GS6000 (3H2F) - Rubbish video quality?

[krawler]

G'day,

I bought a "Original Ambarella A7 Car DVR 3H2F GS6000 support GPS logger (3H2F)" from Foxoffer () and the video quality is really poor - it looks overly sharpened to the point of looking "gritty" almost. It also looks uber processed or something, with scattered shadows and tree branches and anything else that has a high level of detail turning into a bunch of blocky artifacts and noise.

The nighttime video is so bad as to be unuseable, with objects within the headlights beams being over exposed to the point of being unidentifiable white blobs and everywhere else being blurry like a cheap webcam with a fixed focal point that's been adjusted to a quarter of an inch in front of the lens. I was expecting it to be a bit crap based on the demo videos, but mine seems to be an order of magnitudes worse.

The firmware is "SM3H2FDGC.131028.V1" which I think is the latest based on the naming convention.

Is there any special tricks that might help here, like disabling WDR or changing from ~1440p recording to 1080p? Is there a known issue with some of them and I should be returning it? Should I be using a different firmware?

Video shows it's recording at ~18Mbps, and each 1 minute clip comes in at ~140MB so there's lots of data there. Its just crap data.

Example video (trimmed to remove a private phone conversation in YouTube's editor so it's only 1080p instead of 1440p, but the quality is basically identical):

I've set it to 1080p and will check it again tonight but I can't really see it improving a lot?

EDIT: For comparisons sake, here's my old-ish iTronics ITB-100HD which records at something like 40MB per 1 minute clip (4? 5?Mbps) and has passed through Movie Maker's terrible encoding:

While it lacks the pixel count and clarity of the 3H2F (theoretically), it seems to produce a much cleaner image.

Am I expecting too much from the new cam? Or do I have a legitimate problem here?

 

[jokiin]

The new firmware for this model is reported to make a big improvement, check the Texet website

 

[krawler]

The new firmware for this model is reported to make a big improvement, check the Texet website

I'm guessing this is the same as the GS6000? http://www.texet.ru/dvr/dvr571g.htm

I found firmware at http://www.texet.ru/save.php?file=/files/TX3H2FDDGC.140228.V1_1393596954.zip which contains a file called 'firmware.bin'. Using Google Translate on the PDF from the same page (http://www.texet.ru/save.php?file=/files/_1388064238.pdf) it looks like you just copy firmware.bin to the root directory of the SD card, and reboot the camera.

Is this the right firmware? If it's unsuitable, will it reject it or just bugger the thing? I don't want to kill the new camera already, even if the quality is (currently) terrible.

 

[jokiin]

There's a thread here already from people that have updated, best to check there as your concerns have likely been addressed already

 

[reverend]

I updated mine to the latest Texet firmware last night and the night video is still horrendously bad - I've reverted to the custom firmware from the thread linked above to see if that helps at all.

 

[krawler]

Yeah, I've got the latest Texet and it's still pretty useless. Absolutely FANTASTIC in very specific circumstances - for example, in the morning when the sun is behind you. Everything is crystal clear. But driving in to the sun, or as soon as the light starts to fade and it turns into a grainy mess where things should be clear, and a jumbled mess of blurred artifacts in things you'd normally expect to be a little out of focus (like tree canopies on the side of the road). Nighttime? Forget it. A tiny pool of over exposed footage in the middle of the screen where your headlights are, and a mess of black noise everywhere else. You need the best city street lighting if you want any hope of seeing anything clearly.

On top of that, the thing keeps turning on when you start the car but then immediately turning off again. The red light stays on so I know theres power, but no buttons respond and the screen is blank. If you disconnect power and reconnect it, it works fine again.

It also kept turning off on it's own which I *think* was due to a setting called 'auto off' which was set at 3 mins. I thought that was how long it waited when the power went out to turn itself off? The log kept showing "[REC_CAR_VIDEO] STORAGE_RUNOUT DV stop record" yet it would record one or two clips at a time, then show that. Then next time it turned on, it would record a few more. Then a few more. All the time with insufficient space to store a single clip so it was obviously deleting the oldest clips okay before randomly deciding it had had enough?? The last time I checked it was last night when the card was full. I should check it again tonight because we did a few hours of driving today which should be on there continously if the problem is 'fixed' with that setting.

Should have just got a Mini 0801 or G1W-C or something :-\

 

[reverend]

I'm trying various settings out and the sharpening is definitely reduced with the standard Texet firmware which produces less noise in the day.

Daft question but you don't have Xenon headlights do you? I do and that's causing my issues reading numberplates at night.

I've got a Shadow GT680W sat here I've bought for the back window as the extra fstop will help video through the privacy glass but I'll let you know how they compare.

Have you tried turning down the sharpness or using one of the custom firmware a with a higher bitrate from Falsificator on here?

I'm going to do a lot of testing over the next week to see if I decide to keep this or sell it.

As a matter of interest I definitely see improved playback on RegistratorViewer over what I see on my Mac, although that may be due to scaling of the video. The PC is a small laptop and the Mac has a large screen with a resolution higher than the A7 so you see it natively on there.

 

[reverend]

Just to confirm i've just done three hours driving with the GS6000 with custom Texet firmware that runs up to 30Mbps and compared to the new GT680W I have and the GS6000 is now producing a better image albeit with a larger file size.

i'm at the other half's with poor broadband but will upload a comparison tomorrow night when I'm home.

 

[reverend]

Here are two comparison videos today of similar daytime footage with a tunnel thrown in for good measure to show night performance.

This is the video from the GS6000 running Falsificator's custom late Feb firmware:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/106226829/Comparison/GS6000 Day and Tunnel.MOV

And then the same trip from the GT680W with fw 2.6:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/106226829/Comparison/GT680W Day and Tunnel.MOV

As you can see IMHO the daytime footage is superior on the GS6000, and although the tunnel footage appears to have more detail with less streaking on the GT680W I'd say number plates are actually better made out on the GS6000. The reflection of the speaker grille on my dashboard causes the GS6000 a lot of grief in terms of trying to render full detail.

I'd say from this that it is my xenon headlights causing a lot more problems than I would have imagined as both cameras struggle when they automatically come on in the tunnel. These are uprated Osram Cool Blue Intense bulbs so about as bright as you can get without overdriving the ballast.

I'll try and get some proper night time footage ASAP which isn't as well lit as the above and I'll also sort out the firmwares to the latest.

 

[reverend]

I've just done a test run and with WDR turned off and the night vision is dramatically improved for me - I'll have to see what daytime footage is like when I'm back from work tomorrow evening.

 

[Matt789]

I've just done a test run and with WDR turned off and the night vision is dramatically improved for me - I'll have to see what daytime footage is like when I'm back from work tomorrow evening.

Is your cam using the Ambarella A7 chip or the later Ambarella A7L chip ?
A7 was released in 2011 where the A7L was released late 2013.

I am finding my night video is far better than any I've seen here or on youtube except for a UK one which maybe better than mine at night. Modded firmware works far better than the texet firmware does.

From what I have seen the Ambarella A5 with my older dash cam gives the best night results for brightness that is but not as good a video as the A7L. The A7L isn't as bright for night recording.

The A7L for day recording is the best I've ever seen out of any dash cam reviewed thus far set at the highest resolution possible on these.

The A7L I have is the 3H2F-D model which I think is better for overall day and night over the A7.

If I could get the A7L as bright at night as the A5 3H2 model dash cam I would have the worlds best dash cam.

I have some friends looking at modding the firmware to give me what I want and fingers crossed that they are able to do what the dash cam maker can't thus far.