Smallest Ambarella Car DVR a.k.a. Mini 0801

Aw thats bad :( Please keep trying, mate..
 
JazJon said:
as soon as a WDR version in a similar form factor comes out.
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Gonna rank down my mini0801 as a rear-dashcam as soon as a cam like this gets released!
 
Tobi@s said:
Gonna rank down my mini0801 as a rear-dashcam as soon as a cam like this gets released!
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That's where I'm at now, the WF1 is up in front, 0801 in the back. Here's a multi-cam video edit where you can see the 0801 acting like a rear view mirror. http://dashcamtalk.com/forum/thread...-car-luckily-i-upgraded-to-a-train-horn.3299/

The Vicovation WF1 isn't really living up to it's WDR hype though, night is average at best. See video example in link above.
(Vicovation TF2+ WDR rocks though but then no WiFi and not nearly as compact))

I expect to move the WF1 to the rear, and await the release a "great" stealthy WDR cam up front.
 
A bit depressing reading the posts above as my 0801 has just arrived from China with 1026 firmware :(

Ok so I have got the No GPS No internal memory version, and I'm just testing it out at the moment.

What is perceived to be the best firmware for this flavor of the camera?

I don't mind having .TS recording if it means its going to work well.

I see most of the firmwares supplied on this site are for the Internal memory or GPS version.... what about NO meme no GPS??
 
promethian said:
A bit depressing reading the posts above as my 0801 has just arrived from China with 1026 firmware :(

Ok so I have got the No GPS No internal memory version, and I'm just testing it out at the moment.

What is perceived to be the best firmware for this flavor of the camera?

I don't mind having .TS recording if it means its going to work well.

I see most of the firmwares supplied on this site are for the Internal memory or GPS version.... what about NO meme no GPS??
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Don't get too depressed on what you read on here, some people don't have issues. They must sell lots of these camera's, if they all had problems this thread would a thousand pages long not 105 pages, and those 105 pages have been generated by perhaps by the same couple of dozen users. Forums such as this and any other support forum will be full of tales of woe, as people who don't have problems rarely have need to visit them.

Take a look on the iPad forums, and you will see virtually every post is about someone not happy with their iPads. Now Apple make a good product.. don't they? so why are lots of users posting their grievances and feel the need to tell the world they are not happy with their iPads. IOW it's typical across ALL forums. ;-)

Perhaps, it would have been wiser based on what you read when doing your research to maybe avoid the camera until there's 100% reliability across all the models, instead of it being rather pot luck at the moment, as there are many other reliable brands to choose from such as the Mio range of dashcams, which work straight out of the box and are ultra reliable, and I'm sure there are many others, though you have to be prepared to pay more.
I've found the 1026 firmware to be stable on 2 of my camera's, the other one is a more inferior product and I suspect no firmware will ever cure it 100%.

In reality these Chinese cams are built down to a price, with factories trying to undercut each other, and the buyer suffers as a consequence, I bought 3 of these and 2 work reliable while the other one does not, and as I stated in previous posts, I doubt very much they were made at the same factory.
 
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I recall this camera being fantastic, even to the point of being the famous Techmoan's everyday choice. The only negative was the TS format. There was a big talk about it here and also how they weren't able to get the MOV firmware working bug free. This may be a case of the factories rushing out a big firmware change to please us hungry consumers, complaining about TS and wanting MOV, before it was ready. Now they may still be scratching their heads, unable to master it and unable to go back to TS.
I too was all set to buy one, until the problems multiplied, so it's on to the Mobius for me. I, like many, are hoping and waiting for them to master it, because it has so many pluses and the form factor is great. SpyTec has theirs listed with TS recording, so I will write them to see if it's true.
 
