The dreaded no recording... just happened to me :eek:

[tchavei]

So... after a few weeks of testing the A139 Pro on the bench, yesterday I finally installed it in my car. Tested parking mode (Event mode) for a couple of hours and normal mode while driving around , everything great.

So at around 16:30 (4:30pm for Americans), I park the car and leave it.

Today, at 8:00 (after almost 16h in parking mode) I enter the car and after 30 seconds (Like I've setup in the device), I'm welcomed with "two channel recording started". Cool. I leave the kids at their schools and go to work. When I park, I think "I wonder how many files did the dashcam record during the night" because yesterday, during my initial test, it recorded every car that passed by while in parking mode. I could actually count the number of recordings and match it with the amount of cars that passed in that parking lot.

To my dismay, there were dozens, if not hundred of park recording files since I left the car at 16:30. Ok, it could be the tree leafs that triggered the recordings. But... the last recorded video was at 23:22!!! Nothing else after that! Not even my morning trip to leave the kids at school!!! It clearly wasn't some sort of power outage because I have it connected to a LiFePO4 battery (nominal 13.5V, was at 13.2V this morning) and even if it was, the woman inside the cam clearly said "Two channel recording started" which was a complete lie! If I had an accident while taking the kids to school, there would be no records!

I eventually powered down the dashcam by pulling the plug, waited 30 seconds and replugged it. After that, it started to record properly (I checked with the app that new clips were being produced) but my confidence in this €300+ dashcam is 0 right now. What am I supposed to do? I can't trust it for parking mode (it stopped recording at 23:22 so any burglar / thief / Ill intentioned person could have done whatever at 3 am) and not even in normal mode because it didn't record the school trip.

I'm pretty much terrified right now

PS: I formatted the SD card yesterday in the dashcam after installing the device in my car. It was full previously with my bench experiments. So it can't even be an "overwriting" problem

 

[SPL15]

I have the same type of issues on occasion, seems to be related to heat, as it occurs only on bright sunny days & 75F+ temps. It appears the dashcam locks up when it gets hot, where I need to unplug power to reboot it. When it’s locked up, buttons don’t respond; however, the LEDs are lit. There’s no real indication that the unit is locked up & not recording, just no beeps when I press any buttons

 

[tchavei]

I have the same type of issues on occasion, seems to be related to heat, as it occurs only on bright sunny days & 75F+ temps. It appears the dashcam locks up when it gets hot, where I need to unplug power to reboot it. When it’s locked up, buttons don’t respond; however, the LEDs are lit. There’s no real indication that the unit is locked up & not recording, just no beeps when I press any buttons

Thank you for your answer. Heat will be a major problem around where I live BUT... the cam locked up at 23:22 (almost midnight) so no heat there.

However I just checked the packaging of the stuff I received and the sd card is a "Sandisk High Endurance 128GB". When I go to viofo.com, it's listed as "Not recommended" for the A139 Pro (in FAQ)... Now my question is... since I bought the dashcam + Hardwire kit + SD card from Viofo Benelux (which is Viofo's official Partner as far as I know), how in earth did they send me a card that is not recommended to use with this cam?

I wonder if the card filled up at around 23:22 and for some strange reason couldn't overwrite the existing files? This never happened on the bench (it started overwriting fine) but what do I know... right?

 

[VIOFO-Support]

Thank you for your answer. Heat will be a major problem around where I live BUT... the cam locked up at 23:22 (almost midnight) so no heat there.

However I just checked the packaging of the stuff I received and the sd card is a "Sandisk High Endurance 128GB". When I go to viofo.com, it's listed as "Not recommended" for the A139 Pro (in FAQ)... Now my question is... since I bought the dashcam + Hardwire kit + SD card from Viofo Benelux (which is Viofo's official Partner as far as I know), how in earth did they send me a card that is not recommended to use with this cam?

I wonder if the card filled up at around 23:22 and for some strange reason couldn't overwrite the existing files? This never happened on the bench (it started overwriting fine) but what do I know... right?

So sorry for the inconvenience. The card you use is not recommended actually, which may cause issues you met. And we will also remind our dealer to avoid such kind of misleading.

