Blueskysea B1W vs Xiaomi 70mai

miknich

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These two cheap dashcams have very similar discreet design. Both use the same Sony IMX323 sensor, don’t have display, Wi-Fi enabled.
Blueskysea B1W uses a super capacitor, Xiaomi 70mai uses battery.
70mai supports voice control (useless IMO), B1W does not.

Recently I've got both of them, compared side-by-side and want to share the results.
That's how they look on the table (pic1, pic2)and installed(pic3, pic4).

70mai is slightly bigger, however much more noticeable because of the gray color. B1W is totally black.
Built quality of B1W feels slightly better than 70mai, especially mount.
Both dashcams have the latest firmware - v1.06.180528s for B1W and v1.0.6 for 70mai.

Not a big deal for me but B1W audio quality is very poor.

Now to the main part – video quality. Files are untouched.
B1W day
70mai day
I’d say that 70mai provides better quality. Pay attention to the color of of the car in left lane. In fact it was black.
B1W
70mai
B1W often produces bluish tint, with is not good for dash cam.

B1W night
70mai night

Look here
B1W
70mai
Obviously B1W overexposes.

Also I’ve got CPL for B1W (pic5)
The build quality is good.
Here are video with and without CPL
with CPL day
without CPL day
with CPL night
without CPL night

In my opinion CPL just makes bad video quality even worse.

I’d say that 70mai provides much better video quality overall. And it’s a pity because B1W has wider and faster optics, better mechanical design and supercaps.
I hope that Blueskysea will fix video quality in future firmware updates.
 
In my opinion, the video is approximately the same.
Agreed,
At night, the difference is only in different metering.
I prefer the B1W's brighter image, I can see a lot more, only the bit directly in the headlight beam is a problem and everything will move out of that at some point in the video.
At the same time, B1W has a wider viewing angle,
Which may come in very useful since it both shows more of what is happening around you and also makes it look like you are keeping a decent distance from the car in front instead of following too close.

Managing to maintain the detail while also achieving a wider field of view is a very difficult trick!
removable mount
I find that very useful, much easier to take the camera into the house and plug into the computer than mess with a tiny spring loaded micro SD card! Also makes it easily transferable to other cars if you get an extra mount. The B1W mount is about the easiest to use that I have ever met.
and supercapacitors.
So instead of dying due to battery failure in 1 to 3 years time, it will go out of service when you can no longer get suitable micro SD cards for it and your existing card has worn out!
B1W often produces bluish tint, with is not good for dash cam.
I'd not noticed that on mine, certainly not as blue as many other cameras. Looking at Falsificator's framegrabs above, the blue appears to be due to the streetlights, the ones one the left are blue and the ones on the right are orange, it has chosen a colour balance to match the headlights which results in the blue streetlights looking blue.

Anyway, dashcams are for capturing evidence and a slightly imperfect colour balance doesn't reduce the amount of evidence captured.
In my opinion CPL just makes bad video quality even worse.
A lot of people will disagree with that, it depends on how bad the reflections are in your car and how much driving you do in the dark.
A CPL will always remove half the light and thus normally doubles the motion blur, so it is always a trade off.
And it’s a pity because B1W has wider and faster optics...
And faster optics reduce motion blur, so a comparison should always include an image showing the amount of motion blur the camera produces. In this case the Xiaomi probably does quite well since the night exposure is so dark!
 
If the 70Mai is as good as it seems, it will be established in the market as a good value soon. If there is something to prevent this it will be the battery, but many people do not deal with high summer heat so even that might not hurt it's sales. We can't have too many good cams to choose from, only too few which was the situation when I began. This change is good(y)

Phil
 
I've compared B1W with the camera which is very similar but 25% cheaper. The cheaper one shows licence plates in situation when B1W shows wiped out spots instead of the car itself. The cheaper one shows black car and B1W shows dark blue instead of black. It's not what I'd want on evidence video.
What can I say? The cheaper one produces better quality video. B1W firmware is a problem. And Blueskysea doesn't care.
As expected some owners of B1W don't see any problem and even prefer B1W footage :ROFLMAO:
 
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I've compared B1W with the camera which is very similar but 25% cheaper.
Yes, an impressive price difference! 25%! In fact, it’s about 12 dollars in total, and it seems to me unimportant :rolleyes:

B1W firmware is a problem. And Blueskysea doesn't care.
I do not agree here. What does the problem with the firmware mean? Just no problem. Immediately, as soon as they were released in November 2017, they began to make changes to the firmware, as far as possible, even raised the bitrate. Now they have released a beta version of the firmware, working in the parking mode with the time-lapse mode.
As expected some owners of B1W don't see any problem and even prefer B1W footage
And here you are in vain. If you are not particularly satisfied with this dashcam (B1W), this does not mean that everyone just closes their eyes to the shortcomings. This is not true. I like this dash - except for the one mentioned above also because it is as simple as "point and shoot" (camera-soap dishes), and also this is not my first dash and I can draw some conclusions and comparisons. By myself.

And you forgot to mention significant difficulties for users when using 70Mai - about voice control of some functions only in Chinese, firmware and applications only in Chinese, activation of Wi-Fi only through correspondence with Chinese friends through their Q-Q (or through some other mail server that is accessible only to residents of China and has a telephone registered by a resident of China in China). Such dances with tambourines really don't need me. o_OThis is really essential for everyone.
And not all scenes are better shot by 70Mai.
 
25% is 25% :)
It may be unimportant for you but it definitely makes a difference for manufacturer and seller.
I contacted estore009 several days ago with this comparison. His advice was to try old firmware which actually overexposes even more.
However it points that EV correction is possible. I prefer to see licence plates, somebody else wants trees near the road. Just give us an option. They just don't want to bother.

