A129 freezes, hard to start

[terry274]

I have a Viofo A129 Plus Duo, bought in December of 2020. For the last two months I have been having problems with the cam freezing as well as not wanting to start, sometimes it will never start until it has remained off for several minutes. The cam is wired with the Viofo hardwire kit. I disconnected that kit and am now using the cigarette lighter plug to power the cam. That did not help. I also bought a new SD card and again, no improvement. I have also reverted the firmware to 1.5 and done multiple hard resets with the button as well as resets to default.
Does anyone have any suggestions before I discard this camera?

 

[CaptureYourAction]

Unplug the rear camera and test.

 

[terry274]

Ok, the rear camera is unplugged and there is no sd card in the cam. It will not reliably start. I may be able to get it to start if I keep long pressing the power button or unplugging the adapter. But that's sporadic.
Also, on a thirty minute trip the last time it worked it only worked the first ten minutes. And some of those files were corrupt. This was on the old card. I have not gotten the new card to work at all.

I'm thinking it's a over for this one.

 

[terry274]

Also, if I get it to start with no card, when I put the card in it immediately dies.

 

[CaptureYourAction]

You’ve tried both power ports? The mount and direct to the camera?

Have you tried powering the front unit in your house using a USB wall charger and one/both of the supplied USB cables?

 

[terry274]

I have tried both ports.
I will bring the camera inside to test from a wall charger.

 

[CaptureYourAction]

If that does not work, maybe open up the camera and inspect the capacitors. There are many videos online showing how to open an A129.

 

[terry274]

Hmm, inside connected to a phone charger it's working. I'm going to leave it hooked up for a day and see if it continues to work correctly. If it does, then what? I'm using it in a 2019 Honda Ridgeline and I have not had any trouble for two years. Nothing has been changed that I know of.

 

[terry274]

Well, that didn't take long. The REC light is flashing rapidly and it's no longer recording. The MIC light is solid red. What could that mean?

 

[terry274]

It's the same erratic behavior inside the house. I notice the camera is rather warm. Temp inside the house is 70 and the camera feels quite warm.

 

[CaptureYourAction]

Warm is normal.

Format the card in the camera and try again.

What brand and model card are you using?

 

[terry274]

The card is a Samsung Pro Endurance 128 GB.
I'm trying to get the camera booted to format. It immediately freezes with a solid red REC light, no MIC light. Got it booted without the card. Inserted the card and it froze. Unplug, pull card, no start. Got it booted, insert card. Slow binking REC light and I can't access the menu to format. Screen freezes and no REC light at all.

 

[terry274]

It locks up, freezes, with no card installed. Did a reset with a paper clip in the hole. No good.
I giving up on this.
Any suggestions on a replacement. What brands other than Viofo?

 

[terry274]

Ok, slept on it. My wife says don't write off a company for one bad item.
What are your thoughts on the Viofo A139? I'm thinking of upgrading to 4k.

 

[CaptureYourAction]

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