Dual Channel dashcam vs. Two Individual dashcams?

[SteveF]

My question is as simple as the title of this thread: Is there any difference / advantage between having a true dual channel dashcam vs. buying two individual dashcams and pointing one to the rear?

 

[Street Guardian USA]

The best video quality today will be in a single channel product. (and it will have the highest reliability)

Two single channels will give you the benefit of redundancy as well.

 

[SteveF]

Thanks.

 

[jokiin]

all dual channel products have some sort of compromise, depends if that's something that's workable for you or not, single channel you have a lot more to choose from, what you'd use front and rear are not always the same, there's no one size fits all best solution product, choice is a good thing though

 

[sludgeguts]

Whilst I am all in favour of a single DVR recording from 2 or 4 remote cams, I would prefer that the 2ch (for example) be (something like) 2 Mobius-sized cams, each with its own lens on the end of a long lead.
Have a single power supply feed the box & the electrickery inside splits the power to feed each cam. More electrickery inside the box monitors the state of each cam (have they both started recording, sync the time etc...). I would also hope that this central box would have a screen so that you could review footage from each cam. If desired, relevant files from each cam could then be transferred to an SD card in the form of cam1, cam2 files.
I honestly believe that it is just too much to expect hd video from 2 cams to be recorded simultaneously on the one SD card

 

[Gibson99]

Whilst I am all in favour of a single DVR recording from 2 or 4 remote cams, I would prefer that the 2ch (for example) be (something like) 2 Mobius-sized cams, each with its own lens on the end of a long lead.
Have a single power supply feed the box & the electrickery inside splits the power to feed each cam. More electrickery inside the box monitors the state of each cam (have they both started recording, sync the time etc...). I would also hope that this central box would have a screen so that you could review footage from each cam. If desired, relevant files from each cam could then be transferred to an SD card in the form of cam1, cam2 files.
I honestly believe that it is just too much to expect hd video from 2 cams to be recorded simultaneously on the one SD card

well with a central unit like that, space isn't so much of a constraint, so you could have a 2.5" laptop hard drive (ruggedized, better able to handle vibrations) so you could easily have a terabyte of fast storage for all channels to write to simultaneously.

 

[jokiin]

so you could have a 2.5" laptop hard drive (ruggedized, better able to handle vibrations) .

SSD, fast and no moving parts

 

[Gibson99]

SSD, fast and no moving parts

True, but also much more expensive per gb. A laptop hdd with rubber or silicone isolating bumpers should do just fine in all but the most severe rough roads or stiff suspension cars. I had a desktop 3.5" HDD in my car for a year and a half as part of a pc for playing mp3s back in the early 2000s. It was hanging by springs in the center console with foam on the walls in case it bottomed out. No issues the entire time.

 

[jokiin]

a laptop drive could be used, I wouldn't personally though, an SSD drive would be the better choice, lower power consumption, no moving parts but most importantly much faster throughput which would be better for multiple data streams, I think by the time it's a viable option the cost difference will be negligible anyway, there should come a point in time where SSD is the cheaper option I would think, not sure how far away at this stage but I can see it happening

 

[Gibson99]

True.. And now that i think of it, file fragmentation (which would be a major issue with multiple streams) is a non issue on ssd...