Side by Side Comparison of: VANTRUE vs Generic

This review is more of VanTrue than the R1. I purchased the dashcam on Christmas of '15. 17 1/2 months before it gave me the blue screen of death. I really did not expect much from their "18 month warranty" as most companies now days find someway to weasel out of their responsibilities. After contacting Samantha @ Vantrue and a short exchange of particulars, she assured me they would honor their warranty. I am now using a their updated, albeit slightly outdated, version - the X1. It was supplied free of charge and in a quick manner. I am thrilled that companies like VanTrue are still to be found in todays business environment. I fully intend to do business with them in the future. (As long as they are still building the top notch product I have come to rely on)

I was very hesitant to purchase this dash cam, but it has exceeded expectations and I'm very happy with the purchase. It's got a lot of great features for the price and does everything very well. Plus their customer support is fantastic! I've contacted them several times both before and after I made my purchase with various questions and always got a response in record time regardless of the day or hour. I'm very impressed with this device and have provided some pictures to show quality. Note I blurred out plate numbers and road signs that might show my location and my windshield is a bit dirty so the quality looks better in person than shows up on the screenshots I took using video playback on my computer. So understand the real images and video look even better than my pictures suggest.Parking mode has also been fantastic. When I'm parked I unplug the device completely, it powers down, but the battery inside holds a charge to feel an impact motion and automatically turn on to capture and save several seconds of video. I've left my car for 24 hours and the parking mode still kicks on, so no need to hardwire for constant power.Pros:Crisp video captureAutomatically saves and locks video files when a jolt of motion is detectedHas a great parking mode that works even when the device is off and unplugged.Small sizeEasy to route cable along trimCons:Chrome accents are a little flashy (i used black grip tape to conceal it)I had issues with a 64gb sd card, possibly just my card, my 32gb card worked flawlesslyAll in all I would definitely recommend this device. great features including parking mode, great video quality, good video even at night, and fantastic customer support.Attached are several pictures taken at different times of the day (morning, mid-day, afternoon, and night) with license plates and street names blurred out for privacy. Also keep in mind dirty windshield and these are screengrabs using the video playback on my computer, Also attached are pictures of how I taped up my device to better blend in to my mirror and be less visible.

I have had the Vantrue R1 Pro 2K Dash Cam for about a week now. I first set it up and tested the highest quality, with sound recording, and the largest dimension for recording. There was a hesitation and skipping of several frames about every 2 seconds. Now this may seem like a dash cam problem, but it could be the 64GB memory card I bought with it, or my old Windows 7 PC from 2011, or QuickTime player it needed to replay videos at that dimension. The actual dimension of the video was way too enormous anyway, larger than my widescreen monitor! I played around with the many video dimensions by selecting a new smaller size, stopped sound recording (so I could sing again ;), but kept the quality at the highest setting. After trying several combinations, I can play the videos back in Windows Media Player,and fits nicely on the screen. The quality is very good, the recording and playback is very smooth. The lense is nice, and has no distortion / fisheye look even though it is wide-angle. I am very happy with the results I have managed. There are so many different combinations that can be tried, making it very flexible and easy to configure. The fact that it has so many combinations, means people like me who like to experiment can try many different settings and review the results.The mount works very well, and I like how easily the Dash Cam can be removed from it to take inside (just slide it to the side), while leaving the mount attached to the window. I don't have to fight with it, and I do not have to remove the tiny 64GB card. Just bring the Dash Cam in, attach to the USB port via cable, and it becomes a storage device, where you can then easily copy the files off the device.Several reasons led me to buy this Dash Cam. First and foremost, when I was searching on Amazon, I noticed every comment in the reviews was followed by a response from Vantrue. I like a company that is actively supporting their product. I also received an email from them with a few more tips. They try very hard to solve your problems and it has a great warranty. Also, there were many positive reviews, which is always good to see. A low percentage of bad reviews also is good.I am very pleased with the results, and will continue to experiment with the settings. It's been a lot of fun to work with this device.I have had this dash cam for 1 month now, and I am very satisfied with it. It works flawlessly, and has no problems looping / overwriting the oldest files. I bring it in every week or so and check the quality of the videos. No problems so far.One issue that I did have was when first plugging in to my PC, the driver installation fails. Unplugging it and having it attempt to reinstall the drivers works the second time. It did this on my work laptop also. But it does install the drivers and I can copy the files to my pc.UPDATE: Today, my unit failed after 2 months, only a red light would come on. I contacted Vantrue via Amazon, and Joe from Vantrue responded within 15 minutes of my submission (This was after 6:00 CST). He had me reset the unit (which I did not see the reset button on the side), and it is working great again. I am very satisfied with Customer Support when I get a response and a solution that fast!

The Vantrue R1 Pro Dash camera is worth every penny of the $119. The camera body is full metal and feels real sturdy. The window mount is all plastic, but the suction cup is amazingly strong. I drive a Jeep and hit every speed bump at full speed. With all the bouncing I have not once heard the camera come in contact with the windshield. The audio quality is not bad, but driving around without doors and roof on is noisy and windy. Anyhow, I did not buy it for the audio. The only CON for me is the User Manual. I am not sure if something got lost in the translation from Chinese to English, but it could use some more editing. The Vantrue customer service (Joe) was outstanding. He was quick to respond (Saturday night) to help me solve a problem I had with the camera setup. https://youtu.be/20Fsrej6YVM

To put it bluntly, upon testing this camera it KNOCKED MY SOCKS OFF!!! It has absolutely incredible clarity and definition. The lens angle is perfect and the camera is easy to use. I truly don't know how a manufacturer can put this amount of workmanship and features into an item that is as inexpensive as this one. It even looks awesome on a large flat screen monitor using the mini HDMI connector. You will have to buy a cable to do this however. I'm more than happy with this purchase. I also will mention that I had a need to ask the seller a question and my question was answered within five minutes! Just buy one....you will be happy with it.UPDATE: I have had this camera for almost 2 months now. I HAVE had some problems with it. Number One: It gets VERY hot even when not in the sun. It is uncomfortable to leave your finger on it. Number two: In my opinion the manual is bare bones and should have far more explanation and examples. Number Three: I just removed the camera to take some files off of it. I hooked up the usb and it says "USB CONNECTING" It has said that for 20 minutes now. I cannot get rid of it. I unplugged the usb cable and it does not change anything. There is NO way to turn it off since the battery is not accessible. No combination of buttons change anything at all. I am now disappointed in this cam.

I ordered this camera maybe 6 months ago, which was the previous version R1, and then switched to the current version, which is the R1-Pro that's replaced the old model in the same listing. I liked the older version because it took extremely good video for my purposes. Even going 75mph down the interstate, when I reviewed the footage, I was able to clearly read mile marker signs and license plates. Much like our own vision, the edges of the far peripheral vision were not as clear, but they were still far better than I expected at high speeds. Driving around town it sees pretty well across the entire 170°.My biggest problem with the old version was that the buttons and interface were somewhat hard to operate. I had to take it down and fiddle with it to do anything at all. The buttons just weren't user friendly. Thankfully, this has been fixed in the new model.The R1-Pro model that's listed now, I like much better. It has a number of improvements, three of which are really important to me.1) The video resolution is higher in the new model. I haven't tested it at high speeds yet, but around town so far it's great. This lens sees better than I do.2) The user interface is less clunky, and a bit more intuitive.3) They added a panic button. If something happens, you activate the panic state and it will lock the current file as protected, so it doesn't get recorded over when it loops around, just the same as if you've had it detect an accident.I need to fiddle with the parking and motion detection features. I turned motion detection OFF in the old one, because there was a delay, for example, when starting to move again after waiting at a stoplight. Motion detection I don't recommend. Parking protection I do recommend.Last thought - if it doesn't like your SD card at first, try using the device to format the card. It wouldn't accept one of my memory cards until it was formatted. Now I also like to carry a spare SD card in my purse. That way if there's a longer stretch I want to preserve (like on a two hour trip), I can swap the card out and deal with it later.Overall, I do recommend this if you've never had a dash camera before. It's a really good value for the price, it's easy to use and pretty much fool-proof, and the company's customer service people (at Vantrue) have been extremely patient with me bugging them with questions every two days. They really are very responsive.