All "chinese horrors" you mentioned about 70mai are wrong. All of them. The manual is in english, voice prompts are in english, all voice commands are in english, application is in english. And I used my regular gmail email to activate it.

PS: could you please point on my video samples where B1W did a better job than 70mai?
 
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However it points that EV correction is possible. I prefer to see licence plates, somebody else wants trees near the road
Perhaps we have with you different ideas about what and how should shoot dash. I need trees near the road. In addition to the number plates, it is much more important that the traffic situation, roadsides, and the location of other road users are visible. And on the road there are pedestrians, animals, unmarked cyclists, cars without lights, etc.
And sorry, I expressed my opinion and I'm not going to prove anything to anyone.

Thanks for the great work compared these two dashcams.

PS: could you please point on my video samples where B1W did a better job than 70mai?
Just look at the screenshots of your video filming night, which posted Falsificator.

PS: by and large - for what purposes license plates are certainly and absolutely necessary, let this information be clarified by the inquiry bodies. Or folk avengers ...:LOL:

PPS: if you place in your message screenshots from the video beside to the links to the video, it will be much more convenient for users.
This is a hobby, and most of the users on this forum are enthusiasts. Please do not forget about this when you start attacking the mills again ;)
 
[QUOTE = "Nigel, сообщение: 438961, участник: 7825"] ... вы должны были использовать черную микро SD-карту: D
[/ QUOTE]
Да, мы будем вынуждены использовать только черные микро-SD-карты, ;) такие как:
Black1 micro-sd card.jpg


и такой пестрый уже по большому вопросу:
Black micro-sd card.jpg
 
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To assist with this discussion so that everyone can compare the cameras more easily, I have compiled side-by-side videos using the original files provided in the first post.

I see no clear winner with both cameras delivering good value for money
- The B1W is brighter at night, losing highlight detail but revealing more in shadow areas.
- The 70mai colour balance appears more accurate
- The B1W field of view is slightly wider, which may suit some users but not others



Sample frames:
y4mc5wcIfBV126JW1Ff7Pp08O_uXpuHIBOL-f0YUvimNmf9bGtQlZWdWloiaDqY5WVWzFPCfvVkpqFYfjc07_3jyNBXbWUMFs6w57tRtxvI1NvlVR0rFnyv1Osj-IZ_J9uB3a1R1YK3oWLJSps4Q7_wDSkmbdZBT6Icj9obw94jtNTqoL5Rrp13f2Sc5XW6UMcdOinp7D0QSSrx2Y2KNXa-Kg



y4mBqULXka4V3aPAvk2HAWEYcwDNnUQXu5V8iiVJ4qbVirqtBMedQv1c1Q1ryrQ2lE9UC4hbMeZnCjdUIeKuS00TUqQFm1KAFxTpiNlIA1pKeqzXLeipii7KerAsyR932AvUuaea6eRa00S_DucMgDyTb31hQr11fewEtcaK_KGC-URiPOKSdROM_izzZkogGXOuvA5NuOKQ3CpY1rMACPLXg



y4mfNmCVgLCKBob71aVcPt0or-JcQQiE6eIbgUfZL3wn6s-NC4XOnD2ggxgJKZMBAGCH15aKwEL3QJo9jcM4t9scw1ioJwrvzD06b28-gt8FuNJaUm3wZF58euPi7KaoeG-BV3iFBByU2Cv4vlQ0PeYQ3Qyu2GNI4kXfTHh3cSpyRE5-P5eewIne1UnnuVzlKFrtQep1fSFKnBYIWB7hY1qIg



y4mmIDrMzT2yXiH6Y6i7FJHSGRoEP4Ocdy-W27RLBckby_Bw-VNXlMBfpP_wJAAY4KgGNxxbqPzqlvRGE_sQe_xQwCzRBY8GXFWbSHJ90L1U3Vs4ttwMXj8rFCPhIZke04Q6WJDLzJc_wx4-DVcO94Zj9JHhgKBcvrR2AoMeqjwEZkZ8Umivm7q9cF4WEDt8Xk3UhMSwYWU4SNIa3I6DxTUtw



y4me43S9CgbwWeXNAqUIm-vJm2q_4WHPsFz78Lak450DEyzsa7l4KI49KSbbDrsPeV1q_hO34nWDBKTaXporBf06t_gaiMbqxgbdppImetqGGS6UniIAMvHPXXle7TgL2g7p0I3KxBhUI-7XfWcqXZ7NQFbQaGiFh7Xr9L9FbZMXUDFwoo2loiV6nNoSt2jjx3b_s7xD-HAPF7Z1FUEr6-JYA
 
TonyM, thank you. I was too lazy to compile video for youtube. I hope it will help somebody to choose the dashcam.
I can see your B1W hiding in the darkness ... you should have used a black micro SD card :D

Meanwhile the Xiaomi has bright white writing on the front saying "Please steal me."!
If such ideas come to your mind I decided to fix the design.:ROFLMAO: With black permanent marker.
Special ninja edition 70mai inspired by Nigel!
DSC_2016.jpg

DSC_2025.jpg
 
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If such ideas come to your mind I decided to fix it.:ROFLMAO:
Special ninja edition 70mai inspired by Nigel!
Thank you, although it is still more visible than the B1W, especially the mount, and you still need to convince Xiaomi to actually produce a black version, which I bet you can't do!

With the B1W, we have already requested all black with no front writing, and Blueskysea were happy to produce them exactly as requested, even using a black sticky pad :)
 
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