Stick with Sentry Mode/Tesla Cam or invest in Blackvue?

[spon88]

I've tried Sentry mode with varying success. Overall it's a bit flaky in that sensitivity seems to vary with new updates and rain sets if off quite a lot. Night resolution is also pretty poor. So now I just use it in "dodgy" parking locations. It's switched off at night and I rely on good quality home CCTV. I also experimented with a Blink XT wireless cam in the car parked at home which works but is a bit clunky.

The Tesla dash cam works Ok'ish but resolution is a bit pants and unloading an SSD is a bit of a pain. Also nickable.

Ideally I want something that is high-res, can be left on without nailing the battery and also uploads to the cloud. Am I looking at £500 for Blackvue or is there an alternative? Or do I stick with Sentry for locations away from home and the inbuilt dash cam?

What do you folks do please?

 

[ACarneiro]

I’d go Blackvue. Would need to find someone to install it properly though.

 

[Cowpring]

Teslas are so setup to sync to the cloud...I mean the car has a built in LTE connection, hopefully they will implement that at some point..probably not a massive priority right now. The filesizes aren't huge either so totally doable. Also being able to view dashcam footage on the Tesla screen would be nice.

I never use Sentry at home (park my car in a secure underground car park with hundreds of CCTV cameras), and only use it sometimes when away from home, like at a 'dodgey' location as you say.

The resolution only needs to be high enough to make out what's going on, catch a reg, etc. I've found even in the dark it's fine.

 

[spon88]

Teslas are so setup to sync to the cloud...I mean the car has a built in LTE connection, hopefully they will implement that at some point..probably not a massive priority right now. The filesizes aren't huge either so totally doable. Also being able to view dashcam footage on the Tesla screen would be nice.

I never use Sentry at home (park my car in a secure underground car park with hundreds of CCTV cameras), and only use it sometimes when away from home, like at a 'dodgey' location as you say.

The resolution only needs to be high enough to make out what's going on, catch a reg, etc. I've found even in the dark it's fine.

Good point about possible future development. May just hold off for a while as the tech is already there to do what's needed as you point out. Plus the Blackvue kit is not without issues having just done a bit more research

 

[tess19]

Apart from a bit of phantom drain, sentry mode is a no brainer. I would use that even if getting the blackvue. Cannot have enough cameras... I dont use sentry at home either and treat sentry mode a bit of a bonus. All the ICE cars i used to own never had any OEM camera let alone 4.

 

[Daverh]

I'm tempted by the BlackVue so I'm waiting to see if they release a new product at CES (7th - 10th Jan).
There are 3rd party apps for the wifi connected ones that will auto-download recordings when connected to your home wifi, which is similar to what you can do with the TeslaCam/Sentry recordings.

 

[webbah]

I went with a Blackvue 900S dual channel and also installed a Teltonika RUT850 LTE auto router. Perfect setup for me. The video quality of the Sentry videos is sub par (hard to read license plates, etc) and also has significant phantom drain.

 

[Penfold]

Defo get Blackview of Thinkware professionally installed (Simon Home). Although the Tesla DashCam/sentry is good it doesn’t beat having a dedicated system installed. Someone hit mine and the Thinkware F800 Pro that I have had the data needed whereas Tesla data was helpful but wasn’t specific for the angle I needed. Having both at least gives you a better chance. Also, use SSD for Tesla cameras, I have been through about 10 different variants of USB sticks and MMC cards all causing MCU startup slowdowns and crashing, since switching to SSD not had a problem.

 

[ACarneiro]

Has the BlackVue had any significant impact in battery life? Would it be easy to turn off manually?

 

[Daverh]

Has the BlackVue had any significant impact in battery life? Would it be easy to turn off manually?

The BlackVue uses around 5w (380mA average) compared to 200w (please correct me if I'm wrong) of sentry mode so the effect on battery life should be negligible.

 

[ACarneiro]

Just had a BlackVue DS900 (front and rear) installed by Simon Holbon.
Absolutely 5 star service, wires concealed, installed at my place in just over an hour.
The man clearly knows what he’s doing.

 

[Rooster6655]

Just had a BlackVue DS900 (front and rear) installed by Simon Holbon.
Absolutely 5 star service, wires concealed, installed at my place in just over an hour.
The man clearly knows what he’s doing.

What were the costs involved if its not a secret?

 

[DJP31]

Just had a BlackVue DS900 (front and rear) installed by Simon Holbon.
Absolutely 5 star service, wires concealed, installed at my place in just over an hour.
The man clearly knows what he’s doing.

He’s a bit of a Tesla legend is Simon. He used to do so many in one day the rumour was he didn’t actually sleep. He also fits better interior LED’s and that sort of thing.

 

[DJP31]

What were the costs involved if its not a secret?

The tesla accessories

 

[Arran]

Apologies to bring an old thread to life but wanted some input on the best solution to Tesla & BlackVue cameras.

I want to invest in a 24/7 Recording option for my Tesla. I'm completely new to the BlackVue ecosystem, and wonder what would be best for a low-power recording option. Can it be done via the cigarette lighter? etc.

 

[Mr H]

The cigarette lighter socket goes dead once the car goes to sleep. You can either fit a power bank or else wire direct to the 12v at the front

 

[RedMod3]

I fitted a Blackvue 900X front and rear cameras to my Mod3, not too difficult. I uploaded videos on how I did it in one of the threads, It's not too hard.

 

[GlynG]

I've had Blackvue for over 10 years in cars - two actually, two separate cameras one in the front and one in the rear - both connected to a power magic box which monitors the battery and will shut down the cameras if the battery voltage falls below either 12 volts or 11.5 settable by yourself - this prevents discharge to the point the car wouldn't start - never had a problem with them and super 1080p recordings - brilliant at night too, I enabled parking mode so anyone wandering around the car would trigger recordings as would anyone opening a door into the side of my car.

I left the cameras in my RS when i sold it to buy the M3.

I am pleased so far with sentry and think its sufficient - though mine does tend to record events that show bugger all i would classify as an event - so I'm confident anyone lurking or creating damage would be captured - so no intention of going back to Blackvue at this time.

Blackvue aren't cheap, my 900 was around £350 and the 650 i had in the rear around £300 when new though you can get dual cameras models that record onto the main camera unit and they have wifi - so can view on your phone all recordings and the live view.

 

[curmudgeon]

I've had Blackvue for over 10 years in cars - two actually, two separate cameras one in the front and one in the rear - both connected to a power magic box which monitors the battery and will shut down the cameras if the battery voltage falls below either 12 volts or 11.5 settable by yourself - this prevents discharge to the point the car wouldn't start - never had a problem with them and super 1080p recordings - brilliant at night too, I enabled parking mode so anyone wandering around the car would trigger recordings as would anyone opening a door into the side of my car.

What is the parking mode event-detection sensitivity like on the blackvue?
I have a VIOFO and the event detection in parking mode is way too sensitive so that it records 80% of the time, which is pretty useless really.

 

[curmudgeon]

The cigarette lighter socket goes dead once the car goes to sleep. You can either fit a power bank or else wire direct to the 12v at the front

Power bank connected to the lighter seems the way to go for parking mode. There are reports around that connecting directly to the 12v battery results in error codes and a service visit to fix.