Least bad option (of the best?)

[Babayaga]

Hi,

We are looking for a new dashcam and this forum seems to be a pretty damn good resource to check.. the car is an Audi Q7, we've read the stickies and from what I can tell these are the least bad options of what is currently available on the market:

Blackvue 750 2Ch
Nextbase 612GW
Audi UTR (which appears to be a rebadged 750)
Thinkware F800 pro

I know that these are all 'premium' options but our view is... whats the point of having a cam unless you can actually read number plates and get the right details needed should we be involved in an incident and get real value from the captured footage.

From reading these forums, there are threads on each of these cameras where most people seem to complain about the video quality for some reason or another.

We aren't precious about brand name or price but would like a camera which is going to read plates well (day or night).

Any feedback/suggestions would be welcome.

 

[DT MI]

...would like a camera which is going to read plates well (day or night)...

Unfortunately, no dash cam currently available will do that with any consistency - especially at night.

 

[abarth]

from my time here, I've come to the conclusion that a high price, well known brand and quality + reliability are not mutually inclusive.

and everyone will have different experiences and needs but here's my history and thoughts:
lukas 7200: incredibly reliable and fantastic parking mode. the image quality is subpar when compared to much less expensive cameras.
street guardian SGZC12RC: incredibly reliable (after several iterations of the lens that suffered from heat-shift) and fantastic pre-buffered "parking mode". not cheap but the excellent customer service was always chasing a happy resolution for me.
mini 0805: has been quite reliable for me (as long as you abide by the SD card limitations). excellent image quality for the price point. after a while the mount has been shaky and "shimming" the mount was necessary for me.
viofo A119: my favorite camera to date. excellent video quality, affordable and has been very reliable. discreet form factor. only thing that it's missing is pre-buffered parking mode and it would be perfect for me.
B1W: great little barrel camera. it's been reliable and is perfect for mounting in the rear hatch. very affordable.

 

[Babayaga]

The tech exists, just seems that nobody has tried to squeeze it into a dashcam yet. Average speed cameras do it extremely well these days!

 

[abarth]

The tech exists, just seems that nobody has tried to squeeze it into a dashcam yet. Average speed cameras do it extremely well these days!

sure. I can mount my 4K-resolution, light-eating sony RX100 V to my windshield but it's too bulky even though it's a "compact" camera.

 

[jokiin]

The tech exists, just seems that nobody has tried to squeeze it into a dashcam yet. Average speed cameras do it extremely well these days!

speed camera would make for a very poor dashcam (obviously that's not going to happen), speed cameras have a very specific use case and are tailored precisely to their intended use and they do that well, high speed photography with the correct light source against a reflective license plate which is off axis, trying to get that sort of result from a dashcam while still being able to handle everything else they do is just about impossible using current tech, it's not a matter of not squeezing, what you want to squeeze won't fit

there's one very large camera manufacturer in China that does sport cams and dashcams that make the fixed speed cameras that are used here in Australia, not like they don't know what's involved

 

[Wiz33]

The ability to read a license plate. Just let me tell you now that reading license plate is a MYTH! Yes, I'm sure you have seen a lot of comparison video and how they show freeze frame from varies cameras (even on the same vehicle) and how some camera seems to read plates better than other. The truth is that being able to read a plate depends on so many other factors that it often seems more luck than the ability of the camera. Here's a few factors that will affect your camera performance.

a) Your windshield angle and curvature, how much glass you have to see through and the angle can make a noticeable difference. For clear front and back view. A straighter window like those on a bus or pickup offers the least distortion while a sharper angle on something like a sport sedan might have more distortion and pickup more reflection from the dash . The curvature of the window also matters. It all depends on the curvature of the camera lens vs the curvature of the windshield. The closer match between the 2, the less distortion. But in general, don't count on reading plate at more than 20ft and often less especially for vehicles to the side in other lane.

b) The color, shape and material of your dash surface matter. The flatter the dash and the lighter the color, the better chance that you will get a fairly amount of reflection onto the windshield during the day and under bright sunlight. While you eyes tends to automatically dismiss the reflection. They will show up as bright area on the recorded image and may interfere with you ability to read a plate that's right in front of you.

c) The speed differential between the 2 vehicle. Speed differential makes a lot of difference. I would say that your chance of being able to read a plate on another vehicle traveling more than +/- 10 mph compare to you is almost nil.

d) Low light opens another can of worm. It's depends a lot the type of sensor, the angle between the two cars, the brightness of your and the other car's headlight/taillight, the color of the car, the color and contrast of you country/state's license plate, the amount of ambient light from street lights, buildings, signs and other vehicles on the road with you and how much reflection you're getting in combination,

All that said, some unit does work a bit better than others in some circumstances. 4K unit tends to let you read a plate a bit further away and a 60 frame/sec unit tends to have a larger speed differential margin. But compounded with all the factors above, the actual difference (being to read the same license at 25ft vs 20ft or while a car is travelling +/- 15 mph vs +/- 10 mph) is just not something you can depend upon despite all the caught on camera clips you see on Youtube.

 

[kamkar]

I have made a few videos demoing plate capture, but they are more or less irrelevant for Americans as your plates are only half as readable as our EU plates.
Its just for testing i do this as it can weed out a poor configured camera, but in general i dont really care about this personally.

But in general i only expect plate capture on the best of days, though some times i get let down too, only to find the next day with even worse weather, well the camera are again capturing plates.
I honestly think some times dashcams are able to choose unfortunate exposure settings, or its just minute changes in lighting conditions my old eyes dont catch.
Personally i prefer a "zoom" camera to the more distant captures, but you cant run such a camera alone, and you will have to make it yourself by swapping out the wide angle lens on a camera for a 6 - 12 mm lens.
I am eagerly awaiting worth while 4K cameras, and in general higher bitrates as i find all current cameras lacking a bit in that regard.

Most plate testing of mine go on at highway speed ( 80 km/h ) as thats pretty much the fastest speeds we have here with cars passing right by each other.
or i will be doing the 80 MAX most others seem to think the limit are 90.
And on good days both my front / side and rear camera get plate captures, or captures of people messing with their damn phones.