Dash cams

Story & photos by Perry Mack

Why bother with a dash cam?

Dash cams are like insurance. They have almost no value – until the unexpected happens and then their worth can be measured in hundreds if not thousands of dollars.

The most profitable reason arrives in the event of an accident, as it won’t come down to ‘he said/she said in court’. If you rear-ended someone because they cut you off you have the evidence you need to prevent your insurance rates from going up.

Dash cams can come equipped with motion sensors. If your vehicle is sideswiped in the parking lot at the mall you will have the culprit on video.

Insurance fraud – ever here of people who intentionally get hit by a car (or throw themselves down in front of a parked car) and feign injury for the insurance money? This is how you prove it was a fraud.

And fortunately there are also some entertaining reasons including recording your road trip – or off-road trip – and capturing those unexpected events like wildlife, meteors, crazy drivers, and who knows what else?

Pagago! GoSafe 520

On the outside it looks like an old style, small (10 x 6 cm) point and shoot camera. But on the inside it features a top of the line a 146-degree field of vision camera with a 21:9 aspect ratio, (instead of the usual 16:9) and a maximum 2K resolution of 2560 x 1080 pixels at 30 frames per second. You can choose lower resolutions, and it has optional audio recording as well.

You also get a 7.6 cm (3 in), 960 x 240 pixel display, F2.0 lens, 500mAh internal battery, HDMI output and microSD slot for 8GB to 64GB cards (with the current firmware update). The videos are recorded in 5-minute clips and with an 8Gb card you can expect about an hour of footage before old clips are written over. However in the event of a ‘bump’, i.e. collision, the footage is automatically saved.

What it doesn’t do: The microSD memory is not included and the dashcam won’t work without one so you need to buy it separately. If you have a micro SD, SanDisk and Samsung brands will not work properly.

At the time of writing it retailed $229 Can

Papago GoSafe 260

This is a rearview mirror dashcam that clips securely over your existing rearview mirror, rather than attaching a separate dashcam like the 520 to your windshield. The advantages are that your windshield doesn’t have another device stuck to it impeding your field of view and it is less likely to be noticed by thieves when you are away from your vehicle. The GS260 has a range of view of 130 degrees with the ‘G’-sensor to record collisions, and the motion sensor to include parking lot events. It also features more built in photo options allowing you to adjust the sharpness, white balance, colour and picture quality, video options like clip length. Retail at time of writing is $188 Can.

In comparison, the 520, with HDMI output, better lens, larger LCD screen, built-in battery and firmware upgrades is the better dashcam, but I am personally fonder of the 260’s clip on rearview mirror mounting resulting in a cleaner look and more easily accessible adjustments.