Note: My reviews reflect the "value" of a product as it relates to cost. This item was shipped and delivered extremely fast for standard shipping, ordered on Monday received it Thursday. thank you Amazon and UPS. The camera was packaged as well as any other electronic device that I have ever purchased online, with maybe the exception of Apple Products which tend to be pricey (and worth it) so they can afford a little extra luxo packaging. The camera was obviously brand new out of the box with all accessories included. Note: the 12v automotive power plug-in connects to the camera via the usb port, some pictures showed the plug as having a standard power plug. The camera has a port for a standard power supply plug but I guess there is no need for it. Be sure to remove the protective shipping film from the screen and the tape from over the battery terminals before you complain about a dirty scratched screen or non functioning battery. I used a 120v USB power supply (available cheap from Amazon) to power and charge the camera in my home. I took videos at various settings out my front window. I prefer the 720p setting as it seems to provide more of a widescreen closeup but with the same field of view as the 640 setting which yields a 4:3 ratio like an old TV. There did not seem to be any difference between the 1080p and 720p setting. The video quality is more than adequate for it's intended use. The microphone is very sensitive producing clear audio and can be turned off. The complaints in other reviews about the instructions are valid. The important thing to remember is that you must use the Video Record button along with the menu and up down buttons and finish each setting by pressing the Video Record button before exiting settings. I purchased a Transcend 32GB class 10 SD card with the camera and it slipped right in and worked perfectly with no formatting needed. Connecting the camera via the supplied USB cable allowed me to view the .avi videos on my computer as well as save, edit and or delete them. As for the overall quality of the unit, I see no area to fault. Yes it is light weight plastic but do you really want a heavy plastic brick attached to your windshield. The case provides adequate protection for the electronics and how it feels in your hand should not be a concern, as if it were a phone or a razor. I have not tried the camera in a vehicle yet, but my experience with Radar Detectors leads me to conclude that the hefty windshield mount should be up to the task. I will update this review as I gain experience with the unit, but for now and for the price, Five Stars. Update 01/25/15: The night vision LED's only work at close range, I moved the camera around a totally dark room and objects had to be only a few feet away be visible on the screen. It would be best to leave them off for night driving and rely on ambient light from street lamps, vehicles etc. I did not expect much from the IR LED's so it does not change my rating and I doubt some of the more expensive cameras are any better.

I bought the 720p w/out card, and upgraded to the 16 gb card for more storage. After a considerable amount of time navigating through the Menu, you'll have the HD settings and Time Stamp figured out, and you'll be ready to mount which is an easy suction cup, and set screw. The Camera automatically starts recording everytime it's turned on (red light blinks), and continually records, in ten minute segments, as you'll notice on playback. It doesn't jiggle or move at all, and the battery is adequate to not need the car adapter cord. When you're done driving, and want to see your trip, just plug in the appropriate cord to your PC and the videos will start playin back in HD, consecutively. I delete what I don't need, and let the rest store. Copying to a File is easy enough, and I charge mine w/the USB cord to PC. This is fine product which dosn't cost much which may save you from future car accident fault claims, as the resolution is so high you can even read the license plates in HD record settings. The little flip down viewfinder is so neat, it even swivels, LOL I feel like James Bond.

Okay, now that I have become an expert in this camera's system I will leave my true thoughts. The Motion detector works great. Nice and sensitive. It will just keep going. One thing to note is that once the feature is turned on. Nothing seems to work until the device is restarted. I'm sure there is a timer. I left it outside for a short while. It gets a great pictures. Let's you adjust the line frequency. Tons of menu options. This device is fun to play with. You can use it just about anywhere. Super long cord on the DC vehicle adapter. You could have plenty of extension to run it under your dash or wherever. The package was put together nicely and everything looked brand new and properly sealed. Very impressed. I almost left a negative review because I did not realize that the IR Led function is turned on using one quick press of the power button. Viola! It's also flawless the night vision I love it. This thing goes above and beyond a car dash cam and I wish the peephole DVR we ordered had as many options and as good of picture quality and motion detection that this $15 dollar device has.The only draw back I can see thus far is having no option in the menu to choose any option other than 10 minutes for the recording intervals. The motion detection recorded 10:02 before quitting and then picked up something else about 4 minutes before I picked it back up and brought it inside. If you park your car anywhere there isn't going to be motion all the time you could spot vandals with this thing. My peephole DVR takes the same batteries (from old samsung or simillar flip phones) so I have a few of the and O am going to order some more. Love this device, love the person who programmed the OS and the idea is awesome. Better than a cheap radar detector.One more thing about this camera. It has a GIANT original SD card. I had to use an adapter for the 32GB Micro SD card I had on hand. Which shows about 38 minutes of video on the lowest resolution setting available 640x480 but surprising shows options all the way to 1280x960. Thanks to the designer! And seller!

I must say for $15.90 this vehicle DVR is well worth the price!!! The setup was easy, the mount stays stuck to the windshield and won't fall off with vibration or heat. At first I set it at 1280x960 pixels and set it to record on motion, audio on, and overwrite memory to keep it recording if memory runs out. At first I encountered the problem that this unit freezes at the highest pixel resolution, so I set it down to 640x480 pixels. Since then, this vehicle DVR works EXACTLY how I wanted it to work. Video is good at 640x480 pixels. Having it run on battery is kind of useless since you'll never know when it shuts down because of a dead battery. So I just leave it plugged into my 12 volt plug. When I turn on my car, it powers this DVR to turn ON and there is nothing else I need to do. The DVR powers on, I start driving, and the DVR will record 2 minute clips on every motion it detects. When I park and turn off the vehicle, it cuts off the 12 volt power and I either manually turn off the DVR, or most of the time I forget to turn it off and let it run on battery until it dies,,,but that won't affect it since it can turn back on once I start the vehicle. During daylight hours, while driving, I'll check up on the screen and usually always see it recording. Sometimes I may be driving slow on a straight road and it won't record if no vehicles are in front, but as soon as I drive close to a vehicle, motion is triggered and it starts recording. It's just a plug and play device. For the past 2 weeks I've just allowed this DVR to do it's job, then about 4 days into using it, a vehicle cut me off in front of me while driving on the freeway (no accident occurred so no big deal). When I pulled over, I checked out the option to view recordings, and sure enough, it caught the moment when that person on the BMW cut me off. No it did not get the license plate numbers, but personally,,, all I am worried about is catching an accident. Sometimes on a redlight, during the daytime, this DVR can catch license plate numbers if there is no sun glare, this DVR has even caught license plate numbers at NIGHT on a red light if there is no glare from my headlights. Overall I am happy with this vehicle DVR and would buy a 2nd one if needed. I give it 5 stars because of its good performance for the cheap price, but it DOES NOT look cheap when mounted,,. Now on the negative side: If you work as a Private Investigator and need to capture detailed events, while driving, then I do not recommend this DVR because the it won't capture much at night, and it won't capture much at a distance during the day. It is good enough to capture road rage incidents in good lighting, (if not too far away) and the audio will help out if an incident is captured at night. If you just need a cheap vehicle DVR to record accidents while driving, then I highly recommend this one. You can use the record button to push on a moment you just want to capture evidence for your records.

This is the whole reason I bought this camera for myself! While I haven't gotten the time stamp issue corrected, this video will be turned over to the insurance company of the person in the vehicle in front of me. This happened just yesterday evening! I actually forgot for a few minutes that I had the dashcam running! I think for less than $20 bucks I have more than gotten my money's worth. I have edited out the sound, because of the F-bomb that flew out of my mouth at the time of the accident! But sound is very legible, I could hear my radio playing in the background, and myself at the time of the accident. I hope this convinces someone to buy this if you are on the fence. Had this lady not gotten on front of me right before that intersection, this may have well been me, which is why I purchased it!! Both drivers were ok, btw.Update 6/24/15: I have had this camera for nearly two years. I had a few glitches with it, such as not powering on properly, or going blank. I just pop the battery out for about 20 seconds, then replace it, and continue just fine. I never had any further problems, it worked fine. I recorded a couple of more accidents, that fortunately did not involve ME! The video was copied and turned over to the respective parties. I placed this in my wife's car over this weekend, and she went to work with it. Yesterday, she left it attached to the windshield in 97° outside temps ... the entire camera melted under the extreme heat conditions and now needs to be replaced. After owning this for nearly 2 years, and capturing 3 car accidents, I will not hesitate to buy this again. Well worth the money, as inexpensive as it is.

