Hi, my father has said he would like a dash cam for his birthday. I know nothing about them. Can anyone please recommend me one?

Thanks

I was just about to ask something very similar!

Mobius action cam – wide angle.

It does not come with all those software showing speed, impact etc., just plain simple dash cam capturing good video clip.

😀

Budget?

What’s your ability to diy a 12v or usb power supply?

I have a RoadHawk HD, but I must point out that it is utterly, utterly useless. The sound is always 2-3 secs ahead of the video, it does record speed, position etc but you need to use their software to see it. Which would be fine if the software didn’t look like it’d been done by a first year student who had been out on the razz for the first three months of their course and they’d handed that in as their coursework as they don’t have a clue what they did with it but *somehow* lets you view on it. Ish. If you have an Internet connection.

And if you haven’t got an Internet connection, you can’t do anything on the software. ANYTHING. I only wanted to change from continuous 1-minute looping recording, to 30-minute clips with no looping when memory is full. But as I had no internet on my laptop in deepest Africa, impossible to change! Useless!

So, in summary, I am also after a recommendation.

These are larger than Mobius but they are good as my friend got the 402G:

The software comes with the map, speed, g-force etc and the recording is very clear.

Nextbase InCarCam 402G Professional

Nextbase InCarCam 512G (think this might be the latest version)

I’m happy with an older Next Base here. It had a fault, they fixed it quickly.

They need a memory card too, btw: or did when I bought mine.

Im afraid im not sure of what features he wants or needs. He is a 79yr old potterer who stands a chance of getting himself in more trouble with it than without! Something he can just plug into the 12v socket on his car and forget about sounds ideal!

He’ll need a rear view one then to record the devastation left in his wake. ‘Been driving 50 years, never had an accident’ etc… I 🙂

Do the cheap ebay things work ok? I got a cheap rear view camera for my van which has worked fine and been a great help. Don’t want to spend a lot on a dashcam, I’m thinking in the 15-30 quid range but no point if they are no use.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/E-PRANCE-Original-Ambarella-Recorder-Resolution/dp/B00F5WP990/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1437736460&sr=1-1&keywords=0801
£54 quid – good quality even in the dark. and that’s the most important thing. You will also need to diy in a 12v connection.

Lidl have one in their ‘specials’ this week;

http://www.lidl.co.uk/en/our-offers-2491.htm?id=601

Jeeeesssss, that’s all we need on the roads. First we have self righteous and angry cyclists posting up videos of drivers minor mistakes, and now we have the same thing happening with car drivers (yes I’m aware of the irony of me being self righteous about dashcams).

Where will it end, in a few years will we all have a small HD camera surgically embedded in our forehead to ‘out’ anyone who even so much as dares to sneeze in our direction so that we can sue them to high heaven or report them to big brother?

Personally I’d rather that other drivers were not out there permanently filming me and my driving without my permission. Not that there’s anything majorly wrong with my driving but it feels like a big invasion of privacy if you’re being filmed by some muppet everywhere you go.

You do realise don’t you that dash cams can be used just as easily implicate you too in the event of an accident, just as much as the other party, and after the moment of impact probably the last thing on your mind will be sitting in the car patiently deleting the last few minutes of recorded footage.

If you’re concerned about your fathers safety, might be far better to spend the money on a ROSPA or AIM course for him. That way he might never need to use a camera in the first place and the roads might be safer for all without another jobsworth dash cam Darwin award contender out there.

Unless you have something to hide, what’s the issue?
If it was your fault, what the issue with haveing it on film, at least you can maybe put off the constant whiplash claims, if all you did was a minor bump..
Also you obviously haven’t come across the ppl purposely causing accidents to claim “accident compensation” (no brake lights and just slamming there brake on in front of you.. so obv you fault).. this is happening more and more (I know of two cases with ppl we know, not just friend of a friend). Having proof to show your innocence, I’m all for that!

EDIT: PS the FiL got a Blackvue system, which I thought very comprehensive, though he tells me he had a fight with them, when the rear camera had issues.

Also you obviously haven’t come across the ppl purposely causing accidents to claim “accident compensation” (no brake lights and just slamming there brake on in front of you.. so obv you fault).. this is happening more and more (I know of two cases with ppl we know, not just friend of a friend). Having proof to show your innocence, I’m all for that!

