AUSDOM AD260 Dashcam Review – Good camera but no GPS might be a deal breaker for many

Posted On April 24, 2016

I am a dashcam enthusiast, so when I got a chance to review this unit, I jumped on it. I also got this unit for a discount to test out, but as you would see the review is 100% genuine.

I am comparing this to my Roadhawk DC2 dash cam which has been my primary camera for more than a year, that camera was bought for $200 so yes I would expect it to have more features, but when you are going for a dashcam you want something which would be useful incase of a court case or insurance claim. Otherwise whats the point of getting a dashcam.

Sample Videos :

Day :

Indoor Video :

Night Video :

 

Now that you have had a chance to look at the image quality and the date stamping on the camera, 

Lets move onto the PROS :

1. Good LCD Screen – Unlike my Roadhawk camera, this one has a screen which is really useful for replaying footage after something interesting has happened. The LCD screen is clear even in bright sunlight.
2. In-built battery backup – This is a game changer, the internal battery is a godsend as it allows this to be a parking sensor. My roadhawk has an attachment which allows it to connect directly to the battery however I believe that would just drain my car battery. An internal Li-On battery is a nice solution to that problem.
3. Good image quality – The videos are of good quality, not great, not awesome, not excellent no matter what the other reviewers tell you. They need to get a real dashcam if they think this is the best video quality they have ever seen. Don’t be carried away by those hyperboles.
4. G-sensor – Any good camera needs to have a G-sensor which would capture collisions and not overwrite on them as you could discover a dent weeks later and then that image might have been overwritten.
5. Good mounting equipment – The mounting equipment which comes with this camera is great. Never underestimate its importance. My $200 dashcam from Timetec came with a ridiculously badly designed mount which I had to go get replaced.
6. Image taking – The camera does allow you to take images instead of locking videos, I love that 🙂 , sometimes its nice that instead of taking out my camera phone I can take the image on a click.

 

Now the CONs :

1. A little buggy – I have noticed a couple of bugs, the most annoying being when I start my car the camera starts and then immediately shuts down. I have no clue why that would happen. I have to remove power and restart again for the camera to start. I will be emailing the company about this.
2. File sizes are too huge, for a worse image quality than my Roadhawk, the file sizes seem to be a lot larger.
3. Funky white balance – The WB on my unit is funky, its washed out (as the video also shows) , it does have an adjustment which I need to play with.
4. Video stamping is inadequate – The video cannot be stamped with speed unfortunately, that’s a deal breaker for me. As this has no GPS, I don’t think it can measure speed.
5. Unintuitive buttons – The buttons are a little bit hard to understand if you are just starting out. It took me a while to understand how to lock and erase video segments, unfortunately not before I had erased a clip I wanted to save :(.
6. Poor Microphone Quality – The bass is just out of whack with the camera, in the sample video you can almost feel the mic vibrating and distorting the sound.

Verdict :

Overall, this is a solid camera for the price, with good video quality and a ton of features more expensive cameras don’t seem to provide. However depending upon your budget you may just decide to go forward with a camera that has GPS. If you are just a hobbyist and don’t really care about insurance aspects or ticket aspects this might just be good enough. Speed is the only thing this cant capture. I would give it 3/5 stars.