Excellent place to start with a dashboard (or maybe home security) video camera and DVR. Cheap and reasonably good. Just to be clear, the 270 degrees refers to turning the camera around by hand in the mount; the field of view is 120 degrees. The instructions were so bad that I have regenerated them below.UPDATE: In response to readers, I'm using the default settings, And am getting about 80 1-minute videos with audio, about 50MB each and they are automatically overwriting the oldest on a 4GB chip. I have not yet filled a 32GB chip (24 hrs)!LAST UPDATE: l am informed that the menu on items purchased after Dec 3, 2013 has changed, so these instructions may not be useful for people who have purchased such units. Did I mention that these might make dandy motion- activated home security devices?Dowson Dashboard Video/DVR Operating InstructionsThese instructions are based on the actual menu settings of a device delivered in mid-February, 2013. The included instructions did not match.Switching Modes1) Press ON/OFF: (on the back of the DVR this is the international O+I superposed).2) Default mode is Video Recording; press "OK" (which is a round spot on the back of the DVR which lights up) to begin recording. Press it again to stop recording and save file.3) Press MODE to switch successively between: Video recording (red cam icon), Audio Recording (blue A), Playback (left arrow icon), in circular fashion.4) Press to turn OFFFunction KeysON/OFFOK- confirm mode selectedKeys below screen, in left to right order:MENU - choose a menu for settings, detailed below, and also leave a menuDOWN - go down a menu, or 4/3/2/1 x digital zoom while recordingUP - go up a menu, or 1/2/3/4 x digital zoom while recordingMODE - mode switching video record / audio record / playbackMenu SettingsVideo / System SettingsPress ON, press OK, press MENU, press OK, then UP or Down as neededVideo................Output Settings1. Size..............640x480, 720x980, 1280x720, 1280x9602. EV................+1/3, +0.0, -1/3, -2/3, -1.03. White Bal.........Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent4. Time Stamp........Off, Date Only, Date & Time5. Video Time........3, 4, 5, 10, 15 minutes (per file)6. Motion Det........Off, On (when On saves 2 min files during motion)7. Record............Off, On8. Night Mode........Off, OnAfter each selection press OK to confirm, and press MENU to leave one menu item for another and then again to exitVideo with Audio SettingsPress ON, press OK, press Mode, press MENU, press OK, then UP or Down as neededCapture.................Setup1. Size:................12, 8, 5, 3, 2, 1.3 M, or 640x480 (0.3 M)2. Quality..............Fine / Standard / Economy3. Scene Mode...........Auto, Sport, Night4. EV...................+1/3, +0.0, -1/3, -2/3, -1.0 (Exposure luminance adjustment)5. White Bal............Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent6. ISO..................Auto, 100, 2007. Color................Standard, Vivid, Sepia, Monochrome8. Saturation...........High, Normal, Low9. Sharpness............Hard, Normal, Soft10. Time Stamp..........Off, Date Only, Date & Time11. Burst...............On, OffAfter each selection press OK to confirm, and press MENU to leave one menu item for another and then again to exitPlayback SettingsPress ON, press OK, press Mode, press Mode again, press MENU, press OK, then UP or Down as neededPlay....................Setup1. Delete...............Single, All, Select (came up as Execute)2. Volume...............1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8Press MENU again to get the following:1. Format...............Cancel, Execute (came up Next Menu)2. Beep.................On, Off3. Language.............English, Francais, Deutsch, Italiano, Espanol, +6 others4. Auto Off.............1 min, 3 min, 5 min, Off5. Sys Reset............Cancel, Reset (came up Next Menu)6. Light Freq...........60 Hz, 50 Hz7. TV Output............NTSC, PAL8. Data Input...........Off, Set9. USB..................PC Cam, Disk Drive10. Screen Set..........Always On, 1 min, 3 minAfter each selection press OK to confirm, and press MENU to leave one menu item for another and then again to exitThe rest of the operating instructions provided make some sense, except Loop and Slideshow commands, which may be on another hidden menu. If I find them, I will update.

I ordered this camera several months ago and so far it seems to work well. The video quality is good both day and night. Set up is easy if you are willing to read the manual and spend a few minutes familiarizing yourself with the camera. I also found answers to many of my questions in the questions and reviews posted about this device on Amazon. I was very pleased with the construction and feel of this camera. The metal/plastic materials used in the construction of the camera give it a higher quality feel. My only issue with the camera it the cheap quality of the suction cup mount. After approximately a month and a half the mount gave out and I was unable to reattach it to the windshield. I was very disappointed to find out that such a great camera is rendered completely useless by something a simple as the suction cup mount. I attempted to find an after market mount, but could not find one that fit this device. I did order one from iSaddle which I was able to rig to hold the camera, but that required some cutting and a rubber band. After seeing some of the other reviews about this camera I see that the mount is a common problem. I did contact Vantrue customer service about the mount and was pleased that they quickly shipped two replacement mounts to me. I only hope they work to include a better quality mount in the future. With all that said, I would recommend this device to anyone looking for a good affordable dash camera.

I got 2 of these R1 cameras they work very well. I did however learn that it is best to keep them at factory settings other than the loop recording or the motion sensor. Mine I think came with the motion sensor already turned off if your don't and you want to stream all the time you should turn it off otherwise the camera will shut off if nothing is moving in front of it. One important thing I think I screwed up on is changing the video recording to the highest resolution setting for the best picture possible , I had a 64 gb card as well so I had plenty of memory. I think this caused my problem with the camera not to stream , it would stream for about 8-10 seconds at a time at periods but most of the time it would take stills every 2 to 3 seconds constantly. I had to return the cameras and the ones I got back I did not mess with the factory resolution settings and it is crystal clear and I have no problems at all. One more thing if you want to delete all files on the card while in the camera , they on coarse will be in the file named NORMAL when you manage to get to the option of deleting all files press OK, on the X not the check mark , this made no sense to me and it took me awhile to figure it out. REMEMBER DONT CHANGE THE RESOLUTION SETTINGS THEY ARE VERY GOOD THE WAY THEY ARE. hope this helps.

The performance of this camera has been as expected so far which is very good, many people have gone into great detail already on it so there is no point in doing it again.My only grip and is a big one is with tiny print in this products owners manual. You have to strain your eyes to read the thing which is really unacceptable for a product costing $120, that is why I gave this camera 4 stars. The red numbers under the screen symbols on page 6 are near invisible--they match numbers below which describe what the screen symbols are. Unlike other camera's in this price range that have a web sight to download owners manuals, Vantrue has none that I could find. I figured out how to operate the camera but don't like the idea that I could be missing a feature by just guessing at the controls.This is a recommended camera but the manual is lacking.

I ordered this camera over one of the dash cams on sale at Costco because of the huge 170 degree wide angle. The video quality is great and I also wants something that could function on its own battery when not plugged in to the car. I didn't really care about having gps, so that was not on my checklist. The two biggest negatives for me were super shiny front face that begs theives to grab it, and the lack of method to adhere suction to rough are on windshield around mirror. I was able to fix both to my satisfaction. To make the bright shiny metal less obvious to thieves, I purchased sheets of adhesive felt and cut it into sections that fit the curves of the exterior. This also helped cut down on the temps. Before I installed the felt, I couldn't even pick this thing up one of the hottest SC Summer days. To be able to mount the suction cup properly, I took an old glass camera lens and broke it out of the housing. I put 3m double sided adhesive on one side of the lens and stuck the suction cup to non-scratched side. It has been up a couple of months now and has not fallen off once. Both the camera and suction method have survived temps up to 175 degrees as recorded with my thermal imaging camera.

Excellent video recording quality, and because it accepts 64GB MicroSD cards you can record several hours of it even at the highest resolution. Small enough to mount next to the rear view mirror, and since the swivel allows you to turn the camera a full 360 degrees, you could flip it around to face you and your car occupants (or you talking to a cop) if you wanted to record that for whatever reasons. The wide recording angle (170 degrees) catches pretty much everything happening in front of your windshield, although such a large field of view may make it problematic to clearly read license plates of other vehicles not directly in front of the camera, despite the excellent resolution. Audio recording quality - if that matters to you - is also better than I expected from a $99 camera. On other dash cams I've owned the audio is usually muddy at best, this one is clear as a bell. The mic is on the bottom of the body, which probably helps regardless of how you orient and install the camera.A couple of wishes: Unlike others, I'd rather NOT purchase the optional GPS module if and when it becomes available - don't want my video evidence to show how fast I was going - so I wish the speed readout in the video could be disabled (instead of showing "000 km/h" all the time) without a GPS unit connected. Date and time only would be just fine, adding the license plate number will be a nice touch when they implement that feature in other countries outside of China. Also, I wish the camera looked more stealthy (matte black body) instead of shining silver, making it awfully conspicuous and visible from outside the car, which can be a plus or a minus - but mostly a minus in my view. I resolved the hard wiring issue by wiring a 12V receptacle - purchased on Amazon as well - into a switched source above the map lights' overhead console of my Land Rover LR4, and plugging the camera's included power supply to that hidden receptacle. From that point it is a short run to reach the camera just to the side of the rear view mirror, so all cables are out of sight and no 12V receptacle wasted.

I see that yet another glowing review has been posted since I got mine, which is no surprise. I thought I'd delay writing a review for a few days until I'd had a chance to get acquainted with it.Before posting, I exchanged some e-mails with Vantrue and have been very impressed with their promptness and customer service. This has also been favourably noted by others here.The unit is both heavier and larger than I expected. But it has a metal frame (=sturdy) and a usable screen on the back.Others have posted excellent daytime images, but here are some I took at night. (I seem to be having some issue with posting videos on Photobucket, so these are reduced-size screen shots from my iMac.)What impressed me was that even on a rural road at late dusk (9pm PDT) the faint dark blue of the sky was still discernible. There are settings for Day or Night mode. These images were all taken in Night mode, but I turned it off as I headed home and some detail was lost, but the camera still recorded in colour.The 170º lens provides a very wide image area with little edge distortion.All in all, excellent performance.So, what's not to like? OK, I do have a few quibbles - but they're not deal-breakers, just things that I thought could be better or different.The manual is, fairly awful IMHO. (I can hear the gasps of disbelief now- "A GUY who read the MANUAL? Are you nuts?") Well, yes, in a moment of weakness I did read the manual. There is enough comprehensible information to get the unit up and running- as we have all found - but it appears to have been written by someone "who had studied English." (Not, apparently, by George/Joe from Vantrue, whose English is good.) Now I will admit that this sort of thing is a pet peeve of mine. Manuals should be in clear, correct and unambiguous. However, they are working on a revised manual.You will notice from the pics that the vehicle's speed reads "000 km/h". This feature I believe requires the GPS unit, which at this point is not optimized for N. American use. But again, this is in development. Likewise being able to embed your car's license plate number in the footage. Currently this feature is optimized for use in Asia, but this, too, is being updated for N. American use. (You actually can enter your number, but it will be preceded by a Chinese character.)Removing the unit from the car, say for security at night or to connect it to your computer, is not as straightforward as I had hoped. The mount fits VERY snugly into the slot on the top if the camera, so it's best to unstick the suction cup and remove the entire mount and camera. (Unscrewing the swivel lock and detaching just the bottom section with the camera will damage the upper part of the clamp. Ask me how I know.)The enclosed battery is 220mAh and will only power the unit for a few minutes, so really only useful for changing settings if the unit is disconnected from power, or to provide power during the shut down/save operation if your cigarette lighter outlet is tied to the engine being on or off.As far as hard-wiring the unit into your car's electrical system, as some have asked about, it's worth noting that although this can be done, you still have to use the supplied DC-DC adaptor or equivalent since your car provides 12V and the USB input wants to see 5V. A smaller, less obtrusive power adaptor would be nice.But these are small quibbles overall. It seems to be well built, the image quality is excellent day or night, they have good customer support and they are responsive to customer feedback, which is not something you hear often. Works for me.

