Vantrue 2 Channel WiFi Uber Dual Dash Cam with GPS, 2.5K +1080P Front and Inside Cabin Dash Camera, IR Nigh Vision, 3” Touch Screen, 24 Hours Parking Mode, Motion Detection, Support 512GB Max (S2-2CH)

The information contained in this review may seem critical at times, but I want any potential purchasers to know what to expect, so I want to be honest and helpful in my review.Shipping Box -The Vantrue S2-3 arrived from Amazon with a shipping label directly affixed to the product box. That’s a plus for not wasting cardboard on another box to ship the product in. The minus is that everyone knows exactly what is being delivered and there is no additional protection for the product inside should the package handlers not be the most careful. I am sure we’ve all gotten that one box where you had to wonder if it went through a war zone before it arrived at your front door.Stick On Mounting vs. Suction Cup Mounting -This dashcam is larger/heavier than some of the other brands/models out there. As a result, I believe Vantrue may have decided to apply a more sturdy application to the windshield for this particular model. There are pluses and minuses to that. The plus is that it will stay in place for an extended period of time compared to a suction cup. As I've learned, suction cups lose their "suction" over time, and it's just a matter of when, not if, you find your dashcam dangling by its power cord, requiring an impromptu remount. Another problem that can arise with a suction cup mount is the degradation of the cup material enough to develop a crack. There is no chance that remounting or repairing the cup will seal the crack sufficiently to be a lasting solution. In order to resolve that issue, you will most likely have to get a new suction mount from your dashcam's manufacturer.Let's now move on to the downside of having a more sturdy dash cam mounting option. For starters, it makes the initial mounting more deliberate. You don’t really have an easy option to remount the cam if you find out the in-cabin camera picture is obscured by the rearview mirror. You will have to experiment moving the cam to different positions while the camera is on before applying the electrostatic sheet and adhesive strip. Then you'll more or less have an idea of where the camera needs to be mounted to record optimally.Secondly, the stick on mounting makes this camera unsuitable if you switch vehicles frequently. Maybe you rented a car for vacation and you wanted to put your Vantrue S2 dashcam in the rental for added security/insurance should the unexpected happen. No real good way to make that happen.It would be great if Vantrue would consider making an optional suction cup mount so moving the dashcam between vehicles is easier.Third Channel - Rear Facing Camera -It is great that now you have the option of having a camera that faces out of the cabin through the rear window. The cable provided for the rear camera is a significant length that should allow mounting in even the longest of vehicles. The dashcam will allow you to change the recording quality for all of the cameras (Front, In-Cabin, and Rear), as well as let you run the unit without the third channel camera in operation. Since the rear camera mounts in the same way as the front, base unit, I am bringing up the mounting option again. From a manufacturer perspective, they have to make this useful for the most number of users. If this camera was to be mounted on a window attached to an SUV tailgate, a suction cup is probably not the best way to have that camera secured to the window. However, if you are someone who has aftermarket window tint on your rear windshield, chances are that you are careful on what you stick on that tinted glass. Putting an electrostatic sheet on the tint may not be something you are comfortable with. Heaven forbid you have to replace that window tint for any tint failures in the future, you’ll be left with quite the process to remount again.Power Supply -The power supply is well thought out. The USB-C plug that goes in the mounting bracket is at a right angle, allowing the cable to be routed right up to the headliner from the mount and then to your nearest 12v outlet. That being said, the cable length does leave a little to be desired if you have a vehicle with an inconvenient 12v outlet, or you like to completely hide cables, or have a dedicated USB power supply for all your mobile electronics where everything gets plugged into. It’s a delicate balance for the manufacturer to manage the expectations of customer needs and not make a cable too long or expensive to manufacture. Having said that, it is neither a positive or a negative. Just know that if you are picky, you will probably end up having to buy a longer (or shorter cable) to fit your preference.Touch Screen -What a welcome addition! This camera does have a significant amount of customizable settings and the touch screen makes them easy to get to. Especially since the camera is more or less semi-permanently mounted. The screen is responsive with an audible confirmation that can be attenuated or completely muted if the user so chooses. Sometimes it is not pleasant or necessary to have an audible confirmation every time the screen is touched.The menu is fairly well laid out without having too much difficulty in locating the particular setting you want to change.GPS -The built-in GPS is great. Some manufacturers only have GPS capabilities if you purchase a separate mounting bracket that contains the GPS receiver. The plus side to the built-in GPS is that the camera can use this data to automatically set the time and date. While most cameras have the ability to set the time and date manually, they may not accurately hold that time. Plus during the time change, you might have to manually adjust the time instead of it being automatically updated.WiFi -This is an expected feature. The built-in WiFi allows you complete access to the camera through the Vantrue app. Settings, download clips, everything. From a security perspective, having WiFi on the camera can be a concern. From what I can tell, the WiFi must be deliberately turned on at the camera in order for the app to connect. After a time of inactivity, the camera will shut off the WiFi, therefore not allowing anyone else to connect to it. The WiFi on the camera is password protected as well to help thwart unauthorized access.App -The app is fairly well thought out. There are some quirks to be expected with a new interface. One of them is the responsiveness of the app, it can be challenging at times. When taping on a setting, it may take a few taps to get that particular setting to open up. Error popups are in a foreign language, so that may need to be looked at by Vantrue and their app developer. Otherwise, for a first run app, it’s not too bad.Battery vs Capacitor -Let's start by saying this camera is powered by the included power supply. The capacitor is there for the dashcam to operate in a few different modes when the vehicle's ignition may not be in the “On” position. The dashcam is not designed to run solely off the capacitor.There’s not a lot that I can say about the capacitor, other than I am glad this camera has a capacitor instead of a built-in battery. Other manufacturers and cameras on the market that use batteries of varying chemical makeups will have some environmental limitations,mostly heat exposure. In my experience, the near constant direct sun and heat that accumulates in your vehicle will kill the battery sooner rather than later. It’s just a matter of time when that battery will no longer function. Only time will tell how well the capacitor in this dashcam will hold up.Overview -This is a great camera with great options and features. Is a little pricey, yes, but you are getting a lot of features with that price. In an accident or other unforeseen circumstance, you will almost certainly forget how much your dashcam costs and be grateful that the footage it recorded helped you out.

