Blackvue DR500GW-HD
 

Received my Blackvue Wi-Fi today. It's similar to the DR400G-HD II but it's a little bigger, has ventilation slots, and uses Wi-Fi to connect to a smartphone to access the video.

Also took the opportunity to pick up the Power Magic Pro as I intend to wire this up full-time rather than only at ignition. Will put it on the car tomorrow and provide some video sample and impressions.

I didn't expect to receive it this quickly, but I guess they started shipping a few days ago. Expect the 400 to drop in price now that this is out.

Pictures installed and video of driving/parking are in post 38 of this thread.

http://blackvue.com/Prod/images/DR500GW-HD_2.jpg

I don't see it on the English Blackvue site, is it the Korean version?

Looks English to me, no Korean anywhere on the packaging.

Where did you buy it? Can you send me a link please?

Yeah thanks in advance for the link and also for letting us know if it still runs hot.

I've been waiting for the new model to come out to see if they fix that.

Be sure to mount it on your back window. I had my DR400 mounted on my front window and missed the texting girl who rear ended me.

I had some newegg credit so I got it through them.
It was 299.99 and the magic pro was 39.99.



The ventilation slots and larger size will probably help, but we'll know for sure this weekend.




I am actually thinking of getting one for both ends :)

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interested in hearing your feedback. i may pick one up and move my 400 to the rear.

I didn't realize the 500 was coming out at the time I got the 400. Really like the Wifi feature.

Was playing around with the 500 (trying to find a good location for it, testing out the wi-fi, and using the realtime video over wi-fi to my phone) for about an hour today, with it on the entire time in 1080 mode. I didn't notice it getting hot, but I suppose it would take a month of prolonged use before I see any real effects of overheating (fuzzy picture due to the sensor overheating being the predominant symptom).

Gotta pick up some fuses and other wiring doodahs before I put it on permanently and get some video to show, but so far I'm pretty happy with this.

Edit: Additional observation, the larger dimensions of the 500 make it a tight fit in the area behind the rear view mirror if you're going to place it on the driver-side dot matrix portion. I had to adjust the mirror arm down a bit to get it to fit without rubbing up against it. Not a whole lot of room for me to adjust the mirror now, but I'm the only one who drives my car anyway.

Edit #2: I played around with the software today. Be aware that my anti-virus scanner detected the Conficker.B worm on the SD Card's autorun.inf that came with the unit. Nothing it couldn't clean up, of course, but not cool nonetheless. I checked around and at least one other person (in Australia) reported the same issue. There may have been an infected batch of SD Cards that went out from the factory. Conficker.B! is a worm that replicates via network and through mapped drives that exploits a Windows SVCHOST vulnerability to allow unauthorized remote access. Make sure you have anti-malware running.

Edit #3: OK, Magic Pro is all wired up. I have it set to shut off if battery drops below 12V or after 120 hours. The device has been live all day and it does not get excessively hot. After pro-longed use, it is warm to the touch, but nothing that appears to be abnormally hot. I don't have a temp gun to give you guys an accurate external case reading, but it's really not bad at all. I also contacted the vendor regarding the Conficker.B worm detected on the SD Card, and they are communicating with Blackvue directly.

Thanks so much for the updates on this! I'm looking forward to getting this for my BRZ when it comes in. Hopefully the overheating issues that plagues the previous models are truly gone in this newest model. The only other thing that concerns me now is how low-profile it appears on the windshield. Still concerned about potential smash-and-grabs.

I just popped into see what people thought about having one for front and rear... Looks like I'll be buying another one for the rear window.

I should get a license plate frame that says, "If you can read this, you're being recorded."

wait so when you turn off the car does this stay running and that is why you need magic pro? I though it turned off then back on upon impact?

It can do both. Mine is set to record all the time (normal/Parking/event modes) but if to stops record due to no inactivity (no motion, movement or event) then it will wake up and start recording if it senses motion/movement/event.

