At my age, my forgetter is operating at 95% capacity. With a buncha these things which require holding my mouth different for each one, the simpler the process the better.
I like the #16 procedure... push the button, get the light. Push the other button, get the blinking.

My #16 flashes yellow led 5 times and then shuts down. I have flashed fw before for updated fw, no problem. My 16 is AVI. I've tried reset etc from trouble shooting. No bueno Now what to do. HELP.

Originally Posted by clarebanner

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEp_pOT0Kik

That's a pretty definitive comparison, thanks. The color saturation on the #16 is more realistic to some. The GoPro Hero has that "Kodak moment" saturation as a default.

Originally Posted by clarebanner

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEp_pOT0Kik

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I just received a Hobby King A-cam.... with the wide angle lens setup.
It's a lot wider than the #16, I like it.
The barrel distortion is only obvious when there's lots of vertical lines near the edge of the frame. The bent horizon doesn't make itself as obvious as it does with the GoPro.
The camera itself appears to be a very modified 808.. the timestamp resembles the #13, but the video rate is 30 fps, not 15. Images are clear, with little color shifting when it's looking up or down.
Bulkier, and less easy to mount.
It comes with NO information at all! NONE!

Originally Posted by Sparky Paul

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I just received a Hobby King A-cam.... with the wide angle lens setup.
It's a lot wider than the #16, I like it.
The barrel distortion is only obvious when there's lots of vertical lines near the edge of the frame. The bent horizon doesn't make itself as obvious as it does with the GoPro.
The camera itself appears to be a very modified 808.. the timestamp resembles the #13, but the video rate is 30 fps, not 15. Images are clear, with little color shifting when it's looking up or down.
Bulkier, and less easy to mount.
It comes with NO information at all! NONE!

Well if you like MJPEG encoding and the HUGE 720p files it creates, go for it. There is very noticeable distortion anytime the horizon does not pass near the lens center point with these cheap wide angle lenses. Anyway, this camera is discussed other thread(s) in this forum, so any further discussion should be continued there.

I took advantage of the excellent weather yesterday to do some coasting uphill riding at the Mystery Spot, with two #16s.. one on my helmet and one on my leg.
Looking at the videos, I noticed a difference in the times. Checking against a WWV clock, one was running 15 seconds fast, the other 1:25 fast.
Resynced bofem with nr16setup, and now one is 2 seconds slow, the other 3 seconds slow.
It'll be interesting watching the time drift, if they do.

Originally Posted by camcc

Hi,

two question of one who is still waiting for his 808 #16 cam...

1.) Is it possible to downgrade the firmware of the camera without problems and extra risks?
2.) Where can I get older firmware versions?

Thank you very much in advance for any help!
Best regards,
camcc

No, not possible. I have older versions of the firmware, but they all will re-introduce squashed bugs and/or degrade color fidelity or stability... possibly resulting a corrupted file. Why would you want to do this? PM me with your email address and the version number you want, and I'll send it to you, but don't say you weren't warned.

Originally Posted by Tom Frank

Well if you like MJPEG encoding and the HUGE 720p files it creates, go for it. There is very noticeable distortion anytime the horizon does not pass near the lens center point with these cheap wide angle lenses. Anyway, this camera is discussed other thread(s) in this forum, so any further discussion should be continued there.

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There's no choice. AVI files are larger, etc.. but can be converted to mp4, which I do when I put a file on YouTube.
The wide angle lens is what I want. Gluing something on the front of a #16 lens has no appeal to me. On the aforementioned bike ride, a wider angle lens on the cameras would have been nice, to show the situation.

Originally Posted by Mike F

My #16 flashes yellow led 5 times and then shuts down. I have flashed fw before for updated fw, no problem. My 16 is AVI. I've tried reset etc from trouble shooting. No bueno Now what to do. HELP.

That 5 flash led/shut down is, I think, a failure during the camera's self-checking boot sequence. For instance, if it finds the CMOS module to be non-responsive, it will not turn on. You could check to make sure the ribbon cable connector is well seated and making good contact on all pins. I unplug it, make sure there's no bent or dirty pins or contacts (if possible... they are very small!), then plug it back in, makes sure it is fully seated and the small locking pad on the sides are slid into position (refer to the manufacturer's brief instruction sheet for more info and pictures on how to removed the plug... it's linked in the FAQs section in post #3... follow all the links).