 I see this as a personal investment that pays dividends every time I turn it on.The $12 price was very welcoming. I was surprised to look at my first recording and it was actually really clear. The value here is very remarkable. I installed a 32gb sd card. I also purchased a braided USB cable instead of using the cigarette lighter charger that it came with.My only complain is the fact that the instruction that came with it was lacking in great detail.Overall, I am satisfied. I got my money's worth.

The only reason I decided to buy this camera was because it was under $15. I figured I couldn't go wrong at that price. After opening the packaging I was worried by how cheap it felt. It is made with very low quality plastic and you can certainly feel the cheapness to it. While it is cheap, I am not disappointed in the purchase at all. It captures audio and video just fine (may not be the best quality but I expected that). I tested all three video quality modes and decided to stick with the 640x480. I couldn't tell a difference in quality between the three; however, the 640x480 resolution captured the widest and tallest video. The two higher defs captured the same width, but the height was shorter. Also, you can record more video at the lower definition. I was a little worried that the timer showed only being able to record 1.5 hours in 640x480 quality with a 32gb SD card. It should be able to hold much more space, but I have yet to use it enough to see if it holds more or not. Other reviewers say they get over 9 hours which sounds more accurate, so might just be an inaccurate timer.The car charger it comes with has a very long cable so you can tuck it up through the roof and around the side. The suction cup mount works great and is easy to install and remove. I really like the flip down screen. I only use it to set up the settings and then line up the camera for the best view. I don't drive with it down and it hides nicely behind my rear view mirror.While the listing states it gets 120 degree site, I have to question that. When mounted underneath my rear view mirror, I cannot see the sides of my car by the bumper. If someone were to side swipe me, it may not capture that. It would show that I stayed in my lane so that may be enough evidence to prove your case.Pros:Auto records when vehicle startsAuto shuts off when vehicle is turned offAuto deletes older clips once memory card is fullFlip down screen lets you see exactly what it is recordingEasy to swivel and record police out the side windowCons:Cheap plastic (worried about melting in heat)Only shows 1 hour 30 minutes available on 32gb SD card (in lowest definition - only 30 minutes in HD)Not the best video/audio qualityOverall Impression:8/10 for value (price to quality ratio). It records video and audio and was only $15. Can't beat that!4/10 for overall quality. Plastic is very cheap and might melt in the sun, but again, it was only $15.I have no regrets with this purchase and plan on continuing to use it. I have no need for a better dash cam at the moment but may upgrade one day.

I was stunned to turn on this dash cam and find so many options. First you have the four modes of video record, picture take, sound record, and video play back.For most people the mode you'll use most often will be the video capture mode. This mode allows you to choose the video quality, IR LED on/off, loop record on/off, loop record time, sound recording on/off and motion sensor on/off. The most useful of these features is look record and motion sensor. It's pretty cool that the camera will record once it senses motion, theoretically you could leave it on this setting and never have to touch anything when you start driving. From what I can tell the camera also will not continue recording past the first loop until it senses motion again (when on the motion sense mode). The IR sensors on the camera do work, but they are kind of useless when using the camera as a dash cam... They aren't strong enough to see past the hood of your car, they do work however if you want to use the camera in a hallway or something. I haven't used the picture or audio recording features in depth but I can verify that they do work.The suction cup that came with the device is very strong. Once you click on to your windshield correctly its very hard to remove and provides for a very steady recording. I am completely satisfied with this aspect of the product.The two downfalls to this product (at least my product) are that neither the car charger it came with or the usb cable it came with work at all. I don't care about the USB cable since I have many of them lying around, but I did care about the car charger not working. I contacted Amazon and very quickly they gave me a partial refund to buy a replacement charger (I chose an AmazonBasics GPS charger since I knew my Garmin charger worked to charge the dash came). Since Amazon was so helpful and refunded me the money needed to replace the charger I am a happy camper once more.As other reviewers have said, the video quality of this dash cam is nothing special. It says it can take 720p or 1080p but I don't think that is true at all. The quality is definitely good enough to prove fault in an accident but don't expect GoPro quality video...Based on some of the other reviews I was stunned with what I received, everything on the device worked like a charm, and it has so many features, the device arrived with a screen protector on it, that was easily removed and it was packaged well in a surprisingly legitimate looking box with instructions in english (though they don't explain what any of the features actually do). I'm not sure if the shipped product varies greatly from shipment to shipment but I most certainly got a good quality item.I first tested this camera with a Class 4 4GB card that worked perfectly (recording in 2 minute loops was continuous with no lag between clips) and was able to record 44 minutes of "720p" video. Once I was sure I got a working device I purchased a 16GB Class 10 card which is sure to be even better.One final fun fact of this dash cam is that the battery used is the exact same battery used in some older Nokia phones the battery is the "BL-5C" Nokia BL-5C Extended Li-Ion Battery and I am able to record about 35 minutes of "720p" video on a single charge.I paid $22 for this dash cam $11 for a 16gb SD card and Amazon refunded me enough money to buy a new charger, I could not be happier. For the great price, this dashcam is perfect, it takes good enough quality to clearly see cars, buildings, roads and people, only text is really difficult to see. If you are looking for a dash cam to use "just in case" you have an accident, this is definitely a great low-cost option.Hope it helps!-J

Received the item the other day and plugged in an old 1gb kingston SD card I had lying around. Even though it only gave me 15 min of record time, I could not for the life of me get it to loop. Changed it to a 4gb Sandisk SDHC card from the camera and it started looping. Did the same thing with a new 16GB class 10 SD card and it also looped the recordings.For those who cannot get it to loop, I suggest trying a newer SD card to see if it solves theproblem.Some pointers that makes life easier1. The "OK" button is on the top next to the power button.2. to access utilities, press menu then press mode. Once you press up or down, you cannot access the utilites menu until you restart the whole process3. When you turn it on, the center of the screen looks like there is a giant light purple orb. This is from the IR lights, not a faulty screen.4. You can zoom in and out with the up and down button.5. "Continue" in the menu means the amount time you want the camera to stay on after power is cut from it.6. Be careful with the mount, the screws holding the adjustment pins can come loose and you can easily lose the little nut that secures it.7. I would consider putting one of those tinted screen protectors around the front of the camera to help with the white balance.

I thought I wanted a smaller one with no display, but the display is useful for setting up the options, so I am glad that it has it. I am satisfied with the size - smaller than I expected, and no longer am looking for an even smaller one. I wanted one with GPS logging, but now I think logging speed will be more of a liability than an asset. On mine at least, the audio sometimes blips out at times. It is not really 1280 resolution - realize this records at a lower quality than an iPhone set to 640x480 mode. Also it may not be a 120 degree field of view as claimed, though I cannot easily measure that. I am giving it four stars because it is surprisingly good for the price, but I am returning it because I would rather spend $70 and get an actual HD one with a wider-angle lens. My suggestion - buy it if you want to stick to $24 as it does work. But I am excited enough about the concept of a car DVR that I am going to kick in another $40 and do it better.

For less than $25.00 it does a nice job. I don't need a camera that costs so much that I fear that it will be stolen or broken. Has a semi wide fish-eye lens. I'm not looking for wedding photo quality, come on its only 25 bucks. Comes with car charger and suction cup mount, not mentioned in the description. Also comes with a cellphone type rechargeable battery. Plugged into the charger, I get over 9 hours of video (with audio) on a 16GB card. VGA quality is 640x480, so stay with that mode, because the other larger sizes that it records (D1, and SVGA) are actually not different at all. The SVGA 1280x720 is the same as the VGA and D1 680x480, but with thick black edges on the sides, video is not sharper. You may want to buy a different smaller sized window mount that has a "ball hinge". The mount that comes with it is somewhat large, but still fine to use. The charger wire is long enough to tuck under window trim and dashboard trim and reach the car's power socket. Not too bad at night time, so see the attached video sample that I made. The camera comes with infrared lights, but I see no use for them unless you are video recording your hood ornament, or if you use this device as a home security monitor inside of your house. Not a bad idea, just buy one of those 120volt wall adapters to plug your charger into, then attach the camera to a window or wall. If you are not sure you need a DashCam, but still want to give it a try before you go all out and buy a 200 dollar HD broadcast quality one, then this one is just for you. I like the home security idea myself.

