VIOFOA229 Pro 4K HDR Dash Cam, Dual STARVIS 2 IMX678 IMX675, 4K+2K Front and Rear Car Camera, 2 Channel with HDR, Voice Control, 5GHz WiFi GPS, Night Vision 2.0, 24H Parking Mode, Support 512GB Max

Ordered thius after seeing a positive recommedation from Wirecutter. I originally planned on having this installed this at best buy just to save some time. Turns out the installer at best buy thought it would be 'difficult' which was a red flag for me. So I decided to do the install myself. Found lots of resources on Viofo's website and the viofo Facebook group for hints on the install. I had some initial trouble getting the fuses in the right slot with the right adapters so I ordered the HK4 kit which has all the common fuse adapters. There's lots of resources for how to identify the fuses that have continuous power (for parking recording) vs those that are powered once the car ignition is on. I wanted to have the camera active in parking mode so its nice that the kit comes with a voltage cutoff feature to protect from battery drainage. Updating the firmware is easy if you have a computer that can connect to an SD card. Viofo provides clear instructions from the website on formatting the sd card and downloading the bin files for the front and rear cameras. Camera settings are done through the mobile app. The Viofo customer support is top notch as my questions were answered by a real person within a few hours. The install on the windshield was a bit of a challenge so I used other adhesive alternatives than those provided. All is working well with front and back cameras, recording while parked and shutting off as I have set in the app. The build quality is great and 4K provides crisp footage with the polarizing lens which came with my bundle.

Budget meets quality.This has some of the best if not best software tuning of the Sony Starvis II sensor out there. Yet, it remains affordable.This is still a great dashcam, but they came out with newer models. A329, they come with various features, but the same Sony Starvis 2 sensor, 4K front 2K rear. But I believe this was cheaper or some how better (based on reviewers).The newer add on camera's give you additional features, like the telephoto lens that does a better job reading text like license plates since it doesn't use a fisheye lens, also a bit more zoomed in or closer to the subject view. I believe the A329/s gives you extended parking mode and the A329/t is the telephoto version.They also have a record option built-in (software I believe) that allows you to have multiple cameras on one video, in a separate folder than the single camera files. Makes it easier for court, uploading online or showing friends/family what happened.Once you learn the buttons it's easy to use. Has voice commands if you like using voice commands.I like being able to see what it sees, no more having to open the app to see the live feed. The included polarized lens reduces glare and can sharpen images in daylight, may affect the night time camera. The same for HDR, but I believe there was an update for that (at least on newer versions possibly). Basically a auto HDR for day/night.Dual Sony Starvis 2 senors.Okay, not all sensors are the same. Sony makes multiple sizes of sensors some more sensitive than others. Think CPU or GPU chips in your computer, not all Intel i7 cpu's are the same even if their all the smae generation (14th gen), you can have a 14600K and someone else can have a more powerful 14800K chip.Then there is as mentioned software tuning, that improves the post image quality.IMX678 and IMX675. Simultaneously supporting 4K 2160P resolution for the front camera and 2K 1440P for the rear camera. Bigger number = bigger sensor = front camera sensor.What is 2K or 4K? (K = 1,000)Simplest explanation 720p (1280 by 720) is HD (1K if you like because it has 1,280 pixels)1080p (1920 by 1080) is Full HD (just under 2,000 or 2K pixels)What is referred to as 2K is actually double 720P (2560 by 1440 pixels)And 4K isn't 720p x 4, it is actually double 1080p (3840 x 2160)Somewhere someone referred to 3K as 2K and it stuck. This was probably because it was more like 2.5K pixals and they rounded down instead of up. And consumers have been confused ever since.

I started looking for a good dash camera last year, after my car got a rear-end hit. I tried a couple of different cams before getting a 2-channel VIOFO A229 Pro, and I did a lot of testing under various driving and lighting conditions to evaluate the camera and optimize its performance. Though not perfect, it is a very good robust camera for everyday use and documenting a potential accident. Here are some highlights that might be helpful:Both front and rear cameras incorporate advanced Sony STARTVIS sensors (4K IMX678 and 2K IMX675, respectively) to ensure high-quality video and improved low-light performance. The design is well-thought and polished. The front camera windshield mount incorporates a sensitive GPS module that can provide coordinate/time/speed stamp on the video footage. They use convenient electrostatic plastic pads to easily attach/remove cameras to/from the windshield. A direction of the field of view can be manually adjusted for both front and rear cameras. Its flawless operation is controlled by a good software with a lot of settings to optimize its performance with regard to operational conditions. It has a nice display and a set of buttons for manual control. The camera operation can also be controlled and monitored by a phone application via fast 5G Wi-Fi.The camera kit is nicely packed and includes all accessories and cables to setup and use the camera in your car. It includes a CPL filter to minimize potential glare and dashboard reflections, but does not contain a memory card that should be purchased separately. In my experience, various (not even the fastest) cards from SanDisk and Samsung worked well. The video files are pretty big, so at least 128GB is recommended for everyday use. For example, 3 min footage (with panoramic 21:9 aspect ratio) from the 4K front and 2K rear cams takes 1.25GB and 0.516GB, respectively, so the 128GB card can keep record of about 4 hours. Setting the 21:9 aspect ratio (3840x1600 and 2560x1080 pixels for front and rear cams, respectively) reduces the recorded vertical width of view (and the file size!) to focus on the driving conditions instead of capturing images of the sky or the hood of your car.The wide-angle lenses of the front and rear cameras provide good fields of view for general monitoring of driving conditions, but complicate capturing plate numbers from a distance. In my practice, the A229 Pro front camera can provide reliable reading of plate numbers of a car ahead from a distance of up to 3 car bodies at daytime. To increase the distance, one can use the VIOFO 2K accessory tele-camera RTC300 that connects to the front camera instead of the A229 rear camera. The tele-camera operates in conjunction with the front camera and greatly (up to 4 times!) improves the distance of license plate reading, while the front camera still provides broad field of view. I use such setup for about a year and, in my experience, it works very well. The problem is that the front camera does not have an extra port to connect the 2K rear camera included in the A229 kit. As a solution, I tried to use the VIOFO A119 Mini 2 camera as a rear camera. It is a nice, fully functional camera, uses the same Sony STARTVIS IMX675 2K sensor as the A229 rear cam, can be purchased on sale well under $100, and works really well, including nighttime operation. It even supports video up to 60fps, better than A229's 30fps. Alternatively, one can consider new affordable 4K cameras from other vendors to further improve rearview image quality. Those interested in long-distance plate capturing may also consider the new VIOFO A329T 2 or 3 channel kit that includes an improved front camera along with the tele-camera (and a rear cam in the 3 channel configuration).I had a very positive experience with VIOFO customer support. My front camera had some irregular start-up issues that I reported to VIOFO. Their representative Freja was very helpful, following up and suggesting firmware updates and various tests. Finally, when the start-up problems became more frequent, she organized free-of charge replacement of my defective camera with a brand new A229 Pro kit, which works great without any issues.As a final note, VIOFO should improve their Windows video player that is barely functional in its current version. It should operate at the same level, as their excellent cameras and the robust phone app.