Marcus 3 Review by Techmoan

Thanks for that - I've got to admit I'm not overly impressed by the 1080p/60 footage - the numberplate reading in the trees one is crap! It's a shame they don't enforce the use of a card that can handle really high write rates and then use a bitrate of 30Mbps or even higher as that should be great quality.

Some of the 1296p stuff definitely looks better downsampled though than it does at 2560x1440! I'm looking forward to cameras that can do that so I can see what my cheap Korean monitor can do :)
 
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After all the hype about the Marcus 3 I was disappointed with the video quality, especially the pixelation in darker daytime scenes. The video is pretty good actually, especially at night but clearly the A7 technology isn't quite there yet. Also, the camera is bigger and much less discreet that I thought it would be before seeing it in a real-life video.

It makes me appreciate the value for money being offered in the current NT96650/Aptina AR0330 cameras that are well built and well executed. For now, I'm going to stick with my Mobius cams and GT680W before investing in a high end camera.
 
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Also, the camera is bigger and much less discreet that I thought it would be before seeing it in a real-life video..

@ "... bigger and much less discreet", - this wasnt surprise for me. It was my very first concern when I first saw M3 after it was announced, especially makes it bigger mount / bracket design. Only with DIY bracket you can achieve more close to windshield installation, but even then due to M3 "vertical" design its never going to be less discrete than other horizontal-design dashcams.
 
@ "... bigger and much less discreet", - this wasnt surprise for me. It was my very first concern when I first saw M3 after it was announced, especially makes it bigger mount / bracket design. Only with DIY bracket you can achieve more close to windshield installation, but even then due to M3 "vertical" design its never going to be less discrete than other horizontal-design dashcams.

I understand. Somehow, in Techmoan's review it looked enormous to me, even more than I was expecting.

Edit: You are right about the mounts Niko. You would think that a company that put so much thought into designing and building this camera would have figured out a better way to mount it more discreetly.
 
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Edit: You are right about the mounts Niko. You would think that a company that put so much thought into designing and building this camera would have figured out a better way to mount it more discreetly.
Vico suction cup mount has always been huge. I don't know why. That is what makes it even worse having to hack and slash together something because of the curve joint used because of the way the Marcus 3 mounts. I wish they would have left it mounding ontop like the WF1 and TF2.
 
Vico suction cup mount has always been huge. I don't know why. That is what makes it even worse having to hack and slash together something because of the curve joint used because of the way the Marcus 3 mounts. I wish they would have left it mounding ontop like the WF1 and TF2.

I'll bet there's a separate group within the company that designs the camera and another that designs the mounting system. It's like the Dilbert comic strip! :)
 
I'm beta testing an upcoming 60FPS A7 DashCam that has a slight PQ edge over the Marcus 3 with it's current firmware.
Vicovation has a good history of improving PQ after a few months. The Vico-WF1 didn't live up to it's marketing hype until many months later. Vico then finally released a firmware update that improved the picture quality of the WF1 by leaps and bounds.

So again, I wouldn't be surprised if Vico continues to improve the Marcus line-up quality as engineer learn how to tune up firmware & learn new "tricks". (and as new Ambarella SDK updates become available)
 
Vico suction cup mount has always been huge. I don't know why. That is what makes it even worse having to hack and slash together something because of the curve joint used because of the way the Marcus 3 mounts. I wish they would have left it mounding ontop like the WF1 and TF2.
Looking at the camera itself, it's a great size. Add in the mounts and all the wires sticking out the side and it makes it quite difficult to conceal. It seems as if they ran out of time and just put out what they had at that moment. It doesn't seem very polished. A $300 camera with a vibrating filter?
 
Vico suction cup mount has always been huge. I don't know why. That is what makes it even worse having to hack and slash together something because of the curve joint used because of the way the Marcus 3 mounts. I wish they would have left it mounding ontop like the WF1 and TF2.

Even original smallest Vico WF1 mount for me was too big, so I had to DIY low profile.

M3 or whole Vico range could do something like this:

http://dashcamtalk.com/forum/thread...n-mount-for-many-dashcams-incl-vico-wf1.5199/
 
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I'll bet there's a separate group within the company that designs the camera and another that designs the mounting system. It's like the Dilbert comic strip! :)

I wish I could work in any of the group who is involved with design of main unit or mounts, I like thinking practically and outside the box. But Vico is not manufacturer, they buy whats available on the market. I respect their team efforts in polishing up firmware, but not fully understand concept of why they have chosen such a bulky design approach ? Maybe their main market target is local one, not western ? ... who knows.
 
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I'm beta testing an upcoming 60FPS A7 DashCam that has a slight PQ edge over the Marcus 3 with it's current firmware.
Vicovation has a good history of improving PQ after a few months. The Vico-WF1 didn't live up to it's marketing hype until many months later. Vico then finally released a firmware update that improved the picture quality of the WF1 by leaps and bounds.

So again, I wouldn't be surprised if Vico continues to improve the Marcus line-up quality as engineer learn how to tune up firmware & learn new "tricks". (and as new Ambarella SDK updates become available)

Totally agree. Based on WF1 experience I have, I can say Vico did and doing very good job, they are dedicated to what their do and I am sure sooner or later they will polish-up M3 formware to perfection.
 
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