 

[tchavei]

So sorry for the inconvenience. The card you use is not recommended actually, which may cause issues you met. And we will also remind our dealer to avoid such kind of misleading.

Thank you for your answer.

At this point, I'm convinced it locked up when transitioning from an empty card (writing) to a full card (overwriting). Once I rebooted it with the card full, it started (and continued) in overwriting and hasn't failed since (I've been checking every morning after arriving to work). In any case, I've contacted Viofo Benelux and I hope they will make this right. Doesn't make sense supplying an incompatible card. In the meanwhile, I also ordered a Sandisk Extreme 256GB (V30, A2, U3) for peace of mind.

I'll report if it happens again

 

[tchavei]

I'm still waiting for the extreme card to arrive (hopefully tomorrow) but in the meanwhile it happen again. Stopped recording yesterday at midnight. Only found out about it today at 8pm.

Regardless if it's a card issue (I pray it is) or not, the woman inside the dashcam can't say "2 channel recording started" when the dashcam isn't recording anything.

Please add some control or sanity check that the message is only played if files are actually being written to sd card. It's very misleading making the user think everything is OK when it's not.

 

[majones]

Are you using the HK3-C Hardwire Kit? If so, how is the LiFePO4 battery incorporated? If not, how are you powering the parking mode?

 

[tchavei]

Are you using the HK3-C Hardwire Kit? If so, how is the LiFePO4 battery incorporated? If not, how are you powering the parking mode?

Yes I'm using the hk3-c kit and the lifepo4 battery is the car one.

It's not a power issue. I have a bm2 battery monitor hooked up directly to the hk3-c constant 12V and it never gets below 13.2V (the kit is set to shut down at 12.5)

Actually, the only way to get the dashcam working again is to unplug it physically from the USB-C for 10 seconds.

Until then, it pretends it's recording (even in phone app) but isn't creating any clips. Wish there was a way of pulling a system log so developers could have a look at what is happening. Seems to happen every 4 days?

 

[majones]

Yes I'm using the hk3-c kit and the lifepo4 battery is the car one.

It's not a power issue. I have a bm2 battery monitor hooked up directly to the hk3-c constant 12V and it never gets below 13.2V (the kit is set to shut down at 12.5)

Actually, the only way to get the dashcam working again is to unplug it physically from the USB-C for 10 seconds.

Until then, it pretends it's recording (even in phone app) but isn't creating any clips. Wish there was a way of pulling a system log so developers could have a look at what is happening. Seems to happen every 4 days?

Looks like you know your stuff! I bench tested mine using a 5V USB power supply and a switch to emulate ignition on/off and the HK3-C kit before installing it, so you may want to try that to replicate the behaviour off the car. The reason I'm suggesting it is because you may have funny car management stuff going on between the battery and your fuse box. I read somewhere that BMW owners have a problem finding a continuous live.

 

[tchavei]

Looks like you know your stuff! I bench tested mine using a 5V USB power supply and a switch to emulate ignition on/off and the HK3-C kit before installing it, so you may want to try that to replicate the behaviour off the car. The reason I'm suggesting it is because you may have funny car management stuff going on between the battery and your fuse box. I read somewhere that BMW owners have a problem finding a continuous live.

Yeah. That's exactly the reason I installed the battery monitor right into the hk3 circuit. Well actually it was because I didn't want to have multiple points of entry. It's a new car. But having the battery monitor hooked up on the same 12V line as the hk3 kit is perfect because any power dip or even cut out would clearly show on the monitor and there's no gap nor dip



I don't know. At this point I'm praying it's the stupid card and it will get fixed with the Sandisk extreme because otherwise... I'm out of ideas except changing brands. I really like the A139 Pro specs and it was a nightmare to install the hk3 kit and route all the wires. I really would want to avoid having to rip it all out and repeat it for another dashcam but the prime function of a dashcam is to record video at any time. If that fails, what's left?

I would really like someone to chime in here and say: "Hey, I've been running the A139 Pro for 60 days non stop (auto switching from parking mode to drive mode and vice versa) and it never failed to record a clip".

