Dashcam power?

[Tarrantdrake]

I will use a fuse with wire attached and the dash cam cable for the live has a in line glass fuse so all nice and safe. Thank you for the link and I will have a look to see where I can tap into once the add in wire fuse is delivered. Thanks again

[veteran]

wolfie et al,

I too have been thinking about getting a dashcam. Over the last couple of months I've been reading reviews of various marques/models and quickly came to the conclusion that the 300 and 500 range of the NextBase dashcams were the bees-knees, especially after reading Which Magazine's recent review of a number of dashcoms of various brands and prices.

If you don't want to spend more than £89, the NextBase 312GW Deluxe would do for you. But if you're prepared to spend £129, you can have the NextBase 512G Ultra (be careful you pick the Ultra and not just the plain vanilla 512G). On advantages/disadvantages, apparently, the 312GW Deluxe has GPS but the night vision is poor. But the 512G Ultra works better in that regard, is full 1080 HD, has the usual GPS, and also has an antiglare polariser. There's a 412GW Pro model also, at £103, but reviewers say its claimed performance (quad HD) isn't worth having. Thus, of the NextBase offerings, the 512G Ultra appears to be the best choice.

As far as I'm aware, the NextBase ones work off 12v and therefore do not require a separate voltage converter.

One of my neighbours who runs an Audi A3 recently bought a NextBase and fitted it. He tells me he had no problem doing it. He installed it on the windscreen, just to one side of the rearview mirror. Thus far, he's been very pleased with it.

If you look on Amazon, you'll see that the sales of NextBase dashcams are quite considerable and some of their models seem to get glowing reviews. Which's survey, which I read in a July 2018 issue of Which Magazine belonging to my brother, put all three of the above-mentioned dashcams at the top of their listing of those worth getting. I can't recall if the brands/models mentioned by others in this discussion came anywhere down the list, as personally I only ever looked for and scribbled down details of the best. Which are by no means the last word in product reviews but, as is said, there's no smoke without fire.

Do bear in mind that devices like these, which are inevitably in full view from outside the car, are targets for car thieves, when the car's left unattended in a public place. Plenty of car owners have had either their windscreen or side-windows smashed by thieves to get at the device. They're very easy to detach and are easily sold on. It's a pity VW and other car manufacturers aren't incorporating their own dashcams into the rearview mirror itself, and thereby making the presence of the device less obvious.

[wolfie]

As far as I'm aware, the NextBase ones work off 12v and therefore do not require a separate voltage converter.

I suspect you may be mistaken there. I bought a nextbase power-supply from Halfrauds to run my hardwired Viofo. It comes with a "mini-USB" connector, and I'm pretty sure "mini-USB" all require a "5V" supply. Now there may well be different versions with different connectors. But I'm pretty sure Mini-USB = 5V.

If I were you I would double check, I wouldn't like it to cost you a camera because of the incorrect power supply.

Just had a quick "Google" and the NextBase cameras all appear to come with a 12v/Cigarette socket type adapter. They are 12V to 5V converters. So if you do want to hardwire you will need a hardwire kit of some description.


If I get time I will take some pictures of my Viofo install to show how discrete the install is.

[veteran]

wolfie,

Following your response to my contribution, I've done some digging on the Web. (Bear in mind that, as yet, I hadn't decided 100% on which dashcam to get for myself, as I've been extraordinarily busy with a number of other, non-car matters of late). It transpires that you're absolutely right about the NextBase models - they do require a voltage converter, the input end of which needs to be 12v, taken from a suitable accessories connection in a nearby fusebox. There is, in fact, a 'wiring kit', available as an extra, that includes the converter. So, thanks for pointing that out. Had this topic not arisen and you therefore not corrected my miscomprehension, later on I may very well have proceeded with buying a NextBase but then found that it needed a voltage converter.

Looking online this evening at some quite extensive reviews of dashcams (in terms of sheer numbers of them, of various marques), it would appear that high cost doesn't necessarily equate with high performance. Some of the mid-priced ones appear to out-perform more expensive ones.

I believe I've a USB port in the lower part of my centre console (must check that out tomorrow), and I've therefore wondered whether that might be a convenient plugging-in point for power (since USB employs 5v). However, reading the Infotainment booklet that came with my Polo, VW point out that that USB port can be used for either data or charging power, but not both (it depending on the Polo model and the VW-intended function of that port). So, it should not be used as a constant source of 5v to supply to accessory devices, including say a dashcam. Thus, I can begin to understand more fully now why it's necessary to have a separate converter and that the 12v should ideally be picked up from a suitably-fused accessories point on the nearby Polo fusebox.

