New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

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PiratePete
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby PiratePete » Thu Mar 29, 2018 9:47 am

After living with the new Fly6CE for a week my basic observations at this point is that EiS makes it appear that the camera is moving around on the seat post. And interestingly enough when you make a hard turn the footage recorded rotates upwards, as well as to point back along your direction of travel. Then over a period of time seems to correct/re-centre its viewpoint. I've turned off EiS, and have established that the camera is not moving in the mount.

Image quality is greatly improved over the Fly6, however number plates still seem difficult to read. Having the clock updated from he phone app is a big step up, as is the MP4 file format opening up easier editing options.

On the negative side, the hardware. The black design works well aesthetically speaking with my bike's colour scheme, however the old Fly6 could be passed off as a reflector if Inspector Plod were to ask.

The charge port being centred at the top makes it impossible to charge without removing if from my bike due to my saddle bag. The 1/8th turn mount is being utilised regularly due to this.

The other issue which is on a par with the need to remove the unit for charging is the buttons. The old camera's buttons were easy to locate when wearing full fingered gloves and felt responsive. The new one's buttons are more attractive, however being basically flush and smooth are harder to find and they're is a vagueness when operating with gloved fingers.

Battery run time seems OK, however I'm still to give it a decent ride, largest so far was four hours. So far drain seems similar to the old camera.

Due to the SDcard issue reported by @queequeg I have checked my camera with seven different brands of cards, with the Cycliq cable and another no name branded one sourced from Ebay. No issue noted. The brands of cards tried are Lexar, Transcend, SANdisk, Samsung, A-Ram, Kingston, and Cycliq.

I should get to the point of overwriting the Lexar 128GB card next week (going away camping this weekend so no bike riding to speak of), so hopefully I'll see what happens once the filesystem is at it's largest number of files etc.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Jmuzz » Thu Mar 29, 2018 12:34 pm

The USB cable is just a rubber moulding and they can easily have poor tolerance.

If the bricking is resolved (weird there is no answer) just take a knife to the rubber on the cable.

Did you go through support or through their PR guy?
ben.hammond@cycliq.com was quick to replace mine for water in the lens.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby AUbicycles » Sun Apr 01, 2018 7:14 pm

Wet ride on the roadbike so I checkedthat the seal was properly closed (had just topped up charge) and checked when starting up.

In return, the lid / seal of the rear Fly6CE was open and inside was wet and full of roadgrime. The microUSB didn’t want to come out, it was stuck with the grime. It too was wet and full of grime. I did a clean and am leaving it to properly dry before turning it on again and checking the footage.

This is critical and ig may be that the water gets it and the grip is lost.

Will see the results and report it to cycliq.

UPDATE: and the lens is fogging
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby queequeg » Sun Apr 01, 2018 7:42 pm

Jmuzz wrote:The USB cable is just a rubber moulding and they can easily have poor tolerance.

If the bricking is resolved (weird there is no answer) just take a knife to the rubber on the cable.

Did you go through support or through their PR guy?
ben.hammond@cycliq.com was quick to replace mine for water in the lens.
I have gone through their support channels. They sent me an email on Thursday saying they need to inspect the unit, but would send me a replacement as soon as I give them the tracking ID Fir the old one. Due to the long weekend, I can’t send it until Tuesday.

Oddly, they asked me to send them the microSD card that was supplied with he camera, but the Fly6CE does not come with a card. They also don’t want the USB-C Cable. Essentially, two of the three variables will be missing when they inspect it.

I went and got some of my older (incompatible) cards just to test if they eject, and I was unable to make them eject using the same USB cable.

I measured the cards heights with digital calipers.

Sandisk: 15.03mm - OK
Samsung: 15.05mm - Ejects

So, it looks like there is no answer to the bricking. If the card ejects or has an issue during the firmware update, your camera is dead.

When I get the replacement, I will check it thouroughly with every card I have, along with the cable. The only two cables I have are the Cycliq ones, as I have no USB-C Devices or computers at either home or the office.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby AUbicycles » Sun Apr 01, 2018 9:18 pm

A mini review of footage in the rain (I have Flanders type weather right now and glad to keep the right short).

Front footage - image stabilisation off - fairly good. I was able to connect quickly with the iphone app and make the change - all good. In the rain with the front wheel spitting up debris and water I could get fairly good quality. It wasn't torrential rain, just nasty cold winter type rain and wet roads - some water spots hang but disappear by themself - otherwise I could get fairly good clarity and recognise number plates. Testing it along (not side-by-side with the older Fly12), the difference in image brightness is not as recognisable as I am judging it stand-alone.