I spent the day driving around, entering and exiting the car multiple times and was always greeted with "2 channel recording started" yet it didn't actually saved a single clip all day

 

[majones]

Good precaution to monitor your battery voltage across the A139 Pro - so no room for doubt there! I've had my A139 Pro with front and rear cameras for about a month and the video capture has been rock solid. I'm using an Integral microSD card designated for "Dash Cam Security and High Endurance" that isn't on the Viofo approved list but is sold by Viofo UK and has the memory type of Viofo's own cards (MLC) plus a temperature rating up to 85 dec-C. Is the problem your card? - I don't know - and why are SD cards being treated as mystical entities when the specifications of a "good" card should be technical, not trial-and-error. One problem I have had is that "locked" videos aren't always stored in the "RO" (read only?) folder. I'm in dialogue with Viofo about that, but the problem isn't to do with videos not being recorded, rather the handling of those that have.

 

[mikey94025]

What firmware version are you running? To verify - You checked the card and it is missing the video files, right (not just that the app doesn't display recent recordings)? And was your card full when it stopped recording?

 

[tchavei]

Good precaution to monitor your battery voltage across the A139 Pro - so no room for doubt there! I've had my A139 Pro with front and rear cameras for about a month and the video capture has been rock solid. I'm using an Integral microSD card designated for "Dash Cam Security and High Endurance" that isn't on the Viofo approved list but is sold by Viofo UK and has the memory type of Viofo's own cards (MLC) plus a temperature rating up to 85 dec-C. Is the problem your card? - I don't know - and why are SD cards being treated as mystical entities when the specifications of a "good" card should be technical, not trial-and-error. One problem I have had is that "locked" videos aren't always stored in the "RO" (read only?) folder. I'm in dialogue with Viofo about that, but the problem isn't to do with videos not being recorded, rather the handling of those that have.

I don't know but viofo.com clearly lists the Sandisk HIGH Endurance as problematic and that's exactly what I got from viofo.nl

I spoke with viofo.nl and if my issues are solved with the new card, I can send the other card back for a refund.

If it doesn't get solved, I suspect I'll be sending back the whole thing.

What firmware version are you running? To verify - You checked the card and it is missing the video files, right (not just that the app doesn't display recent recordings)? And was your card full when it stopped recording?

I'm running 1.1_321

No, I didn't check on the PC BUT... Once I cycled the power (pull the plug) on the dashcam it started showing new clips from that point on. There was still a gap between May 30th at 00:30 and May 31st 20:00

If it were that app bug I've read on another thread, it wouldn't have that gap, right?

And yes, the card has been full for days. Afaik a 128gb card will only be OK for about 4h of continuous recording before it fills up.

 

[mikey94025]

I'm running 1.1_321

No, I didn't check on the PC BUT... Once I cycled the power (pull the plug) on the dashcam it started showing new clips from that point on. There was still a gap between May 30th at 00:30 and May 31st 20:00

You're probably right but it's still worth checking the card contents to be certain (while you wait for your new card). If it is just an app display bug then try the special firmware fix here.

A "dashcam stops overwriting files" bug is a little less scary than "dashcam random stops recording" bug. What size files are you using (1 min)? Other than parking mode have you changed other settings from the defaults? The bug seems to affect only a subset of customers so maybe it surfaces only with certain settings along with parking mode.

 

[tchavei]

You're probably right but it's still worth checking the card contents to be certain (while you wait for your new card). If it is just an app display bug then try the special firmware fix here.

A "dashcam stops overwriting files" bug is a little less scary than "dashcam random stops recording" bug. What size files are you using (1 min)? Other than parking mode have you changed other settings from the defaults? The bug seems to affect only a subset of customers so maybe it surfaces only with certain settings along with parking mode.

I think both are scary situations because in the end you don't have any footage.

Here are all my settings



I checked on the app and the gap remains. Will pull the sdcard and check on pc but chances are slim

 

[tchavei]

Ok. The sandisk extreme was just delivered.

Formated on pc, shutdown the DC, replaced the cards, booted up, formated card inside the DC again, factory reset, setup everything from scratch.