[wolfie]

wolfie,

Following your response to my contribution, I've done some digging on the Web. (Bear in mind that, as yet, I hadn't decided 100% on which dashcam to get for myself, as I've been extraordinarily busy with a number of other, non-car matters of late). It transpires that you're absolutely right about the NextBase models - they do require a voltage converter, the input end of which needs to be 12v, taken from a suitable accessories connection in a nearby fusebox. There is, in fact, a 'wiring kit', available as an extra, that includes the converter. So, thanks for pointing that out. Had this topic not arisen and you therefore not corrected my miscomprehension, later on I may very well have proceeded with buying a NextBase but then found that it needed a voltage converter.

Looking online this evening at some quite extensive reviews of dashcams (in terms of sheer numbers of them, of various marques), it would appear that high cost doesn't necessarily equate with high performance. Some of the mid-priced ones appear to out-perform more expensive ones.

I believe I've a USB port in the lower part of my centre console (must check that out tomorrow), and I've therefore wondered whether that might be a convenient plugging-in point for power (since USB employs 5v). However, reading the Infotainment booklet that came with my Polo, VW point out that that USB port can be used for either data or charging power, but not both (it depending on the Polo model and the VW-intended function of that port). So, it should not be used as a constant source of 5v to supply to accessory devices, including say a dashcam. Thus, I can begin to understand more fully now why it's necessary to have a separate converter and that the 12v should ideally be picked up from a suitably-fused accessories point on the nearby Polo fuse box.

Like yourself, prior to purchasing my device I spent an age looking for reviews on the various alternatives that are on the market. If I'm honest, I initially fell into the trap of looking for the cameras that had the largest list of features I could find. It's as good as an approach as any but I ended up being steered to cameras that were way above what I wanted to pay. I drew a line under that and decided on a maximum budget of £100, and I wanted it to be discrete and look like OE ( I have a pet hate of the suction cup mounts) Last but not least I wanted the image quality to be reasonable.

It's easy to end up buying an expensive feature laden device only to never use them. Initially I had a short list of the Nextbase 312GW, DDpai mini2 & Viofo A119. My first pick was the 312GW, it has a screen and Wifi so it's well featured, but when I saw the mount and how they "dangle" from the screen it got crossed of the list pretty quickly. That said in it's favour you can buy them almost anywhere in the UK. At the end of the day the Viofo won me over as it's image quality for the money came out very well, as does it's reliability. It uses capacitors instead of batteries internally so is more resilient in hot conditions. I had planned on simply getting an A119 V2, but the weekend I looked they had some great deals on the A119 Pro which has a better sensor and comes with a variety of mounts (suction and adhesive) I also splurged on the GPS mount. (retrospectively it was a really good decision as I simply leave the mount in place and unclip the camera when necessary) I cocked-up when I bought the hard wire kit as I bought it from Halfords and it cost £19 odd. Identical kits can be had off Ebay for £7!!!! That said it did come with a selection of piggy-back fuse taps that fit a variety of vehicles. The fuse taps are cleverly designed so that they leave the original circuit fuse in place and add an additional fuse for the dash cam. I simply selected the fuse that was the feed to the 12V socket in the centre console. (fuse 42 iirc???)

I fitted it all in about 1.5 hours. I've not fitted one before and did not want to get anything wrong or damage the trim. That said if I did it again I think I could do it in about 20 mins. I run it at 1080p/60fps and the images are absolutely fine. I'll try and post a video later if I can work out how to do it. The GPS mount also mean the video can display speed and GPS co-ordinates. While the device doesn't have Wifi, it's not been an issue at all, it far quicker to pop the memory card out and stick it in my computer or tablet than wait for a 64gig file to download over Wifi.

