New to this. Please recommend.

[blazer123]

Hi.

I have an Eken action cam I got from China for recording my fishing and occasional go-karting, biking, and a few interesting drives on my car through the hilly countryside. So I have experience with cams, mounts, SD cards, power banks, etc. But I'm definitely a newbie to dash cams so I hope you can help me out.

Here are some of the criteria I thought of and read about:

• Front and rear
• Turn off automatically when car is turned off. Will cam automatically turn on and record when car is started? Or have to do that manually? That's easy for the front. Doing it manually for back could be annoying.
  • Do some come with a remote? For the rear that would be useful instead of every time opening back door and turning on. On my Eken, I have a wrist remote with ON and RECORD buttons.
• Looping
• Max. SD card size - Probably not an issue since I'm guessing I don't need much. If I were going on a long trip I suppose 64 gb would make sense. But if the camera loops over, and longest drive is say 2-3 hours to the cottage, then I guess a 32 gb would be enough for each. I rent cars for long trips.
• 10 minute video files like my Eken action cam - stops and starts after every 10 minutes so I have manageable files to work with uploading onto computer
• Preview screen and playback- To see what view I have and go through the footage on the actual cam
• Suction mount and mount to clip onto mirror - When I use my Eken for driving, I use the bicycle handlebar mount and clip it behind the rear view mirror. Seems less obstructive that way.
• Good at night - Live in the city but sometimes driving out in the country at night time, like when at the cottage.
• Power cord - Long enough to run along the top of the windshield and down the A pillar of the car, then under the glove box and to the 12V outlet. And for the rear, I suppose that will have to be really long and run under the trim/panels along the bottom of the doors and up to the car battery?
• Can handle -20 degrees Celsius - Live in Toronto area so it only gets that cold a couple or a few times a year at night.
• Wide angle lens to capture as much as possible
• Battery Use - Will it drain and shorten the life of the car battery? Should I get a dedicated 20,000 mah power bank? Particularly for the rear so I don't have to run wires under the panelling of the car doors?
• Parking mode - Only need this for when car is at work for 8 hours in the parking lot (rear only) or for a couple hours at the mall (front and rear). Don't need it when parked at home. So is there an option on the camera to activate parking mode only when needed?
• Budget - Trying to keep closer to lower end than higher end as I don't have a lot of money to spare. Not a garbage cam but something decent.

So many to choose from so I'm hoping you guys can narrow down my choices. Thanks for the help.

 

[kamkar]

With a dual channel camera i would go for a 128 Gb memory card.

Auto start/stop - standard dashcam feature.
Looping - standard dashcam feature.
10 minute segment size, i recon so, personally i use 3 minute, the smaller the better in case of crash ( camera / memory card breakdown ) cuz the less you loose.
No problem, most screens are however small, but with young eyes,,, no problem.
Fewer and fewer cameras use suction cup mount, it is the less optimal way, and also most prone to shaking in footage if mount are not rigid.
IMX 291 are the best night performer at the moment, and it is often what is used in the front camera of dual channel systems.
Dashcams normally come with a PSU, and a plenty long power cable.
low temperature normally not a problem for a good camera.
Wide angle lens - standard dashcam feature.
If you drive at least a couple of hours every day you should be good, but if using parking guard get a BDP too ( Battery Discharge Preventer ) some hard wore kids have BDP build in, dont set a too low cut off voltage, foe people like us living up north on the globe i would not go under 12 V for cut off.
You can also use a USB power bank, many do that and its fine, just 1 minus you have to plug it into the camera every time, USB power banks seem to be problematic if used as a power reservoir that's always charged on.
A 20.000 MAH power bank i recon will give you 24 hours of recording with a dual channel camera ( parking mode )

Im glad you dont mention wifi.
previewing footage might be better if your phone have a micro SD card slot, i can even playback on my cheap Chinese win ce headunit ( 2 DIN / 7" screen )
Previewing footage and the monthly card inspection i find nicer in front of the computer, it take me approx 10 minutes to verify memory card integrity and sample footage on a 128 GB card.

No dashcam are set and forget, you are well advised to have a look at the memory card once in a while and verify that files on it match what you can recall having driven lately, focus on drive sessions not starting or ending in strange places, you like probably realize that you pretty much drive the same routes over and over, so you quickly establish a feel for where things are in a drive session.

i know driving to visit my friend ( 40 min drive ) to see me driving thru so and so little village on my route i just have to play file #7 maybe #8 if i have been slow or caught up in red lights.
looking at ones own dashcam fotage its fast to see how much a creature of habit you are.

 

[SR45]

“ I’m glad you don’t mention Wi-Fi “

May I ask why ?

I only have an iPad Pro and an iPhone 8 and I definitely need Wi-Fi to install new firmware.

 

[kamkar]

People often expect far more from wifi than it can deliver in dashcams, first of all horrible slow transfer speeds and second the smart features that run off the wifi and promise a lot but often people are let down.

Firmware update are normally done with putting the firmware .bin file on the memory card and then boot with that card in the camera.
you can often use wifi to do initial settings just fine, but once that's done, then you start running into problems.
Last summer i recorded some video on my action camera ( sjcam SJ7 star ) so to share it with the people there on a larger screen i choose to DL the video to my phone, but it was a very slow process one i had to abandon looking at and go watch some TV while it did its thing.

And with most memory cards today you get read speeds of 60 Mb/s in a card reader, so the 1 Mb/s at best via wifi are just stupefying.

Newer action and dashcams seem to be having 5 Ghz wifi too, and so i assume also much better transfer speeds, but that's the newest 2018 cameras, and as far as me go still unconfirmed wifi speeds.