Dash Cam?

[jester3681]

I've been thinking about getting a dash cam for quite some time now. Anyone have one or know someone who has?

I drive in Columbus and have opportunities almost daily to total my car that are prevented only by that Ohio is a shared responsibility state and I know that it would be my word against the other driver. I think a dash cam would solve that (as long as I'm not at fault, of course). I just wonder how effective they would be when it came to a citation or insurance investigation.

I kind of take it for granted working on the railroad where all the locomotives (mostly) have a camera and sometimes have to catch myself when I'm driving because I forget my car doesn't.

Thoughts?

[TheBrown57]

Scruit in 3...2...1

[Casper]

Ohio is a shared responsibility state? Eh?

[Casper]

Scruit in 3...2...1

I bet Scruit has a camera on his lawnmower.

[jester3681]

Ohio is a shared responsibility state? Eh?

Pretty sure? I could be wrong, but I thought we were.

[Moto-Brian]

I don't think we are. I'm with Casper. If this is true, I missed it!

Why not just get a GoPro?

[Scruit]

I don't think we are. I'm with Casper. If this is true, I missed it!

Why not just get a GoPro?

Gopro has to be turned on and off each time. Guarantee you will forget to turn it on. OR will forget to turn it off and run down the battery. The card must be cleared every day or two manually. Not a long-term solution.

[Scruit]

I bet Scruit has a camera on his lawnmower.

Don't give me ideas. Under the deck, watching the cutting motion in slo-mow.

(Ba-dum-TSSS... slow-MOW, get it?)

[Scruit]

Scruit in 3...2...1

Sorry I'm late.

[Scruit]

I've been thinking about getting a dash cam for quite some time now. Anyone have one or know someone who has?

I drive in Columbus and have opportunities almost daily to total my car that are prevented only by that Ohio is a shared responsibility state and I know that it would be my word against the other driver. I think a dash cam would solve that (as long as I'm not at fault, of course). I just wonder how effective they would be when it came to a citation or insurance investigation.

I kind of take it for granted working on the railroad where all the locomotives (mostly) have a camera and sometimes have to catch myself when I'm driving because I forget my car doesn't.

Thoughts?

Simple:

Go on ebay and search from "1080p dashcam". I have three of these ones:

I got them direct from Hong Kong via ebay for about $150 each. My car, wife's car, my bike. Hands down the best quality and most reliable of any ebay dashcam I have seen. US sellers will charge $260 for these - you call if you want to pay the extra.

If you can't find one of these exact ones then just check fro any HD dashcam but beware of low-res that has just been upscaled to HD. Make sure it has a HDMI out - not that you'll ever use it, but confirms it is HD.

You also need a 32gb >>>CLASS 10<<< SD card from newegg. Depending on the camera it will be either a regular SD or micro SD. But is must be class 10 for constant full HD 1080p. 32GB gives me about 3 days history, and I drive/ride 2 hours a day.

I have a bigger commercial system in my car based upon the AverDigi EB1304MOB and 4 external cameras, but that system need maintenance and new hard drives every now and then. These cheapo car DVRs on ebay are so much easier to use. Plug it into the big lights and you're done. I actually installed a separate 12v outlet under the dash and ran the wires hidden inside the a-pillar and behind the roof liner. Cleaner look.

[jester3681]

Simple:

Go on ebay and search from "1080p dashcam". I have three of these ones:

I got them direct from Hong Kong via ebay for about $150 each. My car, wife's car, my bike. Hands down the best quality and most reliable of any ebay dashcam I have seen. US sellers will charge $260 for these - you call if you want to pay the extra.

If you can't find one of these exact ones then just check fro any HD dashcam but beware of low-res that has just been upscaled to HD. Make sure it has a HDMI out - not that you'll ever use it, but confirms it is HD.