GJHS said:
I recall this camera being fantastic, even to the point of being the famous Techmoan's everyday choice. The only negative was the TS format. There was a big talk about it here and also how they weren't able to get the MOV firmware working bug free. This may be a case of the factories rushing out a big firmware change to please us hungry consumers, complaining about TS and wanting MOV, before it was ready. Now they may still be scratching their heads, unable to master it and unable to go back to TS.
I too was all set to buy one, until the problems multiplied, so it's on to the Mobius for me. I, like many, are hoping and waiting for them to master it, because it has so many pluses and the form factor is great. SpyTec has theirs listed with TS recording, so I will write them to see if it's true.
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A valid possibility, but it doesn't explain why some work okay but others do not, one would have thought had it been just a firmware issue then ALL the camera's would be affected and that is not the case, I have 2 here that's worked perfectly for 2 months, while the other one has been a bit troublesome... Why ? and quite a few others have also stated that theirs has worked okay too. It's certainly very strange. However I do agree.. knowing the history of this camera that the switch to .mov files exacerbated the problems.
 
OK tested camera out now and when the card is full it falls over and no longer stays in loop record mode. This is with video or video plus audio. Errors are low speed card and io card error.

I reformatted the card and it works again. no errors.

The card is a samsung supplied by e-prance.

Firmware is 1026

Seems to me to be a firmware bug, and it falls over because it cant handle deleting a file or overwriting a file at the same time as recording and saving.

I'll try different loop setting to see if that makes a difference??

Has anyone got the original TS firmware to try it out with?
 
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promethian said:
OK tested camera out now and when the card is full it falls over and no longer stays in loop record mode. This is with video or video plus audio. Errors are low speed card and io card error.

I reformatted the card and it works again. no errors.

The card is a samsung supplied by e-prance.

Firmware is 1026

Seems to me to be a firmware bug, and it falls over because it cant handle deleting a file or overwriting a file at the same time as recording and saving.

I'll try different loop setting to see if that makes a difference??

Has anyone got the original TS firmware to try it out with?
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Sorry to hear your another victim of the recycling problem, seems to be happening to quite a few new cams at the moment, :-( IME the default loop of 1 mins is the probably the best. AFAIK the Russian Procam CX4 .TS format is the only .TS firmware that's available, but be wary.. it has not worked for everyone who's tried it, resulting in a bricked camera.(albeit temporarily) Personally, if trying 2 or 3 different class 6 or class 4 cards has not resolved it or leave the audio disabled. I would ship it back for a refund, and look for something more reliable even if a little more expensive, unless you go for something cheap like the Mobius.
If the seller gets enough returns they might start to do something, as it's obvious the one's that's coming through at the moment appear to still have issues when re-cycling, which has been the problem all along with some of them since they switched from .TS files.
 
One might also ask the question are those cards they supply genuine Samsung cards, as when one user queried the seller by asking how come they supply class 10 cards with the camera when the manufacturer advises in the manual that class 10 should be avoided, and they replied stating they were in fact class 6 but had been marked up as class 10, anyone believe that..lol because I don't. ;-)
 
Ive just looked on a Russian site for Procams and they too are suffering from firmware problems like ours for the CX4 since august this year
 
promethian said:
Ive just looked on a Russian site for Procams and they too are suffering from firmware problems like ours for the CX4 since august this year
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So basically you are saying..using the .TS format is not the answer either, in which case it only leaves one option, and we all know what that is.. send them back. :-(
They must have had a few good ones at some point as I notice 4 users so far have polled the no issues option in the Poll, and 2 out of my 3 work ok, so that makes 5 or 6 good ones..lol. I wish I could wave a wand and offer a magical solution but I can't. If your not bothered about having audio then that may be the best compromise.
I can recommend the Mio range of dashcams for reliability, well the 358, 368, and 388 models anyway but they are double the price, and not so discreet either. :-( Joklin also has some well designed dashcam models being released shortly, which I'm sure will be very reliable. IOW we get what we pay for, or in this case as many don't work.. perhaps not. :-(
 
No not TS format. apparently the procams ver 2 have introduced .mov format and suffering same probs as 0801's since some firmware updates earlier this year. I'm still reading threads and looking for what they say is a good firmware.

for example.....