In a parking lot there's always cars coming and going, people walking by and other various things "moving" so the motion sensor wouldn't likely let your camera go into standby mode.

You can wire it directly to battery (or a circuit that's always live) and it'll record when you turn off the car. The Magic Pro is a battery saver - if automatically shuts off the circuit if your battery voltage drops below a certain level and/or after a set limit of hours.

I have mine set to disable at 11.8 volts or 120 hours.

can you take a picture of where you installed it? in the rear or front? thanks

How hard was the install? how long did it take?

Not sure I'll be able to get a picture up tomorrow - I'm working late so I probably won't see any daylight, but I'll see what I can do.

Install was easy. If you've used an add-a-circuit in your car's fuse box, that's the bulk of the effort. F1point4 has a pretty good DIY article on it if you're not familiar with this. My install went very similarly to his, but I mounted my Magic Pro right above the cutout (it didn't interfere with the harnesses). Wiring goes up the A-pillar on the driver side, tucked along the headliner and right into the camera by the mirror.

I have the camera itself mounted right above the rear view mirror on the driver side. The adhesive is on the dot matrix tinted area so it's nicely hidden from view. If you didn't know what you were looking for, you probably wouldn't notice it from the outside. I also have 35% tint on the sides/rears, so that helps to obscure the view as well. I'd mount it on the passenger side for more clearance from the mirror, but I have my Passport radar detector in that spot already.

Cool might have to get the 500. I have the 400 and am thinking about moving it to the back for reasons explained above. I'll have to play around with the unit to see how well it captures through a tinted window.

Does the DR500 still record video at 15,000 bit rate like the DR400?

I'm getting a escort 9500ix and I bought a mirror mount for it so I don't know if I can't install the cam behind the mirror :( where else could I put it

Post some vids whenyou get a chance? How's the wifi feature? transfer vids and permits live viewing?

How can I confirm this?

I have my 9500ix on the passenger side of the mirror (above it) and the Blackvue on the driver side of the mirror (also above it). This way, both are fairly hidden from external view. I chose not to use the Passport mirror mount as it leaves it in plain view and draws a bit of attention.

Will post some as soon as I can. I just changed all the settings yesterday and got it a 32GB memory card, so hopefully I get something to show soon. Unfortunately, I work early and don't arrive home until after dark, so I won't have any daylight driving until this weekend. I could throw up some parking mode clips though. As for the wifi feature, it allows you to configure the camera, view existing clips on the camera's memory card, or watch the video output in realtime.

Originally, the 1920x1080 resolution seemed like it had quite a bit of video compression going on, so I switched it from high to normal. We'll see what change that had on the video output when I get home tonight.

Edit: Just wanted to add that I've had the camera running all weekend in park mode as well as normal, and this new design does not appear to have any overheating issues. It does get warm, but nothing that you wouldn't expect from any other solid-state electronic device that is always on. Seems that the larger enclosure and the double-vented design is a winner here.

Right click on the video file, select the Details tab. What does the data rate say.

My DR400 uses 7407kbps. (I was wrong on the 15000)

Compared to GoPro HD2: 15000
GoPro Hero 3 Black 1080 @ 30fps: 20000
GoPro Hero 3 Black 1080 @ 60fps: 30000


When you look at the black asphalt road on the DR400, the blacks are grainy on the fast moving road. It looks much better on the GoPro with higher bitrate.

My DR400 (from ebay) seems OK in the heat and winter.

OK I'll check this when I get home tonight - I put a new MicroSD card in the camera so I lost all of my video from over the weekend. I changed the compression setting anyway so it should be at the highest setting now.

I can tell you that fast moving video on the 500 is nothing like that captured with a GoPro. This is good enough for security/evidence capturing, definitely not good enough for actual fast-action video recording.

i wish there was a good camera that had both front and rear at same time, or front and inside at same time.

gonna order this most likely though...foo loving the catback btw!

i wonder how it performs when u park your car under 44 deg C sun with parking mode on..

