I need a robust, low bitrate dash cam to solve a specific business need

[gobao]

Hi, I'm looking for a dash cam and need your advice on what to buy in order to solve a rather specific line-of-business related need. The dash cam I'm looking for should overcome and fit these constraints:

• PRIMARY HURDLE
  I need to fit about 30-40 hours of dash cam footage on a single microSD
  • hence, low bitrate on 1080p - less than 10 Mbps, ideally around 2-5 Mbps
  • I could even go with 720p resolution, if the bitrate would just be under 5 Mbps
  • thus, support for a microSD up to 64 or, ideally, 128 GB is a must
• SECONDARY HURDLE
  (a very) portable installaton
  • the dash cam would change cars very frequently, multiple times a day, every day of the week
  • it would always be used connected to a car-charger
  • cars would need to have a small adhesive-based mount preinstalled on the windshield, something similar to a GoPro adhesive mount or a Garmin adhesive+magnetic mount (images below)
  • dash cam installation in each car would need to be a simple click-on to that preinstalled mount (plus connecting the charger)
• Other must-haves
  • wide-angle lens
  • GPS-enabled
  • date/time, GPS position and driving speed overlay on video
• Should haves (these features are not required, but would be welcome):
  • GPS-metadata in a separate text file or embedded inside video frames
  • WiFi / HTTP API

So, what dash cam would you suggest?

 

[Nigel]

"around 2-5 Mbps"
Not enough for more than 15km/h, unless you are happy with a very low frame rate, eg 3fps?
If you are happy with the low frame rate then some of the more recent ones have a low frame rate parking mode that you could leave it in continuously that would provide the required bitrate...

What image quality, low light ability etc. ?

 

[gobao]

"around 2-5 Mbps"
Not enough for more than 15km/h, unless you are happy with a very low frame rate, eg 3fps?
If you are happy with the low frame rate then some of the more recent ones have a low frame rate parking mode that you could leave it in continuously that would provide the required bitrate...

What image quality, low light ability etc. ?

High-end video/image quality is not a primary requirement.
Also, no low light requirements, would be used mostly during the day.

 

[jokiin]

are you just looking for a camera, or a number of cameras?

High-end video/image quality is not a primary requirement.
.

bitrate doesn't need to be anywhere near that low if you don't mind the expense of larger cards anyway, you can still get decent quality

 

[gobao]

are you just looking for a camera, or a number of cameras?


bitrate doesn't need to be anywhere near that low if you don't mind the expense of larger cards anyway, you can still get decent quality

1) A number of cameras.
2) A 128GB card is fine, I don't mind the expense of it. With bitrate around 8 Mbps I can fit the entire work week on a single card, that's acceptable. 10 Mbps would be by far highest still acceptable bitrate.

 

[jokiin]

1) A number of cameras..

what sort of number?

 

[gobao]

what sort of number?

About 50.

 

[jokiin]

ok, the exact requirement doesn't exist in any product I know, it's not hard to do but 50 pieces isn't enough to get the adjustments you would require, maybe list things in order of importance and see what you can compromise on

 

[Nigel]

2) A 128GB card is fine, I don't mind the expense of it. With bitrate around 8 Mbps I can fit the entire work week on a single card, that's acceptable. 10 Mbps would be by far highest still acceptable bitrate.

The larger cards are more an investment than an expense since a card double the size will normally have double the lifespan before wearing out.

Sounds like you maybe able to use a number of standard dashcams in 720 resolution, but you will need to check the bitrate for the "720 low quality" setting and the maximum card size that actually works (not what is in the documentation) before deciding, most people are not interested in that resolution so the bitrates are not always sensible.

Not sure your maths about an entire week at 8Mbps is accurate though!

 

[Harsh]

If only you didn't GPS, the Mobius @ 480P or 720P would've worked.

 

[Deleted member 37895]

A simple feature would let any dash cam do this-- Low framerate. But the manufacturers seem to be adamant that 30fps is required even though lower framerates would be very easy to program, and some are even offering 60fps.

 

[gobao]

ok, the exact requirement doesn't exist in any product I know, it's not hard to do but 50 pieces isn't enough to get the adjustments you would require, maybe list things in order of importance and see what you can compromise on

Yeah, that's right.

The larger cards are more an investment than an expense since a card double the size will normally have double the lifespan before wearing out.

Sounds like you maybe able to use a number of standard dashcams in 720 resolution, but you will need to check the bitrate for the "720 low quality" setting and the maximum card size that actually works (not what is in the documentation) before deciding, most people are not interested in that resolution so the bitrates are not always sensible.