Hello, Friends!
I have firmware for mini0801 - 20130922. Apparently, it is not much different from ProKomovskoy 0911. Now I think what card to purchase.
For the September firmware under MOV, 16GB and 32GB already rejected, but only the class of 10! In this branch flashed messages that 32 Class 4 and Class 6 16 draw record with no errors and cyclical too. Probably should take 32 class 4? What do you think? Perhaps someone has already denied or confirmed these conclusions?
 
promethian said:
No not TS format. apparently the procams ver 2 have introduced .mov format and suffering same probs as 0801's since some firmware updates earlier this year. I'm still reading threads and looking for what they say is a good firmware.

for example.....

Hello, Friends!
I have firmware for mini0801 - 20130922. Apparently, it is not much different from ProKomovskoy 0911. Now I think what card to purchase.
For the September firmware under MOV, 16GB and 32GB already rejected, but only the class of 10! In this branch flashed messages that 32 Class 4 and Class 6 16 draw record with no errors and cyclical too. Probably should take 32 class 4? What do you think? Perhaps someone has already denied or confirmed these conclusions?
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Ah gotcha.. so as far as we know the .TS option still remains, which is something I suppose, I wasn't aware the CX4 had switched to .mov as well, interesting they too are getting similar issues. They are right..in that some cards will re-cycle ok while others won't.
I've browsed a few of those sites myself in the past, but it's been a while. is that the one with English as an option or did you use a translator.
 
I used a translator. The new version is called procam cx4 ver 2.0

There is also the possibility that the new 0801's are also the same as procam ver 2.0 and the old TS firmware is only relevant to the ver 1 camera
 
promethian said:
I used a translator. The new version is called procam cx4 ver 2.0

There is also the possibility that the new 0801's are also the same as procam ver 2.0 and the old TS firmware is only relevant to the ver 1 camera
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You could well be right, if the hardware has changed in some way. That's been one of the main issues really, as according to joklin some of us may not even have the exact same hardware specs inside our cams.. dependant on which factory the sellers bought their stock Which might also explain why a couple users with recent cams had issues putting that .TS firmware on successfully, and were lucky to eventually recover back to a working firmware.

This is the biggest issue with these particular camera's, we are not dealing with one factory making one camera model, so we all have the same. There are different model versions, which are manufactured by at least 3 or 4 factories in China with possibly hardware differences and probably different levels of quality control assuming they have any at all...lol. and far too much conjecture with very little being really definitive... it doesn't help at all. :-(
 
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Lunar said:
I can recommend the Mio range of dashcams for reliability, well the 358, 368, and 388 models anyway but they are double the price, and not so discreet either. :-(
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Price and discreetness, those are two important reasons to exclude the Mio range off my list.
 
Lunar said:
One might also ask the question are those cards they supply genuine Samsung cards, as when one user queried the seller by asking how come they supply class 10 cards with the camera when the manufacturer advises in the manual that class 10 should be avoided, and they replied stating they were in fact class 6 but had been marked up as class 10, anyone believe that..lol because I don't. ;-)
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LOL, @ you thinking they supplied genuine Samsung. The one I got with my 0801 was knock off. When it died (not even 3 month old), I compared it with real Samsung I got on sale from Amazon (actually less than they changed for junk). Surprise, Surprise - it was knockoff without any doubt, you just need magic glass/loupe (~10 x ) - you will see the difference right away.
What they should have reply with: do not worry - it is class 6 knock off anyway.
 
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efoo said:
Price and discreetness, those are two important reasons to exclude the Mio range off my list.
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Agree.. not the most discreet and my mio368 WDR cam was £163 by the time I paid the UK government its £41.85 import duties...doh, and the 388 GPS version without WDR is £199.99
But they are made by a quite large company that's been making Satnavs for many years, and it just works without any issues at all, nicely built too.

It's in my wifes car.. TBH I don't mind paying the money for a decent reliable cam, but like you say it needs to be discreet, and few are as discreet as the 0801.
 
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