IronSerif
New Member
Hi everyone - Long time lurker, first time poster here. Definitely far from an expert in dash cams but recently my family has been looking into getting one because 1. we live in Maryland and we see so much crazy stuff happen on the road and 2. we take a lot of trips to Disney and wanted another tool to help in case of any issues during the long road trip.
As I've followed this forum for awhile now, I loved reading about everyones experiences and use cases, and seeing sample photo and video (Thanks to everyone for your contributions). Based on everything I've seen and read, I narrowed down my purchasing decision to either Viofi or Vantrue. I reached out to Vantrue and they were kind enough to provide a S1 Pro for my review, so I wanted to share my experience with it so far.
First off, here is a picture of the packaging and products that I received.
Installation - Front Camera/Main unit
So I definitely did my research before even opening the box. I watched multiple installation and setup videos and read through other user experience posts. To make things a bit easier, I suggest others do the same and kind of map how how they want to run the cables. Based on other user recommendations, I decided to put the Vantrue S1 pro on the passenger side of my Honda Pilot 2018. This unit is a great size and really isn't a distraction for the driver when placed in this location, as you can see in the below picture:
Vantrue includes everything you need, as well as this little tool to help you lift up pieces of trim so you can run the cables. As others have mentioned before, this is probably the most time consuming part and it's up to each user on how much time and effort they will want to spend.
For the power cable, it's actually attached to a dedicated car charger, which has a USB port bypass, as you can see in this next picture. Also, there is plenty of cable length here to work with. I actually tucked more in the trim on the passenger side, and left a little bit of slack just in case.
Installation - Rear camera
I think the rear camera installation and cable routing is where you'll spend a bit more time. At first I thought about running the rear cable through the rubber hose on the rear lift, but instead opted to mount the camera right above the rear glass and have the cable come out of the trim instead of running it through the rubber hose. This didn't cause any issues so I decided to leave it this way and so far have been happy with it. Again I think it's user preference on how they want to run the cable, so do what you're comfortable with and what works for you. Here's a picture of the rear camera mounted and the USB cable coming out of the trim:
Also, the length of the rear camera cable is beyond sufficient. I had PLENTY of left to work with, and again, this is installed in a Honda Pilot 2018, so if you're installing in a sedan or a smaller car you will have no worries in terms of cable length. If anything you'll try to figure out how to hide the excess cable, but it's definitely a case of having more is better.
Total installation time was around 35 minutes, so not bad at all! This was my first time installing a dashcam and running cable in this Pilot, so if you're used to do this you could probably shave off some time, but setting aside 45 minutes should be more than sufficient to install a front and rear dashcam unit.
Vantrue Phone App
The app and interface is very user friendly and very easy to understand. In terms of connecting the phone to the S1 Pro unit, it's a very easy process. The app walks you through making the connection, and the screen on the S1 Pro will let you know that it's in connection mode with a phone. Once the app was installed and my phone (Galaxy Fold5) was connected to the S1 Pro, I was quickly able to view a live stream of the camera's and also able to take photos and download previously saved videos.
In terms of settings, I kept everything set to default out of the box. There's definitely plenty of options here to tinker with, but I wanted to see how things worked out of the box and was very impressed how it all just worked as expected. I've read some horror stories from other users of different brands, but none of those existed here.
Videos
Posted some videos as follow-up comments below.
As a new dashcam user, I don't have anything to compare the S1 Pro to first hand but I've been very happy with the quality of this dashcam and ease of use.
And finally, big thanks goes out to Vantrue for this opportunity and big thanks to this community and all of the members for the posts and information you all share. Like I said earlier, I've been a long time lurker and have loved reading all of the posts and interactions here!
As I've followed this forum for awhile now, I loved reading about everyones experiences and use cases, and seeing sample photo and video (Thanks to everyone for your contributions). Based on everything I've seen and read, I narrowed down my purchasing decision to either Viofi or Vantrue. I reached out to Vantrue and they were kind enough to provide a S1 Pro for my review, so I wanted to share my experience with it so far.
First off, here is a picture of the packaging and products that I received.
Installation - Front Camera/Main unit
So I definitely did my research before even opening the box. I watched multiple installation and setup videos and read through other user experience posts. To make things a bit easier, I suggest others do the same and kind of map how how they want to run the cables. Based on other user recommendations, I decided to put the Vantrue S1 pro on the passenger side of my Honda Pilot 2018. This unit is a great size and really isn't a distraction for the driver when placed in this location, as you can see in the below picture:
Vantrue includes everything you need, as well as this little tool to help you lift up pieces of trim so you can run the cables. As others have mentioned before, this is probably the most time consuming part and it's up to each user on how much time and effort they will want to spend.
For the power cable, it's actually attached to a dedicated car charger, which has a USB port bypass, as you can see in this next picture. Also, there is plenty of cable length here to work with. I actually tucked more in the trim on the passenger side, and left a little bit of slack just in case.
Installation - Rear camera
I think the rear camera installation and cable routing is where you'll spend a bit more time. At first I thought about running the rear cable through the rubber hose on the rear lift, but instead opted to mount the camera right above the rear glass and have the cable come out of the trim instead of running it through the rubber hose. This didn't cause any issues so I decided to leave it this way and so far have been happy with it. Again I think it's user preference on how they want to run the cable, so do what you're comfortable with and what works for you. Here's a picture of the rear camera mounted and the USB cable coming out of the trim:
Also, the length of the rear camera cable is beyond sufficient. I had PLENTY of left to work with, and again, this is installed in a Honda Pilot 2018, so if you're installing in a sedan or a smaller car you will have no worries in terms of cable length. If anything you'll try to figure out how to hide the excess cable, but it's definitely a case of having more is better.
Total installation time was around 35 minutes, so not bad at all! This was my first time installing a dashcam and running cable in this Pilot, so if you're used to do this you could probably shave off some time, but setting aside 45 minutes should be more than sufficient to install a front and rear dashcam unit.
Vantrue Phone App
The app and interface is very user friendly and very easy to understand. In terms of connecting the phone to the S1 Pro unit, it's a very easy process. The app walks you through making the connection, and the screen on the S1 Pro will let you know that it's in connection mode with a phone. Once the app was installed and my phone (Galaxy Fold5) was connected to the S1 Pro, I was quickly able to view a live stream of the camera's and also able to take photos and download previously saved videos.
In terms of settings, I kept everything set to default out of the box. There's definitely plenty of options here to tinker with, but I wanted to see how things worked out of the box and was very impressed how it all just worked as expected. I've read some horror stories from other users of different brands, but none of those existed here.
Videos
Posted some videos as follow-up comments below.
As a new dashcam user, I don't have anything to compare the S1 Pro to first hand but I've been very happy with the quality of this dashcam and ease of use.
And finally, big thanks goes out to Vantrue for this opportunity and big thanks to this community and all of the members for the posts and information you all share. Like I said earlier, I've been a long time lurker and have loved reading all of the posts and interactions here!
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