You also need a 32gb >>>CLASS 10<<< SD card from newegg. Depending on the camera it will be either a regular SD or micro SD. But is must be class 10 for constant full HD 1080p. 32GB gives me about 3 days history, and I drive/ride 2 hours a day.

I have a bigger commercial system in my car based upon the AverDigi EB1304MOB and 4 external cameras, but that system need maintenance and new hard drives every now and then. These cheapo car DVRs on ebay are so much easier to use. Plug it into the big lights and you're done. I actually installed a separate 12v outlet under the dash and ran the wires hidden inside the a-pillar and behind the roof liner. Cleaner look.

I'll look into these - figure about $200 for the camera and card? Thanks for the info!

[Scruit]

I just bought one today from ebay for $91.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/261082993510

$30 for the microSD card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=0DF-0005-00029

$130 total. For full fully automatic HD dashcam. At that price we should all have them.

[SWing'R]

I've been thinking about getting a dash cam for quite some time now. Anyone have one or know someone who has?

I have one and I love it. I have this unit... http://www.videodashcam.com/full-720p-vehicle-dvr/

You can see some of the video from it here while mounted in our car...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCUB4Kvlk9Q&list=UUJP7J9xMXxkKlbcxn4l70VQ&index=9&feature=plcp

Here it is mounted on my bike...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWH2eji1ZZc&feature=relmfu

Edited September 8, 2012 by SWing'R

[idodishez]

I just bought one today from ebay for $91.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/261082993510

$30 for the microSD card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=0DF-0005-00029

$130 total. For full fully automatic HD dashcam. At that price we should all have them.

How is it triggered to start and stop?

Nobama 2012

[Gump]

And how do you clear it or know its full when there is absolutely nothing on the vid you want. Be nice if I just just kept recording and erasing it self or blinked or something.

[SWing'R]

How is it triggered to start and stop?

Mine starts recording automatically when power is applied via the power cord and stops when power is removed.

If you are using it on the internal battery you need to stat/stop it manually.

And how do you clear it or know its full when there is absolutely nothing on the vid you want. Be nice if I just just kept recording and erasing it self or blinked or something.

Mine will keep recording and start erasing the oldest videos as it needs room.

However, the 32g sd card holds over 9hrs of video so I almost never have that happen.

If I want to erase it manually you can do so from the menu or pull out the card and stick in your pc and delete all the files.

[InyaAzz]

I just bought one today from ebay for $91.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/261082993510

$30 for the microSD card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=0DF-0005-00029

$130 total. For full fully automatic HD dashcam. At that price we should all have them.

Please give us a short review when you try it out. I've been wanting to mount one for a while now.

[Scruit]

How is it triggered to start and stop?

Nobama 2012

It plugs into the 12v outlet / cig lighter. The outlet turns on and off with the ignition.

If your 12v outlet is always-on then go to the auto parts store and buy a spare outlet and wire it up under the dash to an ignition-switched source.

[Scruit]

And how do you clear it or know its full when there is absolutely nothing on the vid you want. Be nice if I just just kept recording and erasing it self or blinked or something.

Cycle record. It records videos are 2 minutes long. When the car is full it automatically deletes the oldest video when it starts a new one.

[Scruit]

Please give us a short review when you try it out. I've been wanting to mount one for a while now.

It rocks.

The video and sound quality are almost as good as a GoPro:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAcpbQ1e4j4

The power source is a mini-usb plug. If you plug the USB into a computer it will go into a file transfer mode where it simply presents the SD car to you computer as a removable drive. you can get the same effect by taking the microSD card out of the camera and plugging it into your computer. (I carry a microSD to SD adapter and an SD-USB adapter in the car/on the bike so I can take the microsd card out and plug it in anywhere to view the video.

The camera records to the microSD car as a series of 2-minute AVI/MP4 (depending on precise model) videos. VERY easy to put in any computer and view without special software.

