Dashcam innards

In the IT business, we say the question is not “do you back up your files?”, but rather, “do you restore your files?” All the backups in the world won’t help if you discover when you need ‘em that the tapes wore out three years ago.

In much the same way, if you have a dash cam quietly doing its thing in your car, take a minute to ask when the last time was that you looked at any of the footage?

For me, the answer to that question was “2019”. And as it turns out, the micro SD card in mine had failed read-only in the autumn of ‘23. Given it wasn’t even a high endurance one, I’m amazed it lasted as long as it did.

I also noticed that the camera lasted about 90 seconds on battery, which doesn’t matter too much when it’s hard-wired into the car, but means things like knock detection won’t work.

Anyway, one high endurance micro SD card was rapidly sourced. Anyone reasonably handy with a soldering iron and a spudger can swap the battery in one of these NextBase units - the batteries are easy and cheap to source, and there are plentiful videos showing how to do it.

It’s now all stuck back together and in its rightful place on the windscreen, but this time I’ve diarized looking at the footage a few times a year to make sure it’s there if I ever really need it.