Good quality videos and easy to set up. On the 2nd week of use though, the unit doesn't seem to power up correctly. The charging LED would be lit, but the unit will not turn on and record. This has happened 3 times this week already. The only way I seem to have found out to make it work would be to first turn the key ignition to ACC, then wait for the dash cam to power up and start recording, then to turn the key the rest of the way to start the car. If I do this motion all at once, it seems a 40% chance the dash cam doesn't power up to record.

EDIT - Seller handled the situation well. I am upgrading 1-Star to 3-Stars while the seller prepared to sell me a sample of the updated product without design flaws. Your favorite engineer will keep you posted on updates.DO NOT BUY! I am an engineer and this product is faulty! I would give 0 stars if I could! This camera has failed me more than once. Got hit while my vehicle was street parked and came back to find my bumper lying on the floor. Then got hit another time from the back while driving. Driver of the other car overtook me and turned through side road. If the camera was working, I would have gotten his license plate. The camera runs and shuts off by itself. Then I disabled parking mode so it does not switch off while driving and then this happened while it was parked (latest pic from yesterday). I saw the other reviews here and the company points to disable parking mode for the unit not to stop recording but please tell me what's the point of having that feature on this useless camera if it makes it useless. I'm definitely contacting my affiliates, the society of engineers and also department of consumer affairs. I have never posted a detailed review like this but the number of times my cars have been damaged. Wow.

I used the this item over the weekend and overall for the price it's a great dash cam. My biggest issue was the the suction cup, which I tried every method found to ensure it stayed affixed to my windshield with the exceptions of glue. After about 10 minutes, it would come crashing down. The picture quality was great, the overall functionality was great, but not being able to affix it to my windshield is the show stopper and not something I would like to deal with. Returning item and will be purchasing a different brand.

I gave a good review at first but now I am starting to experience minor glitches that are becoming more and more common. it has froze when trying to view on my TV and also it has gone into recovery mode a few times when started up. I'm just praying that if I ever were to need it in the event of an accident it will provide.

First and foremost read all reviews carefullyPros of the Vantrue R-11. Very good video during the day, fair at night2. Has the parking setting3. Takes good still picturesCons1. Will record and stop recording at random, no matter what the settings are. (I reset the motion part to record all the time and this has helped, so take some time to go over the settings and go with what works for you.)(Having it loop back with a 64 GB class 10 card still leaves many days of recording before it records over older ones.) (If something save worthy happens I just hit the lock button and then download it later for saving long term or posting online.2. Get's very hot just resting (speaking with support they are working on this part)3. Instructions are just about none existent4. Needs a good web site for support site.5. Would be nice to update buggy software.6.Worst part is what I feared, it shows it is recording and in the loop mode but after I needed to go back and look at something important I find out it has not recorded in 25 days! This is now in the trash. Im buying something else today.All in all it is not a bad unit, it does work and shoot good video without breaking the bank. I look forward to the next line that comes out.

UPDATE:Below was my original review. I still like the camera, but the license plate menu item is in Chinese with no English option.My battery won't hold a charge almost since day one.File folder naming convention is STILL confusing, have to browse by date created in WindowsTorn between three and four stars-* Owned for about a week, unit gets warm while driving to work under 70 degree temps. Unknown if it will become an issue come full summer* Video quality is superb* Transfer speed to computer is OK. Seems a device with 1080p should also sport USB 3.0?* Setup literature is hard to follow- if you're technically competent, just jump straight into the menu items, it's not horrible to pick up quickly* No matter what mode it's in when you shut it off, it automatically starts recording a new clip every time you turn it on. I've collected a bunch of 5-second clips of my knee* There's some strange license plate recognition setting in the setup menus. When you select it, you only have Chinese as a choice, then English format...huh? When English is the selected/displayed language for all other menus* I like that you can zoom while it's recording, set the display time after recording has started,* The unit displays a moon and star indicating night mode. You have to stop recording (pull over) and go into the menus to change it to day. Seems this should be automatically detected?* I work early before sun up, when I open the garage- all lights out, the camera infrared shows nothing 10 feet away on the garage wall. If I hold my hand or point it at an object in the car, I can see (pitch dark) said object within several feet due to infrared illumination. I don't see why they even put the things on there- useless.***Overall, this is a good camera for the price range. I hope the manufacturer sees this post and tells me there's a FLASH or EEPROM update that improves the functions noted.

I bought five of these cameras, because I need 5 of them, though in hindsight since I need 5 of them I probably would have been better off just ordering 15 of them to begin with and sending the 10 that inevitably wont work back in one fell swoop instead of three and four at a timein several sessions over several days like I ended up doing. But I am getting ahead of myself here....the point being that I bought five (5) in the beginning because I need five (5).So when all five (5) arrived and only one (1) worked, I was disappointed, but not scorned. I arranged for a return and ordered four (4) more to replace the four (4) that did not work, because I bought them from Amazon, and Amazon guarantees their stuff. some time passed. The four new replacement cameras arrived and I was excited, only to be let down again. All 4 powered on, all four displayed video, AND ALL 4 RECORDED SUPERBLY...for exactly 32 seconds before stopping recording and then refusing to recognize the SD card at all, giving me a NO CARD error message across the screen despite having a newly formatted 32gb card in the slot that was perfectly acceptable to record 32 seconds of video on just moments before, but no more after 32 seconds, evidently. I would suspect the card has issue, but not 3 cards, and certainly not the same 3 cards that work just fine in the one working camera I do happen to have.So now, I have nine (9) cameras, and exactly one worked out of the box. after the 4 replacements came, I was able to swap batteries between 2 of them from the first batch that were DOA and got two of them to work (leaving me to assume the originals had bad batteries), so with some fiddling, out of 9 cameras, I managed to make 3 of them work.Oh, and every single cord that came with these cameras is absolute garbage too. I mean it, more cheaply made cords and cables you will not find, anywhere, so if you are considering purchasing one of these cameras, remember to add the cost of a decent 12v power cable and/or a usb cable to the final costs, too. The little suction-cup-thing seems to be made well enough, and it stays where it is put, but I cannot stress enough that these cords and cables are a complete waste of time, money, and effort.So. if you are only planning on getting one, you might just go on ahead and order four or five just to make sure you get one that works and send the ones that dont work back-- just in case.Having said all of that, The three little cameras that do actually work, work pretty well. They come on when the car comes on and they start recording video without any input from you, and they turn off when the car turns off just as effortlessly. The video quality is better than one might expect from such a cheap camera, the sound is as clear as one would expect the menu has a ton of options and settings (motion detect, looping, night vision IR), and for the money, it is not a terrible deal either...provided you get one that actually works.So I am sending 6 broken/dead cameras back and since I have 3 that work, I suppose that since I still need two more. I guess I will just go ahead and order 6 this time....giving me a 1 out of 3 ratio of working vs DOA, and puts the total number of cameras I have ordered at 15 (yes, fifteen)---to get 5 (yes five) that actually work like they should.Go ahead and buy this camera, and know that when it works, its a dandy...., but be warned that you may have to play the RETURN OR EXCHANGE game for some time before getting one (or five) that work, and you will need to buy some cords that do not fall apart in your hand because they were touched or looked at the wrong way.Sooo, the moral of this story is, 2 out of 3 dont work, the cords are garbage, and you can look forward to making a return at least once...but get it all sorted out and you will have a dandy little camera for not a lot of money. Because it is Amazon, you can BUY WITH CONFIDENCE!

Low price, decent quality. Bought Nov 2015. Need to remember this is a low level cheaper setup, but even then it is still a good setup. Mine has 4 video quality options including 1080, 720 and two lower quality. The lower quality options is grainy but decent. 720 is better to the point where you can read most license plates while stopped, and 1080 is some kind of upconverted 720 as it gets really pixelated and much lower framerate. Nighttime view is weak, cannot see much beyond the hood or lit up by street lights. Mine seems to have more of a zoomed forward look with no panorama nor "wide angle" to it, a simple normal neighborhood 4 way stop and cannot see the vehicles stopped on the side roads. Sound quality from the built in mic is sensitive at close range but poor sound quality for what it does pick up, but we buy these for the simple cheap video recorders.For this price level though, it is still a good buy.UPDATE: This had been in the car for nearly 2 years before it finally died. The last few months it would get stuck on the "boot up" screen, I would have to remove power and remove the battery for a few minutes, then hook it all back up and it would work fine for a few days before locking up again. Finally a few weeks ago it just died. Just short of 2 years for a $10 camera, cannot complain too much about that. Good for the daytime, or close encounters at night, otherwise night vision sucks and video quality is mediocre.