And now we wait.

If this holds up for the next 10 days, I'll start trusting it.

I'll report back.

 

[DaCerne]

Ok. The sandisk extreme was just delivered.

Formated on pc, shutdown the DC, replaced the cards, booted up, formated card inside the DC again, factory reset, setup everything from scratch.

And now we wait.

If this holds up for the next 10 days, I'll start trusting it.

I'll report back.

you will be back here sooner than you think.

Been there - done that...

Had the same issues, over and over, used various memory cards from the original VIOFO to SANDISK extreme, various amounts of card memories from 64-256GB, and various apps to format the memory card, even VIOFO send me one, but nothing helped. Many issues including disappearing "protected" videos (like literally disappearing - yesterday was 10x protected videos in the RO folder, today - none. VIOFO suggested that even videos in the RO folder will eventually be overwritten when the capacity of the memory card will reach less than 30% of memory. What on Earth is that kinda news? Since when? I ask you to point it out for me in the official detailed description of that. The issue I have is not even overwritten issue as there are 40GB left out of 256GB (239GB) on the memory card left. Same - 2CH recording - only front camera footage on the card, connected interior camera, the dashcam freezes after few hours of standby (parking mode - auto event). Motion sensitivity on LOW always (ask VIOFO to add 10 more levels of sensitivity, did not apply yet) - have hundreds if not thousands of parking mode video sequences in just 8-12 hours. Just none stopped recording in parking mode.
Was driving a few days without checking the footage, you know - inserted memory card, set up the dash-cam, should be worry-free, setup and forget as they say... One day had a minor incident involving my car. Thankfully, it's just a light bump, nothing to worry about, but love to see the footage from the 3CH VIOFO A139 PRO dashcam. And guess what - there is no footage for half of the day including that incident. Last parking video 6 hours ago.

I am losing my doubts that VIOFO would ever fix all issues that particularly this camera has.

 

[tchavei]

you will be back here sooner than you think.

Been there - done that...

Had the same issues, over and over, used various memory cards from the original VIOFO to SANDISK extreme, various amounts of card memories from 64-256GB, and various apps to format the memory card, even VIOFO send me one, but nothing helped. Many issues including disappearing "protected" videos (like literally disappearing - yesterday was 10x protected videos in the RO folder, today - none. VIOFO suggested that even videos in the RO folder will eventually be overwritten when the capacity of the memory card will reach less than 30% of memory. What on Earth is that kinda news? Since when? I ask you to point it out for me in the official detailed description of that. The issue I have is not even overwritten issue as there are 40GB left out of 256GB (239GB) on the memory card left. Same - 2CH recording - only front camera footage on the card, connected interior camera, the dashcam freezes after few hours of standby (parking mode - auto event). Motion sensitivity on LOW always (ask VIOFO to add 10 more levels of sensitivity, did not apply yet) - have hundreds if not thousands of parking mode video sequences in just 8-12 hours. Just none stopped recording in parking mode.
Was driving a few days without checking the footage, you know - inserted memory card, set up the dash-cam, should be worry-free, setup and forget as they say... One day had a minor incident involving my car. Thankfully, it's just a light bump, nothing to worry about, but love to see the footage from the 3CH VIOFO A139 PRO dashcam. And guess what - there is no footage for half of the day including that incident. Last parking video 6 hours ago.

I am losing my doubts that VIOFO would ever fix all issues that particularly this camera has.

Oh boy...


I hope you're wrong for my sake.

However, if this is so widespread and a known issue, then why aren't the forums full of it? I mean, they must have sold thousands of these units? Are they all failing?

 

[DaCerne]

Oh boy...


I hope you're wrong for my sake.

However, if this is so widespread and a known issue, then why aren't the forums full of it? I mean, they must have sold thousands of these units? Are they all failing?

The numbers could be far more different if consumers would check recorded footage regularly. I started to notice issues only after the accident, ok well just a minor, but imagine slightly other kind of picture. You need to provide proof that you would be certain that you have, but in reality, it's not there. Even though, there are no messages from the dashcam about any faults. The dashcam looks and sounds like it should: LED lights are ON, sound notifications ON, but videos are missing or the camera did not record for a couple of days.

