutting off while power to the camera remains. Moving through the camera's field of view makes the LED goes solid, therefore the camera thinks it's recording. But on looking at the SD card contents there's only items from roughly a day since parking up.

I'm using a freshly in-camera fomatted Kingston Endurance 128gb. Using the official 3 wire kit which correctly detects driving/parking. This is with official v1.9 FW. I've gone to MOD-PMI based on official v1.81 FW to see if that fares any better. If not I'll consider giving up on buffered parking mode and do low bit rate or time lapse and wait for a FW update. It wouldn't be an issue if I drove everyday, but my car is often parked up a few days at a time.

 

[PasswordIsTaco123]

Camera is incompatible with Sandisk Ultra Plus. Will lock up camera. Ultra is supposedly fine. I run the Sandisk A2 Extreme without Problems. Well no freezing. Apparently there's a bug that the camera is duplicating and dropping frames (another forum). That we aren't sure if a hardware issue or a big introduced in a firmware update.

Ahh yep, and I just got an email back from the Viofo rep saying not to use Sandisk cards at all becuase there are so many fake ones out there so they dont recommend using them, but if the A2 is working for you then thats great! I just got a Sandisk Pro Endurance delivered yesterday 128gb U3 C10, and had it run all night with no issues, didnt see any dropped frames (but didnt look hard for them). Just a heads up though in case you didnt know this already, most SD card manufacturers wont cover the majority of their cards under warranty if theyre used in Dashcams, so just be wary of that. They do make these "pro endurance" models, but their warranty is much shorter, but specific to dashcams and surveillance devices.

An annoying thing is with 4-4.5 hrs of parking mode yesterday with the A1 200gb card, I didnt get the issue of stopping recording, worked all the way thorugh the time I allowed it to, so my theory of the issue coming from using a Sandisk A1 card might not be the solve, but dont know 100% yet. So in my experience so far (heavy emphasis on my experience, because it could be an isolated dealio with mine) the two big factors that Im thinking were contributing to the 'looking like recording events, but not actually recording events' issue after about 2-4 hours in parking mode, was not repeatable as of yet with only 1 4hr test, need to do another overnight test or two to confirm. But the successful parking mode tests that have worked have all come after I changed the boot delay to 5 seconds, I'm not running into the issue anymore. They mention in the hardwire kit or manual that some cars need that couple of seconds to go through its sequences before something additional can fire up.
Maybe the boot delay fixed it? Maybe yesterday the events were just spaced out enough not to make the card fail? Who knows haha

Also Im using the A129IR latest firmware on the Viofo site on my A129Duo. The only thing different between these cameras is that the Rear Cam is in Black and White due to the IR firmware.
Ill probably go back and test the latest A129Duo Firmware on the A129Duo with these settings to see if it was the boot delay, card, or potentially something else.

 

[HonestReview]

I literally sat the battery on a charger, set the cutoff voltage to 11.8V and it still turned off.

If the HK3 was truly cutting voltage at 11.8V, the car would noticeably be sluggish to start. This is not the case, the car starts effortlessly.

Try low bitrate recording, see what happens.

Also, are you sure the fuses selected are "OK? I had an issue where my 12v plug fuse was tied into the car alarm. I'd power off camera if not needing it to run and when I locked car, the Alarm turned the camera back on. Switched fuses, problem solved. This was for Battery fuse btw.

 

[HonestReview]

Ahh yep, and I just got an email back from the Viofo rep saying not to use Sandisk cards at all becuase there are so many fake ones out there so they dont recommend using them, but if the A2 is working for you then thats great! I just got a Sandisk Pro Endurance delivered yesterday 128gb U3 C10, and had it run all night with no issues, didnt see any dropped frames (but didnt look hard for them). Just a heads up though in case you didnt know this already, most SD card manufacturers wont cover the majority of their cards under warranty if theyre used in Dashcams, so just be wary of that. They do make these "pro endurance" models, but their warranty is much shorter, but specific to dashcams and surveillance devices.

No way of them knowing what my uses are unless I tell them....

I bought from Sandisk.Com to ensure that I didn't get a fake. Amazon is too sketchy on SD cards. A2 Extreme 256 and 400GB are pretty cheap.

An annoying thing is with 4-4.5 hrs of parking mode yesterday with the A1 200gb card, I didnt get the issue of stopping recording, worked all the way thorugh the time I allowed it to, so my theory of the issue coming from using a Sandisk A1 card might not be the solve, but dont know 100% yet. So in my experience so far (heavy emphasis on my experience, because it could be an isolated dealio with mine) the two big factors that Im thinking were contributing to the 'looking like recording events, but not actually recording events' issue after about 2-4 hours in parking mode, was not repeatable as of yet with only 1 4hr test, need to do another overnight test or two to confirm. But the successful parking mode tests that have worked have all come after I changed the boot delay to 5 seconds, I'm not running into the issue anymore. They mention in the hardwire kit or manual that some cars need that couple of seconds to go through its sequences before something additional can fire up.
Maybe the boot delay fixed it? Maybe yesterday the events were just spaced out enough not to make the card fail? Who knows haha

Could be the boot delay solved and giving camera time to switch into proper mode. My Sandisk A1 Ultra Plus would freeze randomly but at least 1x daily and while it was "recording" nothing was recorded.....See what happens

Also Im using the A129IR latest firmware on the Viofo site on my A129Duo. The only thing different between these cameras is that the Rear Cam is in Black and White due to the IR firmware.
Ill probably go back and test the latest A129Duo Firmware on the A129Duo with these settings to see if it was the boot delay, card, or potentially something else.