In comparison, the Fly6CE rear footage is the opposite, 99% unusable in the wet. The plastic lens covering is perhaps different and water reacts differently I think... so everything is very blurred. Occassionally over a bump, this clears the water and provides clarity for a few moments until more water gets thrown. There is no chance of getting a numberplate, you can probably get vehicle colour and may able to guess a make / model but have to be lucky.

For the water ingress and lens fogging, I will provide updates once I hear from support.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby queequeg » Thu Apr 05, 2018 1:32 pm

I have a replacement Fly6CE on the way.

Will check out whether the new one has a similar issue before I go anywhere near a firmware update. The bricked one has been sent back to Cycliq, so eventually we got to the point where that was the only option. I guess that answers the "can you unbrick it?" question.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby PiratePete » Thu Apr 05, 2018 1:43 pm

queequeg wrote:I have a replacement Fly6CE on the way.

Will check out whether the new one has a similar issue before I go anywhere near a firmware update. The bricked one has been sent back to Cycliq, so eventually we got to the point where that was the only option. I guess that answers the "can you unbrick it?" question.
As an exercise in self preservation, or to be sure to be sure, how about doing the update differently to the explicit instructions? Take the SD card out of the camera and plug it into your computer, copy the file, eject, then plug into the camera. No need to be interfering or going anywhere near the card slot on the camera when performing the actual update. Plug the card in, power the camera on without it being connected to the cable.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby queequeg » Thu Apr 05, 2018 1:58 pm

PiratePete wrote:
queequeg wrote:I have a replacement Fly6CE on the way.

Will check out whether the new one has a similar issue before I go anywhere near a firmware update. The bricked one has been sent back to Cycliq, so eventually we got to the point where that was the only option. I guess that answers the "can you unbrick it?" question.
As an exercise in self preservation, or to be sure to be sure, how about doing the update differently to the explicit instructions? Take the SD card out of the camera and plug it into your computer, copy the file, eject, then plug into the camera. No need to be interfering or going anywhere near the card slot on the camera when performing the actual update. Plug the card in, power the camera on without it being connected to the cable.
Yes, that is what I will do for sure. Only reason to check is to see whether simply changing one of the variables (camera body) solves the problem, seeing as how I still have the other two parts in the equation (cable & Samsung SD Card). If the new camera does not have the issue, we can probably just write it off as a tolerance issue in the assembly process. Hopefully when I get the new device, it already has the latest firmware on it!
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Drizt » Thu Apr 05, 2018 2:00 pm

You guys have SD card readers?

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Jmuzz » Thu Apr 05, 2018 2:07 pm

Just unplug the cable on the computer side.
If the new unit still card ejects then it must be your card standing tall and you should source another card because it will interfere with the waterproof flap.

Can't believe they don't have a bootloader recovery, thats going to cause tears.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby PiratePete » Thu Apr 05, 2018 8:43 pm

queequeg wrote:Hopefully when I get the new device, it already has the latest firmware on it!
I'm testing a beta fw for the 6ce now, so there is likely to be more updates coming through to raise your stress levels ;)
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Drizt » Thu Apr 05, 2018 8:44 pm

I hope they can fix the absolutely horrendous video quality of the fly6ce.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby queequeg » Thu Apr 05, 2018 9:01 pm

Drizt wrote:You guys have SD card readers?
I have a 2010 Mac Mini. It would not mount the SD card via the native slot on the back.

My surface pro has a microsd reader but stupidly you can’t access the slot when it is docked, so i used the usb-c cable instead.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby AUbicycles » Fri Apr 06, 2018 10:55 pm

In conparing the video quality of the Fly6 and Fly6CE I am fairly happy that it suits its purpose... can’t compare with glossy GoPro footage but to recognise details, it is doing well. I may do a few more comparison tests.

For the SD slot, on the mac I have one and put the micro SD card into an adapter. A lot of PC’s have SD slots built in.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Drizt » Fri Apr 06, 2018 10:58 pm

Compare it to the fly12ce or even the fly12. It's pretty rubbish in comparison. A lot harder to make out number plates. I've taken direct comparison footage and stills and sent them to cycliq. They are working on a fix.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Jmuzz » Fri Apr 06, 2018 11:47 pm

Do they say it's the same sensor?
I assumed Fly12CE is a superior sensor to the smaller cheaper 6.
No software fix can improve it if it's a limitation of the module.

They do need to fix the nighttime headlights flare, you can't read a plate or even see the car because it's just 100% white saturation.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Drizt » Fri Apr 06, 2018 11:50 pm

It's a different sensor but some of the problems are caused by configuration issues and too much lossy compression.

Same settings on the two devices results in vastly different file sizes.