Few and far between and sorry but if you get caught out by that sort of thing then you’re driving too close and probably not paying enough attention in the first place. Again an advanced driving course could help.

On the other hand I bought a dashcam after someone coming the other way tried to ram me. Funnily enough I met the same distinctive car a week later in the same place, only this time really close to my boot, and I thought ‘I should have bought two, one for the back window’.

On average, I think it’s more likely to save my no-claims if I’m the victim.

(edit) For the OP…

If you get one like mine, the setting up is a bit tricky. I suggest you add date and time for dad, and set the screen to blank after a minute or two, long enough to see it’s working. Oh and turn on the IR LEDs. I don’t remember if there’s more.

agent007, there are already thousands of cameras out there filming you “without your permission”, not to mention the satellites. No-one needs your permission to take pictures in a public place, any more than they need your permission to look at you. I’m sure as a cyclist there have been times that you would have appreciated people paying more attention to your presence!

I’m absolutely happy to be implicated if I’m at fault. It’s about having a reliable record of what happened, rather than trying to entrap people – how would that work anyway? If you are that worried about how bad your driving will appear on film, then I suggest you do something about your driving rather than complaining that others will see it!

And it was lessons learned years ago on an Advanced course, plus the benefit of experience, that saved me being rammed, as above.

I’ve recently added an A180(?) to my vans windscreen, nice and discreet mounting and quality is excellent.
One small gripe is it is currently producing a bit of noise on the radio which I need to solve, but at £40 rather than £100’s I can live with that and I usually use my phone for podcasts and music anyway!

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/B40-A118-Novatek-96650-AR0330-6G-Lens-H-264-1080P-Mini-Size-Car-Dash-Camera-DVR-/141665962429?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item20fbf309bd

If you are that worried about how bad your driving will appear on film, then I suggest you do something about your driving rather than complaining that others will see it!

Not worried about my driving, what I am worried about is the proliferation of cameras and secret filming. Feels very big brother to me. Yes there are plenty of CCTV cameras around but they’re operated mostly by the Police, the Council or businesses who generally have a good reason for moutning the cameras in the first place and at least are partially accountable for how they use the footage. Filming of me and my young family by private individuals though, to use that footage as they so wish, is a whole new ball game. I’m a good and safe driver but yes I do speed sometimes and occasionaly make mistakes. I don’t want those mistakes misinterpreted by some vindictive, self righteous pr**k and then plastered together with my reg plate across the internet.

I mean would you tolerate someone following you and your family around with a camera say whilst you do your shopping at Tesco’s for example? Of course you wouldn’t so why tolerate this whilst you and your family are out about in your car? Same anti-social difference whatever the reason for filming.

People make mistakes, we all do, that’s life, get over it. That’s no reason to film everyone just to prove to yourself, your compensation lawyer and the internet the odd occasion when you’re right. Sad state of affairs!

Yes, I would certainly tolerate being filmed in tesco, in fact I’d be very surprised if I wasn’t being. You need to realise that you simply do not have any expectation or rights of privacy when you are out in public. That’s what public means. Though being on Tesco property means that it’s up to tesco to decide, I think they probably prohibit photography by members of the public, but they are the ones who get to make the rules in that example, not random shoppers. When driving on a public road, of course people can look at you if they want, and take photos too.

Lerk, ta that looks like a pretty good one.

Guy pulled out into moving traffic and hit the side of my car, just aft of the rear wheel arch, damaging both cars. Obviously, I’m not as awesome a driver as agent007 but I can’t see how my doing an Advanced Driver Course would have prevented it. After some discussion, he claimed I’d pulled in front of him and that there there were witnesses in his car who would support that. I told him I had a camera, we’d see whose word would be believed, his family’s or my camera.
He backed down.
I’m getting a camera.

I’ve got one of these, superb at night but audio is crap. Best to format the SD card every couple of months as well. Watch out for inferior copies.

E Prance G1W

Filming of me and my young family by private individuals though, to use that footage as they so wish, is a whole new ball game.

You ought to be VERY worried about all the closet paedophiles walking around out there, with their eyes and minds. Word has it the eyes can see you and your young family in almost infinite HD quality, and it’s all stored in their minds for recall at a later date. Worst thing is, there’s no way of looking at their mind to see exactly what about you and your young family they’ve recorded or how often they’re accessing it. Best thing you could do is just stay indoors and bolt the front door. For the sake of you and your young family.

