Expandable memory for dash cams. I need a SD to USB

[mckutzy]

After getting into an accident a couple of months ago, I have been looking for a reasonable back up camera/Dash Cam. Now, some seem to be really expensive and then there are a number that are in-between...

I would like a rear view mirror, but currently I have a Comercial bed cap, with no windows(if it had, I wouldn't be able to see much anyways), so seeing is no possible.
I have seen a few of the rear cameras for RV's and a couple that record. So one camera out back for both aswell..

I noticed that they typically all have a SD/SDmicro card for data storage. but the lasting footage is only about 4 hrs with some of the top cards.. not to mention that a high capacity card is really expensive....

Ive been looking for an adapter for MALE SD(or SDmicro) to usb.
No such thing as of late.
This is something but no longer produced...

This, if anything would be good, but Id need it to be in usb for a thumbdrive ect..

The main reason, to have storage elsewhere in a safer hidden location and to have a much larger memory to store driving footage.

What can I do, or to build one?....

 

[itsid]

Well there's a keyword I cannot currently remember you need to look out for.
essentially the camera is recording all the time, but only to it's rather large RAM not an SD card or other physical memory
Then in case of a crash the RAM is dumped to the card
(ram stores usually around 60 seconds of video)
and the recording continues now directly to the card for a fixed amount of time
(I think ten minutes?)

crash recording or such?... crash detection recording? pre crash memory? *shrugs* can't remember... you'll find it.

With that you need no cast amount of storage at all..
the problem otherwise will persist.
SD cards have limited write cycles
once that limit is reached, nothing will be stored to the sd card ever again.
And a card in your dash cam is amongst the first you will forget to swap after a year or so.

The technology of the camera is the important bit of those writecycles.
open, write, close, open, write, close for example uses two such write cycles
while open, write, wait, write, wait, write, close uses just ONE
cheap cameras usually hit hard on the SD cards lifespan because of that

And now comes the worst part:
a thumbdrive suffers from the exact same flaw (limited write cycles)
BUT those are usually far fewer compared to an SD card.
and also.. thumbdrives are slower than fast SD cards,
so it'd be likely that you cannot even record HD video to a thumbdrive at all
(not without missing frames)
currently around here a 256GB SDXC card costs around 30 bucks
the camera you'd want has at least
decent video chip, good low light capability, glass lens, gentle on the SD write cycles...
And that's usually something upwards of 150 tbh...

So the alternative really would be an external harddrive
BUT IDK if you can route from a microSD slot to an external hard drive reliably ..
especially not for fast data transfer rates (which you will need for high definition video)
at lesat you'd need a powerbrick to have the harddrive powered by the car so it actually could do anything

IDK what kind of effort you want to put into this,
something alike is readily available:
a different bred of "dash cam" (Car DVRs) those are essentially small footprint computers that record to a hard drive instead of a microSD card and usually you can attach up to four external cameras
maybe one of those would suit your needs a bit better *shrugs*
mounted below the passenger seat for example it's tucked away from everything,
you need some clever cable routing to mount the cameras of course..

'sid

 

[Whitetrashrocker]

Itsid, your an encyclopedia.

 

[jmaack]

blackvue 2 channel. a little pricey but front and rear cams can be setup to always run even if you arent in car. with a small addition will shut down if your car battery gets to low.

 

[mckutzy]

Okay.. thanks guys...
As I thought.. its not that easy...I was thinking thumbdrive but any higher capacity item would do.. even one of those new ssd back up drives...

Its kinda a shame I just sold my Pi computer I had a little while ago to a buddy of mine...
That would be the thing your talking about for a small form factor computer to run a recording system...
At least those computers are cheap...

 

[itsid]

A Raspbery Pi with touchdisplay powerbrick and case can be bought new for ~70 €

I'm not too confident in SSDs as of yet (I'm old.. new tech is witchery and such)
So I'd settle for a 2.5 conventianl HDD but anyways.. say 40 bucks for the SATA drive
Another 40 bucks for a high quality webcam or a fisheye camera specifically meant to adapt to the raspberry

150 total
(a dedicated set from china costs less and has the software already written)

banana Pi then?...

I'll look around to see what's what and what kinda makes sense...
I'll let you know by sunday if I can come up with a DIY solution that's less than 100 local monetary units

'sid

 

[jmaack]

what software would be run on pi? haven't really heard of anyone basically building dash cam. Pretty interesting.

 

[itsid]

well the PI takes an operating system first (linux mostly)
and the software you run is ...well.. based on that

I think there's an RTOS for Pi and essentially a number of smaller niche OSes
I think most people just run some type of Linux

'sid

 

[jmaack]

well the PI takes an operating system first (linux mostly)
and the software you run is ...well.. based on that

I think there's an RTOS for Pi and essentially a number of smaller niche OSes
I think most people just run some type of Linux

'sid

j know about pis and their linux. I had never heard of one being used as a dash cam and was wondering if there was something dash cam variety os such as retro pi etc.

 

[itsid]

ready made distros to be used in dashcam (or other video surveillance mode)
Maybe..
likely there are ready made packages that can be installed on top of a random linux distro
at least..
If there isn't.. it's a Pi for crying out loud.. do it then.. that's what it's made for!
(a pi is NOT meant for users to install readymade stuff and call it DIY.. it's for people that actually create new stuff originally)

So yeah, what's not already there and can't be built upon must be created from scratch... so what?

'sid

PS a reasonably well sorted list of hackerboards can be found here:
https://www.hackerboards.com/home.php
you can search for specific features (which is nice) and see what the different boards have to offer...


[EDIT]
Well then turns out the Raspberry still hides the HOST Data Bus (pulled low on the pcb)
and the only other reasonably fast Data bus only ever was made to work for NAND Flash according to the internet..
so no direct SATA controller you can slap on.
a USB to SATA would only slow the already slow USB2.0 down.
So no Raspberry (wait the RPi4 has usb 3.0 right?)

Roseapple Pi has a USB 3.0 Port which would make an external harddrive feasible
but you also need the camera so

banana Pi has some Sata equipped ... but it's technically overkill for the task at hand

EspressoBin is the cheapest sata equipped board I can see atm (50) but it doesn't have a camera adapter but comes with two USB ports (at least one of which is 3.0)
it also doesn't have onboard wifi or bluetooth nor a graphics adapter to hook a screen up...
but it has a pci slot to mount a wifi/bluetooth dongle the easy way (one from an old laptop for example)
the best candidate so far IYAM.. but still not ideal ... (still above 100 buckaroos)

Sorry, doesn't look to good so far..
a chinese car DVR is likely to be the way to go then...

'sid

PS a reasonable well sorted list of hacker board can be found here:
https://www.hackerboards.com/home.php
you can search for specific features that you need for example, which is nice.