The camera has all the core dashcam features - auto start, auto stop, cycle record. It also has a GPS chip inside and a G-load sensor. The GPS and G-Load sensors are used to keep a data file containing speed/course/location data. You can play back just the video file in your normal video player or you can use the proprietary player which will read the GPS/GLoad data and present you with a screen that includes a "realtime" map with speed and G-load data. Neat feature, but not one I have yet to use fully. I can see the value in an accident if you wish to show the magnitude of a crash (I rear-ended the guy and he's suing for injuries, but the G-load sensor shows only a 2G impact... Or the guy who rear-ended you says the impact was "just a slight brush" but the G-load says it was over 10G), or if the location of the crash is in dispute and the video itself does not show the location well enough. I'm sure the value will present itself one day, so I have the data tracking turned on. If nothing else it serves to confirm the on-video speed readout.

The G-Load sensor can be set to always keep videos where the g-load was high (theoretically it will never overwrite a crash video) but I found this feature to be difficult to tune...

- If you set the g-load threshold too high and it will not mark the crash videos

- If you set it too low and it will mark too many videos and eventually stop marking them (there is a limit to how may you can mark).

- The vibration on a motorcycle presents a high natural g-load that confuses the sensor.

- 99.9% of the interesting stuff I save the videos from do NOT involve a high-G event. I get several hours of history so I have plenty to to recover any video.

In terms of mounting on a motorbike I give it a 3 out of 5. It does not have a standard 1/4" camera thread, but it DOES have a nice bolthole across the top that you can fab up a bracket for with relative ease. Most car "dashcam" dvrs use proprietary connections between the camera body and the windshield mount, so mounting them on a motorbike is extremely difficult.

I love this camera. I just bought my 4th to replace the rear-facing camera on my bike that has started l corrupting videos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKo-gRGTq8w

[idodishez]

It plugs into the 12v outlet / cig lighter. The outlet turns on and off with the ignition.

If your 12v outlet is always-on then go to the auto parts store and buy a spare outlet and wire it up under the dash to an ignition-switched source.

if I just leave it on 24/7 (to get any possible attempts at vehicle vandalism) will that cause any issues?

Does the unit linked to have composite out? (that could be hooked to my in dash DVD player for playback)

Can videos be played back from camera? Or do you have to transfer to a PC?

"I miss America"

[Scruit]

You can leave it running but you will come back to a dead car battery if you leave it too long. How long does yours last?

This one has a composite out that I have hooked to a screen in my dashboard. That way I can tuck the camera behind the rear view mirror and have nothing blocking my view. HDMI too.

The videos can be played back from the camera but the screen is tiny so only the gross details are visible. Direction of travel, direction of impact etc. maybe traffic light status, maybe lane position. Can also be played back via composite/hdmi out on your dashboard screen.

In-camera playback is a pain, though. You don't get good fw/rwd controls do you basically select your video file and play it through. Hopefully your accident is not at the tail end of a 5 min video file.

I carry a microsd to sd adapter and a sd to sub adapter. I can put the card in any pic with a USB port. I almost always have a laptop with me. If I could plug it into my iPhone that would rock.

[idodishez]

Cool. Good to know.

Bought this one. Looks like they've come down considerably in price. I could get 4 for the price of the one you linked to above.

http://ebay.to/1rd8cds

And if i get in a wreck, I'm pretty sure ill be willing to take the card out and put it in a pc for detail:). More frequent playback (directly from the camera) would be more for seeing if anyone's messing w my car when I'm not around, seeing people's reaction to my rolling political billboard, etc.

As far as battery going dead, I thought about it but I guess I assumed it didn't draw much power. I leave my GPS/radar detector plugged in 24/7

"I miss America"

[idodishez]

If I could plug it into my iPhone that would rock.

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&alt=web&id=251650047663

I have one of these that I use w my iPad. Never tired it w my iphone though.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[idodishez]

Have you used the motion sensing feature? Is it literal motion (of the camera) detection? Or does it look for motion in the field of view like a CCTV camera/DVR?

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