 Granted, you'll also need an SD card (class 10), but those aren't too expensive. I went with this one from Transcend: http://amzn.to/1Kj8O8h $7 for 16GB, not bad.I have the worst luck with vehicles and I've been wanting a dash cam for years, but never looked below the $100 mark. At one point I was pretty much convinced that I would have to get a GoPro for a dash cam to be any good. When I stumbled across this one while trying to research a specific (much more expensive) model, I thought to myself "$14? Geez it's going to suck. Oh look, video reviews. That's.... actually not bad. Oh that guy got hit! I hope he's okay. Yep, I'll try it."So I ordered mine since I just had to get a new vehicle after I was hit from behind and pushed into another vehicle totaling my car. (I miss my car; it was darn near perfect!) Now, however, I'm driving this huge SUV that I love, but driving something bigger means there's more area for my vehicle to get hit. I think I will be buying at least one more of these for the rear of my vehicle, but I want a total of four - one for the front, one for the back, and one for each side!My only two CONS for this item is the mini usb charging cable. None of the devices I currently have use anything other than micro usb, which means I have no option to share other device cables with this camera. It's not a huge deal, so I didn't even take away a star, but it is annoying. The other con was that it was originally in Chinese (I think) and I couldn't figure out how to change the language. Luckily, some other reviewers figured it out and shared the answer here! (Still not worth removing a star!)All in all, for $14 I'm thrilled. I'm not making movies, I'm just trying to make sure that I'm protected if someone hits me again. True story, I was once sued by a woman who caused a wreck, ruined the front of my new vehicle (less than six months old), and then claimed she couldn't see my car. If I had this camera in my car, it would have been obvious that she was lying - instead she wasn't even ticketed and the wreck was listed as "unavoidable due to weather conditions" even though the day was crystal clear. She wouldn't have had a case to sue me, both of the insurance companies, the city, the parish, the state, and the railroad company that owned the tracks I was crossing when she claimed she couldn't see me. The camera clearly would have shown her face on screen the entire time I was driving up to and over the railroad tracks before she pulled across the road in front of my moving vehicle. (Stupid people, y'all. Can't do anything about them.)About the video: I had to shrink it a bit in file size to upload it, but it doesn't look like the quality suffered too terribly. Also, the date and time is wrong because I didn't set it with military time the night before. It's twelve hours off, but I'm pretty pleased with the whole thing!October 9, 2015 Update:I've had this dash cam for a couple months now. I still like it, but the camera does not hold a charge at all. If it isn't plugged in, it doesn't turn on. And if my usb charger gets bumped or I hit a large-ish bump in the road, the camera goes off. Both of these problems are frustrating enough that I'm taking away two stars because, in addition to these problems, there's still the issues before of the language problem (it seems to default to Chinese on occasion) and the unsharable usb cord.August 20, 2017 Update:Okay... I've had this thing for about two years now. It's done it's job and finally given up the ghost. I haven't priced batteries, but the battery wants to explode and it's having difficulty with overwriting old video footage, so I'm just going to look into a new dash cam. For $14, I've definitely gotten my money's worth!

I would have given this Five Stars if the item description was accurate.First of all, the item sent to me is a USED product. I wouldn't even call it refurbished judging from the plastic bags the pieces were wrapped in. I even had to fish a small nut for the mount from the box that had come loose. It had obviously been opened and used at least once, probably more since the bags looked pretty hammered. All they had to do was include the word "Refurbished" in the product description and do a better job of repackaging and I wouldn't be dinging for this. In fact I would have felt better about buying it for the seemingly unbelievably low price if it was listed as a refurbished product.Secondly, it is advertized as " Recording resolution:1280x960 / 720x480 / 640x480 pixels". This is not true. It only has one size, labeled "VGA" in the setup, which is 640x480. The box it came in says "HD DVR" and most people interpret HD as High Definition. The instructions (which were obviously written by someone who doesn't speak English) says you can change the video size in the settings menu but it only has one option -- VGA.Thirdly, the description also says it has "120 degree wide view angle". Perhaps if it actually did allow you to record in 1280x960 resolution this might be true but since it doesn', this is also a false statement.It does, technically, have IR LED for night recording. You turn it on by clicking the on/off button which switches between Day and Night mode (hold it in to turn off/on). But the IR LED light only works for objects within a few feet of the camera. Only a very dim and narrow beam actually reaches the hood of my car making this feature worthless.The instructions must have been for a different model or firmware since the settings described in the manual don't match what is actually available on the menu. For example, it says there is an option for IR LED that can be switched between "Atuo or Off" (type-o included). But this option doesn't exist.Having said all this, I wasn't expecting much for $15. Even though the video is only 640x480 you can read the license plate of the car in front of you while waiting at a signal. Once cars gets much beyond that, plates are unreadable. The mount is very secure and the power adapter has enough length that I could hide it by tucking it between the windshield and the roof at the top, the door weather stripping and column on the side and up under the dash, still reaching the power outlet under the center of my dashboard. I also put the wire coming down from the top of the dash in with the wires to my rear view mirror which are covered so there are no noticeable wires.It has a "Voice Record" mode that will record your voice as long as there is no other ambient sound. But if you have the radio on or a loud cabin fan blowing all it records is static. So I just set it to not record sound since it's worthless unless you want to record dictation or something.It requires an SD card to record (not included) so be sure to purchase one if you don't already have one. It says it supports cards up to 32GB. I use a 32GB card and it works fine. One advantage of lower resolution is it won't take up as much memory space so you should be able to use a much smaller card unless you want to record a 10+ hour road trip.It can be set to record in 2, 5 or 15 minute increments (with a few seconds lost between segments). It can also be set to just record continuously until it's turned off. I think the only disadvantage of this is that when it needs to free up space it deletes old files which would mean losing an entire trip. I think it's better to do that than lose a few seconds that might be critical footage.If you want high quality recording you'll probably want to pay more and get a better dash cam. But this seems like a cheap entry level camera that will help you decide if you really want or need a more expensive device later.

Ok so it arrived today, I plugged it in, instructions are ok, not the greatest ( buy a magnifying lens to read the pieces of paper it comes with ). This is a VERY cheap little gadget, however I will say this the audio is ok enough as well as the video enough that if you use this if you are pulled over or if you use it as a dash cam, it will suffice enough to protect you with proof of any incident you may encounter.This is a far cry from HD as its listed as, I put a large SD Card in it and the quality is maybe 2 megs in resoulution if that, but again, why spend a couple hundred on something that you can drop 20 on and get the same results. It comes with a very very long cable to run power directly to it in your car, a pretty good little mount kit as well, be advised the mount kit is a very large suction cup device that's designed to mount to metal ABOVE the inside of your car on the roof,Most cars have a fabric headliner so im not sure what they designed this to mount to, I tried to place and mount on my dash but due to the height it wouldnt allow me to mount it so it would aim correctly at my drivers window, nor is it designed to do so due to the flip screen being upside while on the dash. I hope this helps, again its a good idea to have and will in fact work as designed but for 20 bucks its not a ton of thrills and frills in the box... Good luck

This is what everyone needs in their vehicles. Remember, this can protect you or incriminate you.

At first when i got this dash cam, it worked wonders.Nearing half a year since I brought the cam issues starts to show. It started to freeze, and stop recording. The blue blinking light indicates it is recording. The red light mean it is charging. I turned on my car, the camera turns on, the LCD screen is on. But it is not recording.There are times it just freezes, you see a loading or busy circle marker on the LCD screen, and there are no actions behind it.I hope the manufacturer contact me in regards to this. This is extremely troublesome.

Less then one year old and is dead, power connection at plug where it plugs into camera has short and even if you can get power the screen wont light up no function's work. The camera has an 18 month warranty but you cant access the manufacturers website which is Chinese by the way and these are no longer sold on Amazon which I can understand as it is junk so how do I get my money back the warranty is still good for over 8 months. I probably cant and warranty means nothing now that its no longer available however Amazon should help me. I got ripped off by a POS Chinese product and their bogus website. Live and learn Crooked Seller!!!

after seeing all these great review on amazon, i think this is the one, so i bought 3, for myself and family members. Boy was i wrong and stupid for buying 3 for thesePROSbuilt quality is goodvideo is very clear,can see license plate180 degrees camera viewhave audio recording option, you can turn on or offautomatically power on when you turn the car on, turns off automatically when detect no powerCONSwindshield suction cup will only last few months at most, this is what i hated the most, every few weeks the camera falls downcamera is very obvious from the outside and inside, not to discreet, way too noticeabledoes not come with memory cardsometimes it crashes, sometimes for no reason, will freeze then screen will display recoveringsometimes when i start the car, it automatically power turn on and suddenly turns off for no apparent reason, i have to manually turn it onside note: i had rear ended a car few months back, guess what? this camera caught nothing, it only power on after the crash, i specifically remember it was on when i was driving that day before the car accidentwill i recommend this one, NOthe people giving this great review are obviously FAKE and/or getting the product for free in exchange for biased reviews

Over view: con: sketchy reliability/odd ball construction. Pro: crisp filming.I gave this dash cam two stars for a few key reasons. reliability: had it for a few months and while it has performed and recorded while I was driving there have been many, many instances where if i don't turn the key fast enough to start the car the camera will not turn on. So from time to time I find myself missing drives because the camera will turn on and then right back off when I start the car. I then have to unplug it and plug it back in to get it to boot up. The other main complaint that the "record" light is a faint blue LED that blends in with the body of the cam. This makes it hard to see if its working or not, with conjunction with the first issue makes me second guess if its working or not. Whats the point of having a dash cam if it does not turn on half the time. My other big complaint is that I sent an email to the address listed for tech help on another question and never heard back.The Good: film quality, when it does work its on par with my gopro, crisp clear footage.over all I would have liked to never buy it, spent another $100 and got a name brand unit I know I could return or talk to a person.