Review UPDATE; I ordered my second dash cam just I hit Buy Again in my Amazon order history, I received the same box, same model and I paid the same, BUT the second dash cam has no rear camera and long cable for the rear camera!!! I contacted the seller and Amazon Support because they modified the item, while they must make new listing for different item! By the way, this dash cam was 3 channel few months ago but now is 2 channel for almost same price, if you buy it you can see it's has mini USB input on top of the fash cam for the rear camera! They have stolen the parts!Everything is fine except one thing, every 1-2 weeks you have to format the installed memory card manually, I you don’t, the dash cam won’t record anything. There is no warning alarms in the screen. When you turn your car on, the dash cam turn on normally and start recording but after 2 or 3 or 4 seconds will stop, and you don’t have any footage from your driving. And it will repeating again and again if you turn car off and on again. Except if you format memory card. I changed 3 different memory cards and all of them comes from top brand in the market they have all recommendation from the manufacturer for memory card. And I’m sure the issue is not come from memory. The dash cam is really good, high quality video and easy to connect to phone and etc. I used this dashcam for a few months and I hope there were settings or updates to resolve the issue.About customer service, when I received the camera, one of the connections cable was broken, I connected to the seller and they sent me another cable, it wasn’t fast shipping because the camera was new in the US and there wasn’t a replacement part in here, and they had to send me from China, it was totally understanding.

The media could not be loaded.  The purchase:I purchased this dashcam as a replacement for another Vantrue product I have owned for years. I previously had the N2 model which I picked because of the capacitor battery and motion sensing parking mode. It did not however have a rear camera and the only way to review videos was either on the small screen or by removing the SD card entirely and connecting it to a card reader on a computer.I saw this new version and it appeared to have the features I was looking for in addition to being a solid dashcam from a brand I had positive experience with. I was probably most excited about the ability to connect the camera to my phone and view the videos there, so convenient!The installation:Installation was fairly straightforward. You have to apply the clear plastic rectangle to a clean window and then you can adhere the dashcam to that. When I applied the first rectangle to the windshield, there were some large bubbles underneath that I was unhappy with. Fortunately, there were 2 provided, so I was able to install the second one. I would suggest placing one corner where you want it and then slowly applying the rest in a diagonal direction while pressing down to avoid bubbles.Routing the cabling is easy as long as you are comfortable with pushing wires behind trim. I ran the rear camera cable up to the headliner and along to the back window with little effort. There is even a small trim tool included in the box to help ensure the wire is tucked away neatly.Pro Tip: If you have extra cable, you can usually tuck the excess away behind the pillar trim(s). I included a picture of some of the excess before I tucked it behind the trim.The only lighter adapter in my truck is on the top of the dash, so there wasn’t a clear way to run the power without a dangling wire. This is not a problem with the dashcam, just an issue with my car’s setup. I will be purchasing the OBD port power adapter shortly in order to cleanly run power and enable power for parking mode as well (my previous webcam was powered this way, but the port has changed, so I need to purchase the updated cable).The operation:Setup was straightforward and intuitive. The menus made sense and inputting information and confirming setting was super easy with the touch screen. It asked to format the SD card, so I did that and the dashcam was up and running. I took it for a short drive (I will also include some video with this review) and I was very impressed with the video quality. The resolution was crisp and details were easy to make out. The quality was not affected by bright sunlight and reflections. I was also very impressed with the rear camera. I mounted it on a tinted window and expected the video to be affected by that, but it did not appear to be! I’m not sure if I really *need* the interior camera, but I suppose it’s a neat feature to have just in case.The verdict:I think this is a really good dashcam. It seems to have all the qualities I had in my previous dashcam while improving upon and adding features that are helpful to me. The video quality is probably the most important part of a dashcam and it is excellent. Adding to that, the ability to view the video on my cellphone is a game-changer! I have not recorded night video yet, but I expect it is just as good if not better than my previous Vantrue dashcam. I will update the review if there is any significant different. I would recommend this dashcam if you’re looking for a quality and reliable recording method. There are a lot more features I did not mention in the review, but you can look up all those goodies easily enough. Lastly, I would highly encourage purchased the OBD power cable because it gets you the constant power for parking modes and doesn’t require you messing around with the fuse box!Notes of interest:I had difficulty connecting to the app initially until I turned off the connection to Android Auto. I’m not sure if that’s what was causing the trouble, but it seems as if that fixed it. Once I made that disconnect, it connected right away and I could view all the videos!