Not sure your maths about an entire week at 8Mbps is accurate though!

Large cards are fine, no doubt there. My maths is OK, it's not an "entire week" but "entire work week".

A simple feature would let any dash cam do this-- Low framerate. But the manufacturers seem to be adamant that 30fps is required even though lower framerates would be very easy to program, and some are even offering 60fps.

Low framerate will not work for this project, I require 25-30 fps. I don't mind compression artifacts as much, hence the talk about low(er) bitrate.

Initially, I bought a GoPro HERO5 for testing, turns out it can't tag GPS videos, only still JPEG images, and you can't set the bitrate. It is fixed at 30 Mbps (!!!) for 1080p. It also doesn't work as well as a dash cam, since it can't overlay date/time, speed and GPS in video.

 

[gobao]

Can anybody with a Garmin Dash Cam 55 comment on these requirements? It seems like a very good candidate, but I don't know its' bitrate of 720p and 1080p video, and I've heard something about that device splitting each recording into small 60-second files. Is it true and can that be overriden to record an entire driving session in a single file?

 

[jokiin]

Regardless of which camera you get splitting the files is a good thing, none will create single continuous files due to file size limitations, it's also a huge liability, losing a minute of video if something goes wrong is bad, nowhere near as bad as losing an entire trip in one go though

Even if the video is chaptered into single minutes it's very easy to export as a single file without adding or removing anything in the process

 

[Nigel]

Low framerate will not work for this project, I require 25-30 fps. I don't mind compression artifacts as much, hence the talk about low(er) bitrate.

In that case, choose a dashcam you like, then if the 720 low quality mode is not low enough bitrate, either get in touch with Tobi@s , or use his tools to modify the firmware yourself to the bitrate you want and give 50 donations Don't expect great quality at high speed though, and my guess is that you would be better to use 1080 at low bitrate than 720 at the same bitrate. Better make sure his tools work with the dashcam you choose.

 

[Deleted member 37895]

Can anybody with a Garmin Dash Cam 55 comment on these requirements? It seems like a very good candidate, but I don't know its' bitrate of 720p and 1080p video, and I've heard something about that device splitting each recording into small 60-second files. Is it true and can that be overriden to record an entire driving session in a single file?

I don't have that one but I have a Garmin 35 and it records in 1 minute files each of which is 61 megabytes, so about 8mbps

 

[lacibaci]

Can anybody with a Garmin Dash Cam 55 comment on these requirements? It seems like a very good candidate, but I don't know its' bitrate of 720p and 1080p video, and I've heard something about that device splitting each recording into small 60-second files. Is it true and can that be overriden to record an entire driving session in a single file?

Garmin 55 can only record in 60secs. segments.

 

[gobao]

I don't have that one but I have a Garmin 35 and it records in 1 minute files each of which is 61 megabytes, so about 8mbps

Garmin 55 can only record in 60secs. segments.

Thanks guys, that's very helpful. Couple of questions, though...

So I imagine you must rely on vendor software for video playback on a PC, since manually stitching all those files would definitely not be user-friendly.
If I copy all those one-minute files to a folder on a PC, and disconnect the camera/card, is the software smart enough to play it back in sequence?
Can you disable the warning system (collision, lane assist, traffic lights...)?
Can you disable the rotational (first in, first out) recording, so content does not get overwritten when you fill up all available space?
Has anybody tried if a 128GB card would work with a 55, since it is declared up to 64GB-only?

 

[Deleted member 37895]

Thanks guys, that's very helpful. Couple of questions, though...

So I imagine you must rely on vendor software for video playback on a PC, since manually stitching all those files would definitely not be user-friendly.
If I copy all those one-minute files to a folder on a PC, and disconnect the camera/card, is the software smart enough to play it back in sequence?
Can you disable the warning system (collision, lane assist, traffic lights...)?
Can you disable the rotational (first in, first out) recording, so content does not get overwritten when you fill up all available space?
Has anybody tried if a 128GB card would work with a 55, since it is declared up to 64GB-only?

You can disable the warnings. You can't disable the rolling recording but you can of course copy files or swap sd cards.

There is no viewer software that I know of. You can play the whole folder by dragging the files to a playlist in VLC. There are also some video programs that will play everything in a folder

 

[lacibaci]

Garmin does have "Dash cam player" for PC and MAC.
http://www.garmin.com/en-US/shop/downloads/dash-cam-player

I just use VLC for playback.