There's another issue on these cameras duplicating (rear camera) and dropping frames (front) we're all trying to figure out

 

[Cozza]

Try low bitrate recording, see what happens.

Also, are you sure the fuses selected are "OK? I had an issue where my 12v plug fuse was tied into the car alarm. I'd power off camera if not needing it to run and when I locked car, the Alarm turned the camera back on. Switched fuses, problem solved. This was for Battery fuse btw.

I am using low bitrate mode.

The fuses I'm using are the same I was using with my previous HK3 and did not have any of these issues. Cam recorded for days before low voltage cutoff.

I'm going to reinstall my old HK3 and see if the problem goes away.

 

[HonestReview]

I am using low bitrate mode.

The fuses I'm using are the same I was using with my previous HK3 and did not have any of these issues. Cam recorded for days before low voltage cutoff.

I'm going to reinstall my old HK3 and see if the problem goes away.

So do you think the new hardwiring kit, while solving noise issue, has another flaw? Or did you just get a dud.

 

[Cozza]

Quick update on this one for me. Changed to my old hardwire kit, dashcam is now running all night and day without shutting down.

One thing I have noticed is that I have a device connected to my OBDII port that is supposed to shutdown when the engine is off. It's constantly turning off and on randomly when the car is off which it did not do with the new kit.

 

[jokiin]

One thing I have noticed is that I have a device connected to my OBDII port that is supposed to shutdown when the engine is off. It's constantly turning off and on randomly when the car is off which it did not do with the new kit.

what's the other device?

 

[Cozza]

what's the other device?

COBB Accessport. And before you suggest it's contributing to the problem, the dashcam does not power down when it is unplugged 🙂

 

[jokiin]

COBB Accessport. And before you suggest it's contributing to the problem, the dashcam does not power down when it is unplugged 🙂

I wasn't going to suggest it was the problem but some devices that plug into OBD have some settings to prevent what you're experiencing, that's why I asked what it was

 

[Cozza]

I wasn't going to suggest it was the problem but some devices that plug into OBD have some settings to prevent what you're experiencing, that's why I asked what it was

No worries, yeah it's certainly not causing any problems but there's definitely something going on in the (old) hardwire kit to make the AP power up and down like that.

 

[CasualSaiLo]

It seems like I'm getting this problem too. After a few hours of parking mode, footage stops getting written to the micro SD card.

- A129 Duo (front and rear)
- GPS on
- Wifi off
- Parking mode motion low sensitivity
- Parking mode G sensor high sensitivity
- No boot delay
- V1.9
- Using a 256GB Samsung Evo Select micro SD card
- HK3 is set to 12.0 V

In the morning, I will walk past my car/camera to trigger motion and get inside. The recording LED is solid, indicating that it is recording. I press the 2 squares button to turn on the screen and see that it shows parking mode and the blinking red recording light on the screen.

Let's say the time is 8AM. I'll start my car, which will kick the A129 out of parking mode into driving mode. I would then stop the recording and look through the footage and see that it has 2 clips for 8AM (for the few seconds I entered driving mode), and then the clips before that could be something like 1AM. The A129 had power when I went into my car in the morning, and it indicated that it was recording, but nothing was on the SD card. Still trying to troubleshoot and try different configurations, but it's a slow process

I'll see if I can get a recording of the issue next time

 

[CaptureYourAction]

It seems like I'm getting this problem too. After a few hours of parking mode, footage stops getting written to the micro SD card.

- A129 Duo (front and rear)
- GPS on
- Wifi off
- Parking mode motion low sensitivity
- Parking mode G sensor high sensitivity
- No boot delay
- V1.9
- Using a 256GB Samsung Evo Select micro SD card
- HK3 is set to 12.0 V

In the morning, I will walk past my car/camera to trigger motion and get inside. The recording LED is solid, indicating that it is recording. I press the 2 squares button to turn on the screen and see that it shows parking mode and the blinking red recording light on the screen.

Let's say the time is 8AM. I'll start my car, which will kick the A129 out of parking mode into driving mode. I would then stop the recording and look through the footage and see that it has 2 clips for 8AM (for the few seconds I entered driving mode), and then the clips before that could be something like 1AM. The A129 had power when I went into my car in the morning, and it indicated that it was recording, but nothing was on the SD card. Still trying to troubleshoot and try different configurations, but it's a slow process

I'll see if I can get a recording of the issue next time

Try using a 5 sec boot delay. Not sure why, but some users find it helps.