Dashcams!

Associate
Joined
6 May 2006
Posts
1,102
Location
Rowley Regis, West Midlands
Fitted a front facing nextbase recently, the following day the wife was on way from work on a dual carriageway and indicated to change lanes, as the van in front of her, approx. 4 car lengths away was turning left and slowing, she knew full well there was a copper behind her at the time. The cop, on his own in what appeared to be a pool type car with a single police symbol on bonnet decided to jump lanes and floor it, in an attempt to stop her pulling out...she pulled out anyway.

Said cop was not a happy bunny and followed her all the way back home to the point where she parked outside our garage.
The conversation went like this :
Wife : can I help you?
Cop : you do realise I am a policeman?
Wife : yes...and?
Cop : you were a bit close to that van back there when you pulled out on me.
Wife : no I wasn't but you deliberately tried to stop me changing lanes.
Cop : do you want to come and sit in my car to discuss this.
Wife : am I under arrest ?
Cop : no
Wife : well you can come sit in mine then (which he did...lol)

He then repeated about being close to the van, at which point the wife said hang on, I can prove how close I was, I have a camera......
She then removed camera and faffed around trying to work it (like I say, I only bought it the previous day) the cop said "let me try" at which point he took the camera from the wife and watched the footage, then changed his tone. His parting words were "we shall have to agree to disagree" so the wife said " I shall take that as an apology then" (she likes a row if you haven't guessed )

She was still mad when I got home, so I put the PC on and watched the footage through the supplied software, I had it set to record in 3 minute clips, so there were numerous ones on the card. By coincedence, in the footage, the van started to turn as that clip ended, the next clip that appeared was outside my garage. I couldn't understand it and thought I had jumped a few files somehow, so I loaded the files into windows explorer and all became clear......the two missing files had been deleted, as the files on the card were in numerical order and they went from clip 1, clip 2, clip 3, clip 6, clip 7 etc.

Amazing coincidence that the two files that would back up my wife's account had miraculously disappeared after the cop had handled it. Needless to say it won't be handed to anyone again....especially cops. :(
 
Permabanned
Joined
9 Jun 2009
Posts
11,904
Location
London, McLaren or Radical
Looking to get one myself... struggling to decide between:

- Blackvue DR600GW
- Mini 0806

Both seem to offer decent quality footage.

I have no interest in an in-built screen... and although the 0806 seems quite small, it looks (pictures) to be bigger than the blackvue.

Quality would over-rule... but I'd like something that will be well hidden behind the rear view mirror.

I like that the blackvue has inbuilt wifi so that if I really needed it... I could preview a video at the side of the road.

Price difference isn't that huge to make much of a difference.

Recommendations?

From reading... it looks like the blackvue doesn't have a polarising filter... but it's night time recording looks better than the 0806.

I'm not sure what the reflections will be like in the Boxster yet... anyone installed one in a 987 Boxster?
 
Man of Honour
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
100,345
Location
South Coast
If your roof is down then you may find, like I did, that on a bright day there's more reflections off the dash. It doesn't cause too much agro but it's there I guess. Hence why I upgraded to the 0806 with CPL filter.

Installed the 0806 today, shipped pretty fast.

A few differences observed vs the 0805, the menu buttons don't beep when changing settings, this is nice. There's a customisable LED for mic on/off indication or GPS activity. The LEDs are not as bright as the one on the 0805, this is good as it's less distracting at night.

The 0806 base feels a little less rugged than the 0805, it is slightly wider by the looks of it and comes with sloped plates should you need them on your windscreen and numerous clips and sticky pads.

The 0806 pads are black, yay! The 0805 ones are grey and were my only real gripe as the dashcam is visible because the grey stands out amongst my blackness.up there.

I managed to do a cleaner install too and closer to the rear view mirror as the 0806 has USB ports on both sides of the dock meaning you can orientate it either side.

dashcam_0806.jpg


I also like the screen power off can be set to 15 seconds lowest whereas the 0805 is 1 minute at the lowest.

Edge to edge the picture appears sharper at the same resolution too, I figure this is due to the higher quality lens the 0806 uses.

Fitting the 0806 into the dock is VERY tight though, the instructions say it will loosen up over time. I hope so as I almost whacked the rear view mirror off and hit myself in the face another time!
 
Associate
Joined
6 May 2006
Posts
1,102
Location
Rowley Regis, West Midlands
Bloody hell, that's a bit dodgy.

You sure your wife didn't press the backup button which protects the clips butting them in a different folder?

Nah, deffo deleted, the software shows "all files" or "protected" and the missing files weren't in either.


Do you guys leave the dashcams in the car 24/7 or do you remove them when you leave the car. I always remove mine for fear of some little scrote smashing my window to thieve it. Although my mate always leaves his clipped in place but saying that, he does the same with his sat nav....although he had the last one robbed when they broke his window, whilst parked on his drive :rolleyes:
 
Soldato
Joined
1 Nov 2008
Posts
4,413
Cheeky bugger!

Depends where you live. I used to live a real dodgy area of Nottingham and I wouldn't leave 2p in plain view of the center console.

Where I am now I'm wouldn't be fussed about leaving a large dash cam on view. Although the discreetness of the K1S is part of the reason why I got it, as at a glance it's not obvious.
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Jan 2008
Posts
2,923
Location
Peterboro, Distro:Ubuntu
I don't know what the audio is like on your dashcams but on my Blackvue GW550 it's absolutely horrific !

It's a lot better if you use the audio from the rear cam but there really should be a way of reducing the audio sensitivity without actually muting it !

 
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