Hi everyone Patrik CK here with a follow up to my review and installation guide for the
Aukey DR02 dash cam.
Before we dive into the details I just wanted to say thank you to all my subs, we hit 2,000
recently which I think is absolutely momentous, so thank you all, looking forward to more
milestones!
Just like my original review of the ASUS AC1300 Router I like to come back around a year or
so later to exam what it’s been like to actually live with something I’ve recommended
so highly, the good and the bad.
It’s also a perfect time to answer a bunch of questions I've been asked about the DR02
since my initial video.
If you haven't seen the first video about this dash cam check it out and come on back
when you’re done, I'll leave a card linking to it above.
For a device that’s technically meant to be installed and forgotten until you need
it the Aukey has performed marvelously.
I installed it in such a way that it was completely out of site so I really did forget it was
there sometimes.
If I ever did need some footage I’d just pop out the SD card, upload it to my computer,
and pop it back in and to follow up on one viewer’s question, the way you insert the
micro SD card is like this, with the contacts facing down which may seem a little counter
intuitive when looking at it.
To answer another common question, you do need to remove the micro-SD card to download
the footage as plugging in the camera itself just turns it on to record.
This does require a SD card reading, the one I’ve used for the last year and longer is
this Transcend TS-RDF5K USB 3.0 multicard reader.
You can find it on Amazon for $8 bucks at the link below.
You could also pickup this Anker USB type-C card reader which can be hooked up directly
to your phone assuming it has a type-c connection like my Samsung S9 and upload footage directly
to it for storage or to share.
This is a really cool little adapter that removes the needs for a computer or laptop,
it’s only $13 bucks on Amazon, link to it below.
One thing I still love about the DR02 is how easy it is to mount and unmount the camera
whenever I feel the need to put it out of site, even with its subdued design you just
don’t know in some places.
I still contend that this is a far superior mounting system than all the suction cup designs.
It simply won’t move or get jostled out of place over time due to everyday vibration
or after hitting a pot hole or two.
Of course the only downside being the ability to remove the whole camera system and put
it in another car easily.
This is partly why Aukey gives two mounting brackets in the box.
I never had to move it so it didn’t affect my opinion of it, but your needs may vary.
Now even though I drive in and around the Atlanta area I'm happily surprised to report
that the only crazy video I have to show from over a years’ worth of footage is of this
guy, now watch this.
We get behind him as he’s leaving the apartment complex, drives up the hill here, underestimates
the turn, pops the curb and hits a light pole, good thing no one was trying to leave the
gas station at the same time.
Even though that was the only real slightly major incident I caught, this is still Georgia
so there was plenty of THIS kind of stuff to deal with on a daily basis.
I mean seriously what in the frack are you doing!?
Just Moooove!!!
Then you got this box truck running the light, or this dude who’s in some kind of rush.
Finally you got me, crossing 5 lanes on the highway in one fell swoop, pro skills.
Anyway with that aside the only real glitch I've run into were some corrupted frames that
popped up seemingly at random during playback.
Out of the 40+ hours of video that I've actually reviewed there may have been 12 corrupted
frames that were obvious like this one.
In the grand scheme of things it seems not to be a major issue unless of course it’s
right when you need it.
To my best estimation I’ve recorded roughly 400 hours of footage since I installed the
DR02.
Doing some back of the napkin math with the above ratio I came to estimate a corruption
level of about 0.8% or roughly 3 full minutes of unusable footage from those 400 hours of
recording.
When I first noticed these corrupted frames I decided to see if switching SD cards would
make a difference.
So I took out the Kingston 64gb class 10 UHS-1 grade SD card, which on its own is a good
quality card, and popped in a Samsung 128gb class UHS-3 grade SD card but after 3 months
I noticed the same corrupted frames occurring at pretty much the same rate.
So I have to believe there must be a transcoding issue from the camera itself or some cosmic
bit flipping.
Again this hasn’t been a big issue but I’ll be curious to see if it gets worse.