🙄

For the OP, Mobius Actioncam is about as good as it gets. This seller has just about every combination of camera & accessories, if you can wait for delivery from Hong Kong.

@ agent007 – muppet! for your comment on they deserve it.

There’s far too much of bad driving in fact just plain dangerous and potentially dangerous driving not to be filmed, i.e. needs to be filmed.

I was on an empty dual carriageway last night and we were doing 57 ish mph when a complete wankshaft thought it appropriate to follow 3 metres or less at times behind, the worst I have ever come across.

I as passenger wrote down registration plate and all info etc.

Going back to if you have nothing to hide agent007, I suppose if you’re asking for it, then you’ll get it!

Posting to bookmark the thread.
Just spoken to my insurance company, they said they don’t give any discount for use of dash cam. 🙁 Maybe the company name simply means they charge More Than anyone else…

As for the comments about everything being filmed, dashcams usually only record about 15minutes of footage before recording over it again. Personally I think all cars should have dashcams and black boxes as standard, that’d soon improve the quality of driving!

So back on planet earth after we’ve all picked our toys up off the floor , which is the best budget cam ?

agent007 is Smurfmatt and I claim my £5.
I’m still trying to work out if he’s a troll or an idiot.
Or an idiotic troll.

Lol at the would you like to be filmed in Tesco comment 🙂

My local Halfords had a big display of Nextbase ones last week, Inc this one link which looked to have all the bells and whistles for £150 and is a ‘Which’ best buy (for what that’s worth). They do fitting as well which seems easy to diy. Plenty of cheaper ones as well.
Would be interested to hear of any experiences of the Nextbase range.

Using this model for over a year with no problems.

http://uk.transcend-info.com/Products/No-498

Not expensive,good quality day or night and also sound is good if thats important.
Added bonus of iphone app to access it for whatever you want.

I’m having a Blackvue DRG380G fitted tomorrow after much research & discussions with a couple of accident investigators.

In my work I regularly see exaggerated & fraudulent claims as well as ‘crash for cash’. It’s becoming “normal” in the UK to take the **** when involved in an RTA from faking injury to claiming there were another 3 or 4 people in the vehicle. The way UK so-called justice works is, in general, it’s their word against yours and that is often swayed by a mysterious independent witness that comes forward at the 11th hour.

It was only 3 weeks ago we had someone deliberately reverse into a client at a roundabout then claim they were driven into – the dash-cam footage showed otherwise. The co concerned are trying to get that individual prosecuted for attempted fraud which may be possible with the video footage. If the authorities can catch & prosecute a few more of these t*****s then it may dissuade others from trying it.

Excellent advice chaps!

I have an older NextBase which has been fine. Except it once threw a wobbly, I mailed it to NextBase and they sent it back fixed. I was confident enough in their kit to buy a cheaper one while it was away. I may try it in the back window.

I can’t remember how much, but it holds a lot more than fifteen minutes recording, which someone suggested up there. Plus don’t memory cards keep getting bigger?

@ ‘the man on the telly’ – I have the 302. It was a bit of a faff to set up, it needed a teenager really.

Blackvue are good.

What sold me was a guy on the Skoda forums who was just driving along at 50mph when a plank fell off a tipper Transit going the other way, straight into his A-pillar and windscreen. Transit driver hadn’t noticed, kept on going.

It’s the kind of thing where by the time you’d realised what had happened, you’d have no chance of getting the registration. In his case, it was clear enough to read off the reg plate, he sent off the footage to his insurance company who had no problems claiming the full amount from the Transit driver’s insurer. No excess, no NCB lost, car fixed quickly.

I just use the Garmin VIRB from my bike. It mounts to the windscreen behind the rear view mirror. Battery lasts a couple of hours so I only plug it in to the 12V socket on longer journeys. Set it to a 20 min loop, perfect really. I know it records my driving but that doesn’t worry me as I’m a grown up that can read a speedo and leave a decent gap.

Have recorded a few clips of near misses but deleted them later. Will only keep footage if the crunch comes and someone denies responsibility.

I like the look of the Mini 0806. I think rumour has it that 0901 will be out at end of August this month but no confirmation yet.

Thanks slowoldgit.