I'm pretty sure the prices have just fallen on the Viofo, as they have just introduced a dual camera device. So should fall within your budget if you fancied a look at one. (just looked and the price of the A119 Pro has fallen to £81.10

[veteran]

wolfie,

I concur with almost all the general points you make about mounting and fitting, but after subsequently doing some particular research on the Viofo A119 I remain unconvinced. The A119, even v2, gets a good deal of criticism in the reviews (at techmoan.com and on amazon). People seem to be experiencing a wide range of problems with it - sometimes it fails to record anything at all, or the whole thing stops working for good after about a year's use, the unit interferes with radio reception on FM, it apparently requires special-grade microSD cards (real mystery, that one). And if you want light polarisation in order to reduce windscreen reflections, you have to buy a separate polariser to clip over the lens. And the whole thing seems to be the wrong aspect ratio to me too, it requiring a good deal of space between the windscreen and the back of the rearview mirror for mounting.

On your Polo, where exactly on the windscreen did you afix the pads, and can those pads be removed from the glass if need be? Incidentally, I watched the author's review of the A119 at techmoan.com. A good review, but his experience with it doesn't match with those of other purchasers.

I suspect that the black-dots area associated with the rain detector on my Polo is a conductive mesh and that therefore it might well act as a screen against RF - in which case you'd get poor GPS reception if you mount the A119 anywhere near that mesh.

On the Polo, when you turn off the ignition completely, or you remove the ignition key, is all current draw removed on that accessories position? It strikes me that if that's not the case and some current can still be drawn from the vehicle battery from any add-on accessories, eg. this camera, you'd need to be very careful that the camera consumes virtually zero current in standby. Otherwise, you might find that if you only do short journeys in the car (as I do), the vehicle battery will gradually run down. So, with this A119, I'd need reassurance that 'off' really is off, completely.

Rightly or wrongly, the impression I'm getting is that the A119 has been designed and built down to a price, and as a result it comes with some baggage. You yourself have already taken the plunge, it seems. So, let's wait a few months and see how yours performs over a reasonable period. Presumably, you'll let us know?

There's a lot to successfully designing and manufacturing a dashcam with durability. Over time, it's subjected to extremes of temperature, and the video may be totally ruined by jarring if any of the vehicle's audio speakers are anywhere near the dashboard or A-pillar. Then there's UV bombardment of the dashcam's casing. Oh, and what about burn-out of the CMOS sensor when the camera happens to inadvertently point directly at the sun? To top it all, the whole thing's in full view and an obvious temptation for car thieves. Is it worth all the bother, I keep asking myself? If VW had been ahead of the curve, they should have incorporated a well-tested dashcam into the rearview mirror itself.

[wolfie]

veteran,

No worries, you like what you like, what suits one doesn't necessarily suit another. It wasn't my intention to try and sway you from what you like, just what thus far has worked for me. I hear what you say about the Viofo having some reliability issues. In the main they appear to relate to the early V1 devices, though there still appear to be a few gremlins in the works. I tried and failed earlier today to post a couple of images of where mine is fitted (I'll try again later)

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ZhUl0 ... DGhd3BU3xi
https://drive.google.com/open?id=19kGC6 ... UYwpcxW6V9


Couldn't get images to post but I've stuck in a couple of links to google-drive


However you guessed about right in that mine is tucked away behind the mirror so it can barely been seen from the drivers seat, with the mounting pad located in the dotted area of the windscreen. The dotted area has nothing to do radio interference, it's simply Vdub going cheap again it acts as a sun shade for the centre section of the screen that is not protected by the sun visors. Previous Polo's used to have a pull down visor in that section. Generally the rain detectors are an optical sensor. I've had no radio interference whatsoever. Though I have read about people having issues with DAB radio reception, however that is not limited to just the Viofo. It's probably more to do with folk using cheap un-filtered power supplies.

I think but am not sure that the aspect ratios of the image change a little depending on which resolution the camera is set to?

Depending how you want to use the camera, you can choose how you hardwire the camera. If you require parking mode to be active you need to find a live feed that isn't routed through the ignition switch. That is the mode that can give you issues with running down the battery, though some of the better hardwire kits have a voltage cut-off built in to help limit that. As you say the accessory socket only goes live with the ignition on, which is how I have mine wired. So off is off. I'll try and get those images up.

[veteran]

wolfie,

First, let me thank you for all the quite useful info you've been supplying. It's certainly much appreciated by me. I'm not being openly dismissive, I hope.