You would be certain like I was, I set up the dashcam, rigged it to my car's battery, checked functionality on the first day, all good, and you forget about it. Days pass, and you not even might have a chance they need the footage. Assuming that if that day comes - you will be set. Worry-free. Unfortunately like in my case, since I started to investigate the recorded footage, not only does parking mode auto event mode fails, just records 24/7 non-stop in 45second intervals, but even videos are missing from the live recordings when I am driving, nowhere to be found: Movie folder, RO or Parking. Nowhere on the memory card. And I just noticed it as I was editing a movie of my journey out of the city, missing intervals of video sequences. Let's say I set up a loop mode to 3min. So the videos are in 3min sequences. But instead finding 3min after 3min after 3min... some 3min long videos are not there. And it's all regarding me driving - live recording!

So if everyone that had bought VIOFO A139 PRO would just spend some time investigating the operation of the dash-cam - numbers would definitely be much higher. I am pretty sure of that.

Besides, reviewing the operation of the dash-cam is not an easy part and it sucks a large amount of time which I don't have to spear. So do many. Many don't even complain.

I just found this forum myself today, I was looking for an old version of firmware to downgrade the dashcam. But I see that already many have the same issues. I have issues that are not even on the list here yet.

And I found it to be very hot when operating. In winter times it is good as it helps to defrost the windshield both front and rear. Both cameras emit heat.
And summer is not yet here.

However, I hold my fingers crossed for you in your case.

 

[tchavei]

The numbers could be far more different if consumers would check recorded footage regularly. I started to notice issues only after the accident, ok well just a minor, but imagine slightly other kind of picture. You need to provide proof that you would be certain that you have, but in reality, it's not there. Even though, there are no messages from the dashcam about any faults. The dashcam looks and sounds like it should: LED lights are ON, sound notifications ON, but videos are missing or the camera did not record for a couple of days.

You would be certain like I was, I set up the dashcam, rigged it to my car's battery, checked functionality on the first day, all good, and you forget about it. Days pass, and you not even might have a chance they need the footage. Assuming that if that day comes - you will be set. Worry-free. Unfortunately like in my case, since I started to investigate the recorded footage, not only does parking mode auto event mode fails, just records 24/7 non-stop in 45second intervals, but even videos are missing from the live recordings when I am driving, nowhere to be found: Movie folder, RO or Parking. Nowhere on the memory card. And I just noticed it as I was editing a movie of my journey out of the city, missing intervals of video sequences. Let's say I set up a loop mode to 3min. So the videos are in 3min sequences. But instead finding 3min after 3min after 3min... some 3min long videos are not there. And it's all regarding me driving - live recording!

So if everyone that had bought VIOFO A139 PRO would just spend some time investigating the operation of the dash-cam - numbers would definitely be much higher. I am pretty sure of that.

Besides, reviewing the operation of the dash-cam is not an easy part and it sucks a large amount of time which I don't have to spear. So do many. Many don't even complain.

I just found this forum myself today, I was looking for an old version of firmware to downgrade the dashcam. But I see that already many have the same issues. I have issues that are not even on the list here yet.

And I found it to be very hot when operating. In winter times it is good as it helps to defrost the windshield both front and rear. Both cameras emit heat.
And summer is not yet here.

However, I hold my fingers crossed for you in your case.

Thank you for the heads-up. I really appreciate it.

I'll keep monitoring it for the coming weeks and see what happens. I did notice several strange things including that "apparent" freeze when AED mode starts recording non stop.

I can confirm the heat generation. Today when I swapped the cards, I could barely touch the DC and we're not even in summer (currently 24C ambient temp). I can only imagine what will happen when it's 43C outside.

In the end, if this card doesn't solve the issue or no new firmware comes out soon to address some of this issues, we do have other options....

I love the video quality but if it isn't able to be reliable then the quality doesn't mean much.

Maybe I'm one of the few who run the DC 24/7. Maybe people don't use parking mode. Maybe they completely shutdown the dashcam at the end of the day. I don't know.

I'll keep you all updated.