Protection from vandals and police?

[Lemur15]

Hi, all. I've already gotten two affordable dash cams (G1WH and G90) based on some extensive research here at dashcamtalk. I quite liked them, but they both eventually got glitchy, so I'm in the market for something a little pricier and more reliable. Meanwhile, I have concerns about existing vandals and thieves, and a possible stalker, at my workplace. There are no security cameras facing the parking lot.

So, first question: My car power sockets both turn off while the car is off. Is it reasonable to connect a dash cam to a USB power supply/battery while the car is parked, so that it can still record after something trips the motion detector? (I imagine I'll need quite a spacious memory card.)

Second question: Assuming that the above works, what's a good camera to get, that will catch someone walking close enough to vandalize my car or other nearby cars? Preferably, I would like to upgrade to a dual camera. Something that I can easily swivel to record police at the driver's window would also be good; we have fairly corrupt police.

If the first answer is a no, I might just use a wildlife camera, and other suggestions are welcome. I'd still like advice on upgrades. I'd be doing all this research myself, and not asking for help, but I'm not sure that I have time for that (given the possible stalker situation). So I appreciate whatever you can tell me.

 

[dash riposki]

Motion detection generally hasn't worked well for detecting pedestrians near a vehicle in most dash cams. You're kind of stuck with running cams that cover the areas you want 24/7, and dealing with the power supply issues. Most of the cams with motion detection or on standby with g-shock enabled still use an amount of power that it (Currently) makes sense to just keep them running normally, not on motion detection. So it you are at work and notice some damage to your car, you may have to sort through 8-10 hours of video. Not fun. The easy solution is multiple decent cams, but then you need to solve the power situation when parked.

 

[Nowuseeme]

Motion detection generally hasn't worked well for detecting pedestrians near a vehicle in most dash cams. You're kind of stuck with running cams that cover the areas you want 24/7, and dealing with the power supply issues. Most of the cams with motion detection or on standby with g-shock enabled still use an amount of power that it (Currently) makes sense to just keep them running normally, not on motion detection. So it you are at work and notice some damage to your car, you may have to sort through 8-10 hours of video. Not fun. The easy solution is multiple decent cams, but then you need to solve the power situation when parked.

Not true when it comes to motion detection. The Blackvue cameras work extremely well with motion detection. It uses buffered motion detection and I can tell you it works. Thinkware is another camera with good motion detection. Both work very well when hardwired.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

 

[SawMaster]

He said "most" dashcams and that is true. Blackvue is one of a very few where MD works well, but even then some have missed footage they needed with Blackvue and Thinkware in MD mode as has been reported here on DCT. When you consider that you're asking the cam to always record movement the size of a person nearby or larger, but to not record a small bird landing on your car or trees moving in the wind or clouds racing by its a wonder that MD can be made to work at all.

The only certain way to not ever miss anything is to have the cam constantly recording. The main problem with that is if you find damage, you will have to review all the footage until you discover which clip shows the incident. And you will have to find the damage yourself before it gets over-written on the card.

The second problem is that your car battery has limits. In my experience, most car batteries can support one single-channel cam recording for 8 hours with almost no shortening of battery life. Change that to 12 hours and you may lose several months of battery life. One way around this issue is to use a powerbank when parking, but that can be a hassle. Adding cams doesn't equate directly; ie 2 cams at 4 hours is worse for your car battery than one cam at 8 hours.

Third problem is with camera heating; in hotter climates you will need a super-cap powered cam that handles the heat well, which not all cams do. And of course you'll need SD card capacity large enough to cover the time parked with the SD card wearing out more quickly due to it being constantly written to.

I've ran my Mobius, B1W, and WR-1 continuously in fairly hot summers constantly with no problems. A 64GB card gives me 8 1/2+ hours recording time with these. I've noticed slightly more wear on the 2 different car's batteries but nothing major. I feel the tradeoff is worth the positive protection I'm getting. If this is a concern to you, use a powerbank when parked and keep the powerbank in a cool area out of the direct sunlight.

Phil

 

[Lemur15]

Thanks for all the info! I've never owned a power bank, so I just want to check: They seem designed to supply decent amperage (1A or 2A) for quick charging purposes. Do they work all right as a power source for lower draws over extended periods?

 

[Dashmellow]

Thanks for all the info! I've never owned a power bank, so I just want to check: They seem designed to supply decent amperage (1A or 2A) for quick charging purposes. Do they work all right as a power source for lower draws over extended periods?

I've tested 2 20,000 mAh power banks that were not brand new running a camera with a draw of 400mAh and the power banks ran the camera for approximately 50 hours each, give or take several hours.