Your pictures were nicely available on the google links and give an exact idea of how you've mounted the A119. As for the dotted area, my previous thoughts were that it either purposely acted as an RF screen and/or it would provide some shading of the back of the rearview mirror and would therefore limit the degree of UV breakdown of the plastic. From what you say, the dots are not conductive and therefore do not in any way act as an RF screen. I see that you've mounted the A119 just within the bounds of that area, but on the left. Seems sensible, and there does appear to be enough room to accommodate the A119 in the first place. At least, that's the case on your Polo, which I note is a 6R SEL. From memory, I don't think there's a great deal of room behind the rearview mirror of my Polo. Can you look in the specn. of your A119 and give us the overall dimensions of the unit?

Am glad to hear that, wired via the ignition switch, off is definitely off.

From what I read, one of the common problems with add-on devices such as dash-cams and dash-mounted satnavs is that vibrations coming up from the road through the suspension into the front of the cabin eventually dislodges the device from its usual position unless it's steadfastly glued down and is rock-solid. And in the case of the dash-cam - any dash-cam - the continual vibrations cause blurring of the images. You'll have to let us know how the A119 performs in that regard. Also, ask yourself whether its sticky pad would have properly stayed in place during the spells of really continuous hot weather that we had this summer. Something else worth thinking about - and again this would be relevant for all marques/models of dash cams that are glued to the windscreen - is whether the glue would, in the longer term, migrate into the glass and cause a permanent marring of the windscreen. After all, glass is not a solid, it's simply a liquid of exceptionally high viscocity. A rubber sucker might therefore have an advantage over a glue-pad in that regard. Since add-on dash-cams aren't tailored to a specific vehicle, I guess the manufacturers have to make do with offering either a glue-pad or a sucker as the means of attachment. It's a pity that the device couldn't be hard-screwed instead to a small area of inner roof, where the roof meets the glass. Tomorrow, I'll take a hard critical look at my own windscreen and rearview mirror assembly.

[wolfie]

veteran,

Apologies for the images, I was in a bit of a rush. I'll get some views up from different angles over the next couple of days.

I agonized for ages as to exactly where to position it. I too had few concerns about whether when it came time to remove it, the mount would take the dots with it! After a quick google they are thermally bonded to the screen during the production process so removing them is all but impossible. (hopefully) The camera itself is pretty compact, it's actually smaller than I expected it to be. Approximate dimensions are (53W x 38H x 83H mm) Had I not decided to also fit the GPS mount it would have easily tucked right up behind the mirror, with the adhesive completely hidden behind the dotted area.

Using the GPS mount adds about 8mm to the height, so necessitated positioning the camera a little further down the screen and peeking out a little. I read up about the GPS mount and it is something I could have lived without. However, other than the extra GPS and speed information it adds, it also mean that the power connector enters from the top of the camera instead of the side, which makes for a tidier install. Plus as I think I mentioned earlier when you want remove the camera you can simply leave the mount and wiring in place.

As for the adhesive pads! They don't take prisoners, u need to get them in the correct position first time. Even through the summer we've just had it, it's not budged. In fact with being so hot it's helped it bond. The adhesive pads they use are proprietary 3M VHB, you get a couple of spares included. Plus what looks suspiciously like a length of fishing line to remove the old pads. I looked on-line and the idea is you slide the wire behind the pad to free it, bit by bit. Then remove the residue with some IPA. (As for will it mark the glass when it been in place for a few years? I can't honestly answer that one. I know I've had parking permits on my screen for 5 or more years and they always come off completely with a little IPA and glass polish.)

As for vibration I've had no issues whatsoever. The early V1, Viofo cameras had some issues when using the cameras with the GPS mount. One was that the connector between the GPS and camera would be susceptible to vibration and momentarily reset the power, also that you could occasionally hear buzzing/vibration on the sound playback as the GPS vibrated against the camera body. On the V2, the connector has been changed and they now come with a little foam gasket that fits between the devices. You also get a couple of spare ones in the box. That said I've not fitted mine and it's been absolutely fine. Recorded images are free from vibration, even on our pot-hole riddled roads. One point you need to be mindful of is that the camera needs to be positioned so it has a view that is swept by the wipers when it rains.

My one gripe would be that the sound recording from the camera could be better. It's not the quality of the sound, it's volume. When you play back the MP4 files I need to turn the volume up to about 2/3 to hear everthing clearly. I've installed a couple of firmware updates that were a doddle to install.

[Midinotes]

I already have the wiring for a nextbase 420 dashcam (mini usb) but I would to change to a Viofo A109 or similar. As it also uses mini usb does anyone know if I can use the same power lead wiring for the viofo as the nextbase?

Simon