Other than that I really don’t have any complaints, the video quality is excellent
during the day, at night, and everything in between.
All the pieces have stood the test of time this far, something I can’t say about some
other cameras so I’ll still recommend it especially if you don’t plan or need to
move it from one car to another frequently.
Now time to go over some more of the most frequently asked questions from the last year.
This will actually be a two parter, I’m dedicating a whole video for the motion detection
feature and what you need to make it work when the car is parked.
It’s more complicated than it sounds and there’s a lot to cover, so hit that subscribe
button and tap to bell to get notified when that video comes out.
One item I didn’t go over is how to adjust the camera’s view.
The body of the camera does not actually move when mounted.
Only the housing the holds the lens and sensor can actually move.
It can tilt vertically down as far as 90 degrees from its original position
and locks in at 15 degree intervals, so weather you drive a H1 Hummer with a straight vertical
windshield or a GT60 with a crazy back slopped windshield the camera will always have a great
view.
Now about that gray double sided tape that comes preinstalled on the mounts.
As I eluded too and many of you have confirmed this gray color just stands out far too much.
So soon after installing my camera I replaced the gray double sided tape with the same 3M
double sided VHB adhesive but in black.
VHB apparently stands for “Very High Bond”, who knew?
I bought a 1 inch wide by 15 foot long roll on Amazon for $14.
15 feet is a lot just for this application but this stuff is useful for so many things
so I’m good.
To replace the stock tape I first removed the camera from the mount, used a safety blade
to carefully pull off the bracket so not to scratch up the windshield, peeled off the
old tape and replaced it with about three centimeters, one and a quarter inch length
of the new black tape.
That’s all you really need.
I adhered it back in place and voila, much better, of course you can also use it for
the cable loops!
Highly recommended, link to the roll I bought will be in the description.
Next up the Emergency Recording mode, it’s the first button in the lineup below the screen
and honestly I didn’t realize what it did until recently and it’s pretty important
if you remember to hit when needed.
When activated it puts the current recording and any recording that follows while it’s
active into a separate folder from all the other footage.
This protects it from being overwritten no matter how much more standard mode footage
is recorded.
Of course if you forget that Emergency Recording mode is on you will fill up your memory card
until it’s full.
It will only turn off when you turn off the camera.
You’ll know it’s active because this small warning icon will be at the top of the screen.
I’ve read in a couple comments that some other customers have had issues with dates
not recording properly or settings being reverted to default after powering down.
Unfortunately I can’t speak to this issue as I have not experienced it while I’ve
owned mine.
Last but not least, the glare from the dashboard has been a bane since I first bought my car.
After researching a few things I settled on getting a mat for the dashboard.
I was still pretty skeptical about it so I tried to find the cheapest one that fits the
weirdly shaped and oddly large dash of the 2013 Honda Fit.
After leaving the $50+ mats on Amazon behind, I found this one on Ebay for $15 with free
shipping from China, funny enough made by a company called Xukey, maybe they are the
24th cousin of Aukey?
It took 3 weeks to arrive but it was worth the wait.
The initial quality was surprisingly good, clean edges (mostly), super soft, it just
felt like a decent quality item.
Can’t beat it for the price.
It was really easy to install, it pretty much stays in place on its own but to be safe it
comes with a handful of tabs with velco on one the top to stick to the underside of the
mat and 3M tape on the other side to adhere to the dash itself.
I only used 8 or so to secure down the corners and odd sticky outy bits.
Having used it for a few months I have no complaints about its fit and finish.
The really amazing part is the fix to glaring issue.
Just look at the before and after here, it is a world of difference, I don’t know why
I didn’t try this earlier.
Technically there still a reflection on the wind shield but because the matt is black
and fuzzy, instead of flat plastic it actually feels like the view out of the window is gamma
corrected and crisper than before.
100% recommend to use a dash mat to fix this problem.
Link to where to buy it on eBay will be below.
Well that’s it for this video.
If you liked it consider subscribing and checking me out at cktechcheck.com, thanks again everyone,
see you all next time!