1080/60p 5min
Fly12ce : 1200MB
Fly6ce : 800MB

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Jmuzz » Fri Apr 06, 2018 11:57 pm

Yeah but might not be compression. The worse dynamic range and less sharpness means 6 will compress better at even identical compression. And that's assuming it is a real 1080 sensor not just upscaling like the very similar SQ12 mini cameras.

I would certainly rather 10fps at better detail and HDR if that is a possibility.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Drizt » Sat Apr 07, 2018 12:01 am

In my opinion, the current video quality of the Fly6ce renders it almost useless to me. I was expecting at least fly12 standard. In reality, it isn't a massive improvement over the totally useless fly6.

I now use a fly12 on the rear as I deem the fly6ce not fit for my purpose. Sad. Could have been brilliant.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby whitey » Sun Apr 08, 2018 4:28 pm

Been tracking this thread for a while, have enough bugs been ironed out to make it worth buying these? Do they actually work as advertised?

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Drizt » Sun Apr 08, 2018 4:29 pm

In my opinion, no.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby Jmuzz » Sun Apr 08, 2018 7:21 pm

It's still about the only ready to go device in the market.
What else is there? The Garmin or action cams, which have shorter battery life plus you need a light.
Otherwise DIY a minicam or dashcam, which won't be as small, nice or waterproof.

It's an incident cam, no good for YouTube content besides of crashes where low quality is tolerable.

I think it falls short of where it should be though and unfortunately Australian Cyclic is going to get wiped out when something with the same quality shows up on AliExpress for $50.

Their service has been excellent and the hardware is good for first production run, but software is damaging their reputation.

IMO incident cam is almost an essential bit of gear for the roads. So at $200 it's still ok until there is something better/cheaper.
I've seen one pay for itself (and much more) after a hit and run.

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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby queequeg » Mon Apr 09, 2018 4:38 pm

Got my replacement Fly6CE today.

With the same memory card and same cable as previously, the card will not eject. In fact, you can plainly see when the cable is plugged in now, that there is a gap between the cable body and the memory card.
So, my conclusion from that is that the previous camera was a manufacturing issue.
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby PiratePete » Tue Apr 10, 2018 1:55 pm

queequeg wrote:Got my replacement Fly6CE today.

With the same memory card and same cable as previously, the card will not eject. In fact, you can plainly see when the cable is plugged in now, that there is a gap between the cable body and the memory card.
So, my conclusion from that is that the previous camera was a manufacturing issue.
Whew!
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Re: New Fly6 CE and Fly12 CE Camera's

Postby PiratePete » Tue Apr 10, 2018 2:16 pm

I've run into what I've found to be very frustrating and a rather weird issue with both my CE cameras and now that I've got a handle on it and appear to have 'resolved' the issue by work around I thought I'd mention it here.

Problem: The camera would intermittently power off, or, intermittently power on, or, I'd pull up somewhere and see that the lights were on when I normally ride with them off, or, all of the above...

I managed to get it to a re-produceable state on the weekend so have spent many hours playing with the technology that is weighing my bike down till I finally found the root cause...

My watch.

Yep, that's right, the thing hanging on my left wrist that tells me the time, plus its an activity tracker so it tells me that I don't get enough sleep and don't walk enough. Oh, and it makes my Cycliq Fly12ce and Fly6ce do some pretty funky stuff, sometimes synchronised funky behaviour.

So, the details, the watch is a Garmin (need I say more), Vivoactive HR, the superseded one, not the nice new one that could almost pass as a watch rather than a geek thing. This device is employed as a backup to my ELEMNT for recording my rides, it doesn't satisfy this role particularly well as it's ANT+ supported sensor list is very short and does not include power meters, so the data is rather assumed.

When I finally work out what was going on, I discovered that at some point it had detected the ANT+ signal from the CE cameras and paired itself. This is rather strange because when I installed my Powertap P1 Power meter, it did not detect it. This is when I found out how limited the supported sensors was.

So when the ce camera's turned up from Cycliq, I didn't even bother to attempt to pair them, but somehow this has happened. They appear in the sensor list as 'Lights' as they would on a Garmin EDGE (which is supported by the CE's). The Cycliq camera's don't support the Garmin activity trackers, nor does Garmin support Cycliq cameras with their activity trackers.

The result is some pretty funky behaviour.

Moral of this story, if you have some weirdness going down with your cameras, and you have a watch or some other device that has ANT+ ability, check it.

I only really started looking down this line as at around 03:30am on Saturday while I was getting ready to head off for a bit of an adventure ride. While standing in the dark at home both the cameras turned on their lights simultaneously, no hands... The only way that could happen was an external influence.

in my playing, I've now observed this influence to power the cameras on but more importantly OFF. The other common thing observed is the turning of the lights to on, or flashing.
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