VIOFO A129 Dash Cam Firmware

BCHobbyist

BCHobbyist

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It would be very helpful if Viofo would always include the full 3 digit firmware version number for all dashcam models
v1.03T3 = A119 V3 Beta Test Firmware
v1.01 = A129 Pro
v1.02 = A129 IR
v1.03 = A119 V3
v1.94 = A129 Duo
v4.01 = A119 V2
v4.03 = A119S
Viofo Firmware Downloads = https://support.viofo.com/support/solutions/folders/19000140970
 
LeJerk

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Is this for the A129 Pro as well? If not, where will the new Pro versions be posted? Will it load new firmware through the Viofo app? I saw the app has a firmware check button.
 
Capture Your Action

Capture Your Action

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LeJerk said:
Is this for the A129 Pro as well? If not, where will the new Pro versions be posted? Will it load new firmware through the Viofo app? I saw the app has a firmware check button.
Click to expand...
This firmware is for the A129 DUO only. The Pro will have its own section on the Viofo site.
 
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MiamiC70

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How much longer do we need to wait for V2.xx firmware to be released? Getting ridiculous that the firmware update is taking longer than the life cycle of the camera!
 
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Ormy

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Where can I find the change logs for previous firmwares?

My A129 Duo worked perfectly since purchase (August 2019) until it developed a weird issue a few weeks ago. It originally came with v1.5 firmware. Today I formatted the card, then updated to v1.9 which didn't fix the issue at first, then I formatted the card again after updating to v1.9 and (fingers crossed) it seems to be fixed now. (If it's not fixed I'll start a new thread to get help)

Just wondered if mine was a particular issue that was fixed in one of the firmwares. So where can a find the change logs for all versions after v1.5?
 
Capture Your Action

Capture Your Action

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Ormy said:
Where can I find the change logs for previous firmwares?

My A129 Duo worked perfectly since purchase (August 2019) until it developed a weird issue a few weeks ago. It originally came with v1.5 firmware. Today I formatted the card, then updated to v1.9 which didn't fix the issue at first, then I formatted the card again after updating to v1.9 and (fingers crossed) it seems to be fixed now. (If it's not fixed I'll start a new thread to get help)

Just wondered if mine was a particular issue that was fixed in one of the firmwares. So where can a find the change logs for all versions after v1.5?
Click to expand...
What was the issue?
 
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Ormy

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Capture Your Action said:
What was the issue?
Click to expand...
Very briefly; the recording would stop before the 10 mins I have it set to in the loop-recording setting. The recording would freeze for about 30 seconds (recording timer top right corner would stop/freeze, but clock time bottom centre would keep ticking so the display and device as a whole were not frozen), then beep and restart recording in a fresh file. It would happen randomly, sometimes 30 sec into a recording, sometimes 9 min, but would never make it to 10min before starting a new file with only a 2-3 sec pause as it should. I checked for loose connections and tried a different SD card, no joy. If I disconnected the rear cam OR turned bitrate to 'low' the issue would go away which I found particularly strange, almost as if the bandwidth of the video-encoding chip was not quite sufficient. As I said it suddenly started doing this after 9 months of perfect operation. Any ideas?

I'm going to do some more testing later today to see if it's fixed and post a more detailed thread later.
 
Capture Your Action

Capture Your Action

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Ormy said:
Very briefly; the recording would stop before the 10 mins I have it set to in the loop-recording setting. The recording would freeze for about 30 seconds (recording timer top right corner would stop/freeze, but clock time bottom centre would keep ticking so the display and device as a whole were not frozen), then beep and restart recording in a fresh file. It would happen randomly, sometimes 30 sec into a recording, sometimes 9 min, but would never make it to 10min before starting a new file with only a 2-3 sec pause as it should. I checked for loose connections and tried a different SD card, no joy. If I disconnected the rear cam OR turned bitrate to 'low' the issue would go away which I found particularly strange, almost as if the bandwidth of the video-encoding chip was not quite sufficient. As I said it suddenly started doing this after 9 months of perfect operation. Any ideas?

I'm going to do some more testing later today to see if it's fixed and post a more detailed thread later.
Click to expand...
There is a known firmware bug that causes random beeps (as a new file is started) and truncated videos. Not sure if this is your issue or not, but sounds similar. Maybe this is something you hadn't noticed before? This happened with the same firmware you had been using for 9 months with no issues? Not since updating to V1.9?

What memory cards are you using?

How are you powering the camera?
 
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Ormy

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Capture Your Action said:
There is a known firmware bug that causes random beeps (as a new file is started) and truncated videos. Not sure if this is your issue or not, but sounds similar. Maybe this is something you hadn't noticed before? This happened with the same firmware you had been using for 9 months with no issues? Not since updating to V1.9?

What memory cards are you using?

How are you powering the camera?
Click to expand...
Yes that sounds like the same issue (do you know which firmware version fixed it?), the currently-recording video would end early, recording would stop/freeze for 20ish seconds, and then start again with a beep. So instead of a series of 10min video files from a long drive (with only 2-3 secs of non-recorded dead-time in between each) I would have files of random length (most shorter than 4 mins) with around 20 seconds of dead non-recorded time between each one.