The only front/rear ones I've seen were rated pretty poorly.

Re: catback - I knew you would. No silencers right? I should've charged you more ;)

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I'm too scared to leave mine attached let alone on parking mode. This aussie summer is going to melt these cameras like butter. Unfortunately i've got a Itronics ITB-100HD, which doesn't have a quick release type of connection, it requires fastening to the mount, so it's an annoying process when i want to stow it.

OK, looks like it's 10261kbps on the DR500.

Edit: not sure what I changed, but now all my MP4's are ~7500 kbps which puts it on the same level as the DR400. Anyone know what setting may have changed it?

Thanks for checking. I'm looking for a 2nd camera for the rear window ever since I got rear ended in traffic.

If you got any video, pleae post it. I'd like to see the quality.

Will have to wait until the weekend - only video I have is of my car parked. I want to get some daylight driving samples in addition to some nighttime ones. Will do that on Saturday!

no silencers. waiting on the invidia resonated front pipe to arrive, hopefully that will tone it down a tad. it sounds great, the drone isn't like my sti, but its so odd that its ONLY between 3-4k. i haven't tried the silencers yet so who know. all i know is, i do love it.

as for hte cameras, you're right, no good front/rear cams, and mounting two 500's will be costly and i dont want one to see behind me, i want one to see inside, incase someone breaks in, and when its at the dealer...never trust anyone. does the 500 have another video input so maybe i can hook up a good quality back up cam to it to record?

where'd you buy yours, and how much you pay?

Unfortunately no, there's no inputs to do what you're thinking of.

As for that 3-4k drone unsilenced, yeah it was stupid. If you get past 4K the whole thing actually gets pretty quiet. You could be tooling around at 85MPH in 6th and wonder where your exhaust went.

Still the best sounding exhaust I've heard for our cars. With the silencers on, you'll cut the 3-4K drone out considerably, but it also tones down the mean throaty growl, which is the whole point of the Evo 3, IMHO.

exactly.

now, have you done research on dash cams? the blackvue seems to be so maint stream, is there another camera you really considered?

just found this, seems interesting.... garmin GDR35

http://translate.google.com/translat...ed=0CFQQ7gEwAg

I ordered mine two days ago. I will get them installed as soon as delivered

Foobar, please post some pics of where you installed it when you have time. I was pretty much set on getting the 500g but after reading your post regarding the tight fit behind the rearview mirror in the front, I'm now having second thoughts.

I switched to the auto dimming mirror yesterday which is thicker than the regular manual one so I had to move my camera further down. It is now right behind the mirror at the same level rather that sitting above it all the way at the top of the windshield.

You can still put it on the passenger side of the window if you really wanted to keep it all the way at the top, but I decided to just go down and keep the lens perfectly center instead of off to one side. I also didn't want to move my 9500ix which sits in that spot.

Placement as seen from the side:
http://www.imgur.com/ZZMBYUd.jpeg

Outside shot:
http://www.imgur.com/Yq9JmIF.jpeg

That's my 9500ix sitting above it. You can see it from this inside shot:
http://i.imgur.com/S4rUReC.jpg

Daylight driving sample:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI7hA3o9Qng"]Blackvue DR500GW-HD Sample - YouTube[/ame]

Daylight parking sample:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rezqKkfnFI"]Blackvue DR500GW-HD Sample - YouTube[/ame]

Night parking sample:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djJfjUmk8xw"]Blackvue DR500GW-HD Sample - YouTube[/ame]

Night driving sample:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAGG27jCgxw"]Blackvue DR500GW-HD Sample - YouTube[/ame]


I think my video is still highly compressed - seems to be a lot of artifacts. Compared to other sample Blackvue videos, mine aren't looking as crisp. Anyone have any suggestions on what to check?

so parking more works only when the motion is sensed?

Its always recording but it only saves based on the sensitivity you set. You can set it to always save to the memory card regardless of sensitivity (sensitivity of zero basically).

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