But that may have nothing to do with the failed condition and it could be a more serious component failure that is not user fixable!

ERROR: Expiration date past. RIP!

If the camera is fairly new, you might contact your eBay seller for a resolution.

Originally Posted by Sparky Paul

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There's no choice. AVI files are larger, etc.. but can be converted to mp4, which I do when I put a file on YouTube.
The wide angle lens is what I want. Gluing something on the front of a #16 lens has no appeal to me. On the aforementioned bike ride, a wider angle lens on the cameras would have been nice, to show the situation.

Many like the wider angle lens, and one with suitable AOV and quality is still being sought for the #16 camera according to the developer. I hope to have one for testing at some point.

But for clarification, AVI format has virtually nothing to do with the file size... it's just a wrapper for the encoded data. It's the MJPEG encoding it uses, which stores JPEG compressed full pictures for each frame that is the issue. MJPEG compression requires 3-4 times the data rate to get equal quality compared to the H.264 encoding used with the 808 HD cameras, and that makes the files that many time larger. Your posted image shows that... the HK camera used over 22Mbps average for MJPEG compression compared to a nominal 7Mbps average for H.264 compressed #16 files. You can convince yourself by taking a #11 or #16 MOV file, run it through MP4cam2AVI utility which will extract the video and audio streams and re-package with no re-compression in an AVI container format. Compare the sizes... negligible difference. Or, load the AVI firmware into your #16 and shoot the same scene with it along side the HK camera... compare the file sizes... HK files will be MUCH larger...close to 3 times larger, I predict.

The file sizes don't bother me.
Getting the image at all is what I want.
After that, the manipulation is not that big a deal.

Originally Posted by Sparky Paul

The file sizes don't bother me.
Getting the image at all is what I want.
After that, the manipulation is not that big a deal.

I'm glad that works well for you. I mentioned it only for others who are concerned about how many minutes of video they can record on a given flash card size with the #16. Since the #16 has firmware to record in both MOV and AVI formats, I wanted to be sure they weren't left with the impression that AVI inherently produces much larger files. With H.264 compression, they will be very close to the same size.

Originally Posted by Tom Frank

That 5 flash led/shut down is, I think, a failure during the camera's self-checking boot sequence. For instance, if it finds the CMOS module to be non-responsive, it will not turn on. You could check to make sure the ribbon cable connector is well seated and making good contact on all pins. I unplug it, make sure there's no bent or dirty pins or contacts (if possible... they are very small!), then plug it back in, makes sure it is fully seated and the small locking pad on the sides are slid into position (refer to the manufacturer's brief instruction sheet for more info and pictures on how to removed the plug... it's linked in the FAQs section in post #3... follow all the links).

But that may have nothing to do with the failed condition and it could be a more serious component failure that is not user fixable!

ERROR: Expiration date past. RIP!

If the camera is fairly new, you might contact your eBay seller for a resolution.

Thank you Sir. Ive contacted the seller and ordered a second #16.
Mike F

I have some questions that I've not been able to solve by reading the docs nor the forum:

1.- Does the camera charge the battery when plugged to the USB but switched ON (recognized as a drive by the SO) or does it only charge when the led is green?

2.- How much battery is used when the camera is unplugged and ON but not recording: nothing, very little, a bit less than recording, the same as recording?

Originally Posted by Gradius

I have some questions that I've not been able to solve by reading the docs nor the forum:

1.- Does the camera charge the battery when plugged to the USB but switched ON (recognized as a drive by the SO) or does it only charge when the led is green?

2.- How much battery is used when the camera is unplugged and ON but not recording: nothing, very little, a bit less than recording, the same as recording?

1. Battery will charge when the camera USB port is connected to a 5V standard USB source, whether it is recording, in standy, or off. The Green LED may be on then or off (off means battery is not accepting a charge and doesn't need any).

2. About 120-140 mA in standby (charging current is limited to about 140 mA max), about double that when recording, and VERY small when off (only powering the internal clock (in the low microamp range, I think).