If it was happening before I would have noticed, when functioning correctly the current file gets to 10 mins and a new one starts without a beep. One day I started hearing occasional beeps whilst driving. I'm 100% certain it was working fine, for the first 4-5 months of use I was checking the video files every week. This issue started all by itself one day in March, no settings changes or firmware changes caused it (still on the v1.5 it had when bought). My usual card is a Samsung EVO 256GB (yes I ran a full test on my PC to make sure it's not a fake, I know how common fakes are and I know how to verify). First thing I tried was a Kingston 16GB I had lying around, same issue.

Disconnecting rear cam OR setting bitrate to 'low' fixed it, which is the confusing part for me.

Today I formatted the card THEN updated to v1.9 firmware, same issue. I formatted again after firmware update which seemed to fix it (only tested once, testing again later).

Memory cards are 256GB Samsung EVO and older 16GB Kingston, both verified and not fake.

Camera is powered by the included Viofo 3 wire hardwire kit wired into my car, voltage cut-off set to minimum (11.8v). Car has an almost brand new AGM battery and brand new alternator (both new last year). I checked all voltages and wiring connections visually and with a multimeter.
 
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Capture Your Action

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Did you manually default the cameras settings after updating? You should also press and hold the reset button on the side of the camera for about 5 seconds. If you did not, I would do those two things.
If you still have the issue, I would format the card with SDFormatter. Do the full overwrite, not the quick format. Once that’s done, format again inside the camera.
You may want to format the card to exFat too. V1.9 supports exFat and its better at handling larger file.
You may also want to keep your looping files at 3 minutes or less.
There is also a beta, V2.3, you can try if you wanted, though the bug still appears in that version.
 
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Ormy

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Capture Your Action said:
Did you manually default the cameras settings after updating?
Click to expand...
No, I didn't think it necessary given that all the settings had returned to their default values anyway. I did try defaulting the settings a few days ago (while still on v1.5) but it did not help.

Capture Your Action said:
You should also press and hold the reset button on the side of the camera for about 5 seconds. If you did not, I would do those two things.
Click to expand...
So that's what I was originally searching for this morning. I assumed there had to be a hard-reset button somewhere so I was googling where it was, I came across this forum and saw the firmware update and decided to try that first. As I said earlier the issue persisted initially after updating, but after another format of the card the issue finally went away. The reset button was next on my list of things to try.

On my second test drive later on today (25min drive each way), I got no beeps, no early truncation of videofiles. I checked on my PC, 4 videos of exactly 10 mins as expected, and 2 more of 5 mins each corresponding to final 5 mins of each journey before parking. Every function working as expected and I consider the issue fixed.

If it goes wrong again in the future I will obviously try the reset button and defaulting all settings.

Capture Your Action said:
If you still have the issue, I would format the card with SDFormatter. Do the full overwrite, not the quick format. Once that’s done, format again inside the camera.
Click to expand...
I've just been using the format function built into windows, is SDFormatter better somehow? One of the things I tried last week was a full format (not quick format) of the card in windows (in exFAT, it took over 12 hours on a USB2 card reader) and then format again in the camera, did not fix the issue. Windows only gives me the options of NTFS or exFAT given the size of the card.

Capture Your Action said:
You may want to format the card to exFat too. V1.9 supports exFat and its better at handling larger file.
Click to expand...
Really? Has this been verified as working? I understand very well the benefits of exFAT over FAT32. If this is true this is great news! Also slightly annoying that Viofo doesn't state this anywhere obvious, if it weren't for this conversation I would never have discovered this. I'll give it a go in the next few days. Does formatting in the camera still format the card always to FAT32?

Capture Your Action said:
You may also want to keep your looping files at 3 minutes or less.
Click to expand...
Why is that? I prefer having 10 minute files, makes it easier to search through the footage later. And since there's 2-3 seconds of dead-time between each recording, the longer the files are the less often that dead time occurs and so it's less likely any incidents will occur during the dead-time.

Capture Your Action said:
There is also a beta, V2.3, you can try if you wanted, though the bug still appears in that version.
Click to expand...
Have you got a link? I probably won't try it unless the issue reoccurs (if it ain't broke don't fix it) but would be useful just in case.

Thanks very much for your help with all this. I'm so happy the issue has been sorted finally, it has been frustrating me greatly since March.
 
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Capture Your Action

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It's always a good idea to manually default the cameras settings after an update, even though settings default to the new firmware. Sometimes old values from previous versions get let behind, messing with the new firmware. Manually defaulting the settings gets rid of them. Not always needed, but it's a good habit to get into to avoid additional issues. This has fixed many strange issues for users.

Pressing and holding clears the internal memory. That's my understanding anyway. Again, a good habit to get into even though it doesn't always cause any issues.

SDFormatter formats the card back to factory defaults (full overwrite). It's my understanding that Windows default format program is not good at formatting these types of cards when they are used in dash cameras.

I believe once the card is formatted to exFat, the camera will keep the exFat format. At least in later firmware versions. I would have to double check if this is the case with V1.9, but I believe it is.

V2.3 is here. Keep in mind that you will also have to update the boot loader. Do the boot loader first, then the firmware.
 
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