To start this review, let me state that this review is for the camera I received pre June/July (R1) before Vantrue released their updated model (R1 Pro). I felt I should really take my time with months of use in all types of weather & temperatures before posting a review. The camera I received simply said "Car DVR" on the front instead of updated Vantrue, has 4 IR lights instead of 2, speaker on the front instead of the back, etc. I want to definitely stress this first as perhaps Vantrue may have updated some of the issues *I* had as well as warn anyone who might try to get it used or maybe even a seller's stock of the older model.For the good, this camera is very top notch in terms of the wide angle and HD video it records. The audio the microphone picks up is also fantastic. It picks ups in-cab conversations as clear as day, and it is cool to go back and watch your recordings listening to you and your passengers or music you were playing at the time. It does perform well at night but do not expect the IR lights to really help in terms of driving illumination. It is likely more for removing the camera and taking close pictures in a dimly lit environment in my opinion. The extra memory (it supports up to 64g instead of 32 like most other dash cams) is a very nice bonus for having more files before the overwriting starts.Now the bad. The instructions that I received were not very helpful at all. It was more helpful to download the Falcon F170 pdf instructions (since the original version, pre-redesign was basically a clone of this other camera) to learn all the ins and outs of this camera. The time-stamp on the bottom is rather large and centered but it is not a huge deal. The only bad thing is if you don't have the optional GPS add-on attached, it will constantly say 000 km/h. Another annoying thing to me was that it creates a separate folder for each day yet when it overwrites the older files and empties the directory, it doesn't delete the folder! You are then left with a handful empty folders on the storage card.Visually, it is small and compact but the decision to have a shiny, chrome style circle around the lens area was just totally foolish in my opinion. I tried to surreptitiously position it behind by rear view mirror, hidden cable and all, in my Wrangler and did a pretty good job; however, my first passenger remarked immediately before even getting into the car about my new camera. I ended up using a cheap matte black paint ($1 walmart) to cover the chrome part so it wasn't so noticeable. The unit is also noticeably heavier than the two others (my father's and my new dash cam) that I have experienced since ditching this one. Also, the little plastic tab cover for the catch/holder on the top of the unit snapped off after only a few uses. It did not affect securing the until to the suction cup mount at all though.The worst part of the unit i received however, is the total lack of reliability whatsoever and this was really the death knell for this camera. The recording light would be flashing but pressing the "OK" button to turn on the display to check would fail to respond. I'd have to power the unit off/on to get it to start recording again and then it would hang again at some random point in the future. The camera gets very warm (especially compared to the new dashcam I have) and I wonder how much this had to do with the reliability issue. I was using it all throughout the summer here in North Carolina for reference. People in super hot, desert climates should be somewhat wary in my opinion. I had left the camera plugged in (constant 12v port, not the switched one) and running sometimes while I went into stores or the gym, so I fully acknowledge I may have been at fault for damaging the unit. The electronics of this particular camera may not be able to withstand those type of temperatures. I will note though that I do the same with my new camera and have *no* issues whatsoever.I really wanted to like this camera and gave it a good 4-5 months of use before posting this review. The reason for rating it so poorly is due to the total lack of reliability. I just had too many instances when I thought the camera was working and it turns out it had hung/crashed. And honestly, what is the point of having one of these things if it fails and you miss that one moment for which you bought this in the first place? I upgraded to the slightly cheaper TaoTronics and haven't looked back at all. There was massive potential with this camera, but it was such a disappointment and waste of money in the end for me. Take your time, research and really shop around with these dash cams!

Latest update 9/18/2016They sent me a replacement after it malfunctioned within a few months for FREE but that too only lasted 13 months and stopped recording.I guess I'm going elsewhere to find one that's more reliable.

For $15 dollar, you get what you paid for. It works in most cases. Be aware that it could interfere with some GPS systems. This works fine with my Nissan Leaf, but makes my Mitsubishi Lancer GPS unable to get satellite signals. I started noticing it when my GPS location are always off by a few streets as time goes by. This is because even without satellite signals, your GPS system try to estimate where you are depending on the direction you are headed and the distance you travelled. But without the signals, plus with the GPS's trying to put you at the nearest drivable street you are closest to, you'd be about 50 miles away just in days. At first I thought my GPS system went bad until one day I had to unplug this cheap dashcam to charge my phone, then my GPS corrected itself. I went to the GPS system and did some traiging. With the dashcam off, my GPS system can get signals from 8 different satellites. When dashcam is on. Zero satellite signals.

this thing works very well... for a couple of months.it started randomly shutting off while i was driving and i would have to unplug it, take the battery out and put it back, and then plug it back in to get it started back up. this occurred about once a day until one day the unit refused to power on and it hasn't worked since. i even ordered a new battery and tried a new SD card and different usb cables and the unit is still dead. $15 for 3 months is more like a rental plan. I wish I could get it to work again.

I ordered this product with low expectations, I mean who wouldn't for $15. The product comes in its box along with a car charger cable for it and a battery which you will end up placing inside of the dash cam. This camera does not record in HD at ALL! It says that it does, but it doesn't. This dash cam records in standard definition which is okay with me. As long as I can have proof of my innocence in a crash ill be happy. Another flaw about this product is that the battery only lasts about 10 minutes on a full charge, it is complete crap. That being said, the dash cam must always be plugged into a power source when you are using it. This dash cam's default language is set to Chinese when you get it, but I did some research online and 10 minutes later I found out how to switch it to English. The instructions to do this should come with the product but it doesn't. A couple good things about this is that it actually does work, with all flaws put to the side, I guess the camera does what it's suppose to do, record. The Dash Cam also has a very easy navigation menu and live playback on the screen and seems to have a firm build. So if you care more about getting video and less about battery life then this product is just for you.

When I first received this 39 days ago, I was very happy with the product, considering it's price. The video is clear when reviewed, it came set up for English language, and it worked reasonably well.The only complaint I had was that the SD card occasionally shakes it's way lose of it's contacts, without actually popping its door out, so I needed to pay attention to the recording indicator to determine whether the SD card had worked its way lose and I needed to reseat it to get it recording again.The SD card slot itself relies on the tension of its door to hold it against it's contacts, with a spring providing pressure to pop the card out when the door is opened. There is no separate catch for the SD card, and the door itself is has a very weak latch.I was happy, considering the price, with this issue. Unfortunately, although it first appeared about a week after I purchased this, it happened more and more often over the following 4 weeks. Now, 39 days after purchase, the door itself no longer stays closed. Whenever I attempt to seat the SD card, the door doesn't catch, immediately popping open again, unseating the SD card as it does. It makes this otherwise well designed dashcam completely nonfunctional.I gave it two stars since issues were expected. This is a VERY cheap dashcam and I originally purchased this assuming it wouldn't last very long. I wanted to use it to determine whether or not I wanted to purchase a more expensive option or have no dashcam at all. After the first few days I was pleasantly surprised at the deal, considering it gave me everything I needed. Alas, it needs a better SD card enclosure to work long term - either a better, solid latch for the door or a separate latch for the card itself.

Upon reading the item description, this Dash Cam seemed to have everything I was looking for at a very reasonable price. However, after I got it I was very disappointed for the following reasons.1. (and most importantly) the video is in 19 second chunks, with a 3-5 second gap in between each file. A lot can happen in 3-5 seconds, and I don't like having big gaps in the recordings.2. The instructions are vague. It tells you what each button is, and some basic functionallity, but does not go into detail, and I still can't figure out how to operate it properly. The navigation through the menus is awkward and it is obvious the instructions were written by someone with limited English language skills. I just have to keep pushing buttons till it turns off, or take out the battery.3. The field of view is narrow.4. The swivel on the mounting arm is flimsy, and I can't get it to tighten down so the whole unit does not move when I open/close the video screen.5. A little big for a dash cam. It's about the size of a radar detector and takes up a lot of area on the windshield.6. The battery does not last very long.7. Misleading description as far as "auto start". It doesn't tell you that you have to hard-wire it into the ignition for this feature to work.On the positive side, it does take pretty good video and audio; you can replay the files right on the device; and the suction cup mount works pretty well, less the swivel tightening portion.I am overall disappointed with this product and am actively looking for a better model. Save some time and spend a little bit more money to get a higher quality dash cam.

For $22.00, you would say to yourself that it is too good to be true. That is indeed the case. (cons same as what others reported)- When it did work, video was not great, reasonable on 640 mode.- Instructions are of no value, but with menu button experimentation, you'll see how it works.- 2/5/10 min loop does not work. (only once where i saw it loop at 2min)- "HD" does not work. Might as well leave it in 640 mode to save disk space.- 90% of the time, playback is very choppy. (also reported by reviewer "Manx")- Recording corrupts the SD card. (this is the cause of choppy playback.) Takes 30 min to copy a 50MB file from SD card to laptop. Have to reformat under windows to get the card to work again. (fyi: card works fine with my Sony camera and copies very fast between Sony camera and laptop)- Locks up on many occasions. Had to remove battery/power.- IR does not seem to have any effect. Recorded during nite, but playback showed dark video. (headlights helped more)- Bright / sunny day and driving into sun causes recorded video to be "foggy/snow blizzard". - maybe direct sunlight too much for weak lens- Product appeared used when I got it.Overall, product not reliable and does not work as advertised. I wouldn't mind it with 640 mode, since objective is to get proof of a accident, but the broken 2/5/10 looping and choppy playback are unacceptable. Spend the extra money and get something that is reliable.

The dash cam served its purpose while it worked. I found 3 design flaws: (1) The suction cup kept falling off the windshield during hot sunny weather. A bigger & better quality suction cup may solve this problem. (2) The video time stamps seem to lack behind the actual time of the video. (3) the camera malfunction under 100F weather. I cannot resurrect it.Time to get a better quality dash cam.

This camera is useless. It claims to perform continuous recording; looping back to the beginning of the memory card and replacing the oldest video files first before recording over it. Instead, it fills up the video card and them stops recording altogether.TOTALLY USELESS

I have a really good description of this camera and I can sum it up in one word---Junk. Have many issues with it but the number one is the thing skips and records at will. Not reliable at all. And customer support is great if you can read Chinese. Would be fine as a paper weight.

Good product, video is well formatted having high quality, but some videos are then corrupted after a few recordings. It loops every 1, 3, or 5 minutes and depending on the level of time used, the video will then become corrupted, cause lapses in the recordings. The dashcam also stops recording randomly, making its use very sketchy.

USB cable is faulty, doesn't work if base is lifted because the internal copper is too thin and frayed. This assumes the copper within is shoddy and as thin as possible, only works when kept at a certain angle. My dash cam is also defective, as it freezes when the SD card is full and then does not respond to any button presses and only shuts off when unplugged and the battery runs out. Very unhappy for the price paid for this product.

Pros: Solid construction. EXTREMELY high video quality for both day and night driving. Low profile design. Built in viewfinder/display. Easy setup and installation. Excellent cost/value proposition. Very responsive and helpful customer care through Vantrue's Amazon store. Good documentation.Cons: No integrated GPS. Lens doesn't lend itself to using a polarizing filter. Some firmware quirks.I say "nearly perfect" because if not for a couple of shortcomings, this device would be a perfect 10 star device. The biggest shortfall is absence of integrated GPS. That's the bad news. The good news is the device IS equipped with a GPS antenna port and I do know that a companion GPS antenna for the device is expected to be available soon. I will update my review when that is available.One thing I give a lot of weight to is how a company responds to customer feedback and concerns. It doesn't matter how well a product is built or how it performs if the company selling it isn't there to back it up. I can tell you in that regard, Vantrue has exceeded every expectation. Yes, the unit is well built. Yes, the video quality is EXCEPTIONAL - STUNNING - UNMATCHED even when compared to other devices at a much higher price point.The setup and installation is a breeze. Device comes with documentation that should answer most every question and for questions that aren't, customer care has your back. The built in viewfinder/display takes all the guesswork out of making sure the camera is mounted properly for optimal recording. Once the GPS add on is available I honestly believe you won't find a better Dash Cam at this cost. Frankly I'm not sure you'll find a better Dash Cam at ANY cost.Yes I have (and will) buy this again. I could have docked the R1 Pro two stars for it's current lack of GPS but the rest of the camera is so good that it compensates very nicely. Once GPS is available I hope to be able to give this device the full five stars it would otherwise deserve.UPDATE 3-1-2017: Camera has not had heavy use in the time I owned it. It has been replaced twice and has once again stopped working. The GPS mount was delivered but the major downside on this camera is the manufacture does not have a software viewing solution. After two years dealing with them I'm convinced they never will have a software solution. I stand by the statement that the video is fantastic... WHILE IT WORKS. Will not purchase another Vantrue product.

 There are obviously a number of different units that have the same casing as this one. The lenses can be VERY different, and mine is perhaps a 50mm lens equivalent on a camera, not at ALL 120 degree angle. Even my standard iPhone 5S has a much wider (and 100x clearer) image than this. Also the lens is pretty crappy (uploading pics and video) and the resolution quality is even more horrid. Granted it is a crap shoot buying this as it seems the manufacturer has probably 6 or even more different places that assemble these. The menus are different, image quality and frame rate are (as I've compared mine with others and mine is the far cheaper version). The unit was set onto FHD 1080p, but two painful realities: It only recorded in 720p (half the size), and the image quality was SO BAD, that I could barely read license plate on vehicles in front of me.Thinking that perhaps the VGA setting might yield a wider image, I attempted that setting, however there was zero change in field of recording view. One can take still images, but they are absolutely no better, and the size is so paltry, what's the point? (I will add images from this and comparing iPhone image too). You're really gambling with the parent company that designed these. My suggestion? Look at the good vs bad reviews. If the good numbers outweigh the bad, that's your chance of getting a winner. However, if (like this camera) the reviews are far more worse than better (34pct of 1-star reviews vs 24pct of 5-star postings as of mine), you'll more likely get a unit that you won't be pleased with. I'd like to just throw mine on a trash heap, but I'll just return it this week.I will attempt to upload the uncompressed images and clips, but they already look bad now, and I wonder how they will look when Amazon compresses them? Look at the bright yellow sign near the start of the clip, and how impossible it is to read what it says.

Ordered two, but only one worked. The on/off and record buttons are supposed to light up, but the on that doesn't work looks like the buttons are painted on with no lights (I'll try a replacement). The other has lights on the buttons, but the charge function is a hit or miss. Instructions are a challenge; tiny print, inconsistent graphics (shows HDMI and direct power ports that don't exist), and barely clear function descriptions. Bottom line, the one that works is about what I expected for the price. The windshield mount is sturdy, but there's no quick release for the camera, so the camera with the mount must be removed to keep the camera out of sight and out of the weather. I would not have been happy at all if these had been more than $14.37 .. Hopefully, I'll get a working replacement for the dud and we'll go from there.. Just OK..UPDATE: Gave up on working camera - battery lasted all of 15 minutes and wouldn't charge properly. Sent both cameras back. Down to one star. I would NOT recommend these little suckers..

This camera is like the movie 'plan 9 from outerspace' it's so horrible you can't help but laugh.Now for those who think I'm just being overly picky for the price: I didn't expect 720p (honestly, it looks like maybe 160p at best - I think a first generation Motorola Razr could have out performed it) so I wasn't worried about that (I noted that from previous reviews) The audio recording was terrible, but again I knew that from other reviews (and the $14 price) However....The part I didn't expect to fail was the primary reason for having it: recording. For the two hours it worked, it did its job: $14 is a cheap insurance policy to simply prove liability at the very least (even if it can't see faces or licence plates) but thereafter it said "No SD card" tried taking it out, replacing etc, resetting, formatting etc. No good.It's $14, so I really don't think I'm going to bother returning it (The effort to repackage and ship the thing back would cost me more in time than its worth)Save your money - put it towards a better rated unit in the $40-60 range.UPDATE: I decided to run an older SD card and it started recording again. I used it for a few days without anything to write home about. However, today it was about 90 degrees out and when I went to go for a drive the camera went was recording just pitch-black nothing (sound only) as the car became cooler, the screen started to show multicolored lines and got progressively 'better' (better being a very generous word)UPDATE 2: After deciding to dissect this horrid abortion of the lowest Chinese-built technology, I discovered the lens was factory set out of focus - WAY out of focus. After fixing that issue and putting it back together I will say you can actually see things quite a bit sharper (IE a car looks less like a blob) but the video quality is still awful.Final notes: The battery for this unit is the same one that I used for my Sylvania SP234 Bluetooth speaker, so I can't bitch about having a spare battery for it .Overall; for $14 I got a spare battery for my speaker, a really good 10ft USB car charger (great for my GPS!), a decent windshield mount for a future purchase of a better dash cam and quite a bit of fun taking it apart and harvesting parts off of it.

The camera started falling apart after four days! See the attached photos. And the video quality is not good and you will not be able to see the license plate of the car in front. The product description says it supports 1280X960 resolution, but I couldn't change the resolution because it only shows 720, unless I missed something but I spent one hour in the camera settings in vain. And the night vision is terrible and you will not be able to see anything clear.Overall, a cheap and bad dashboard camcorder, but for a camera around $15, I guess you got what you paid for.

Always know, you get what you pay for. Printed up the return label within an hour of receiving it. Let's start with the build and feel of it. It's made out of the same cheap plastic you'd get from a toy in a happy meal. I'm actually surprised they don't give these away in happy meals. Next, there's no logo on it. That's something you can even see from the pictures. None of the buttons on mine worked either. The only way to kill the power was to pull the cord out, which slipped out on its own anyway. It didn't stay in. The camera worked, showed an image, but like I said..nothing worked. No menu, wouldn't record...nothing. I'm currently looking for something legit. Maybe try a Garmin, or some better brand. This time I'll actually pay for quality.

Amazon's description states, "Recording resolution:1280x960 / 720x480 / 640x480 pixels". THIS IS NOT TRUE!The "capture" resolution is 640x480 no matter if the "standard" or "fine" setting is used. However, the "Video" monitoring output may be set to 1280x960 / 720x480 / 640x480 pixels. This allows for full screen viewing on a HDTV screen.The captured MJPEG avi will always be 640x480 resolution regardless. MJPEG compression is also not very agressive and will result in large video files of 25 MB per minute of recorded video.and will require a 16GB SD card be used for up to 10 hours of video.The lens also is not much of a wide-angle lens and delivers poor coverage of the roadway.