The Holy Grail of bike-cams? X170 review

A rugged all-in-one bike-cam with a small screen. Could this be it, could this be the perfect extreme sports video camera?

The X170 from Drift Innovations is so called because of its 170 degree wide angle lens. The screen lets you line up your shot - a brilliant feature for a bike-cam - and you can watch your video masterpiece there and then without hooking up to a computer.

The camera is an inch longer than a Garmin GPS and can be fitted to helmets and handlebars with the included straps and mounts. Or, screw off the shoe and you'll find a standard tripod thread.

Noticed the black dot yet? It's caused by the curvature of the ultra wide angle lens. There's nothing you can do about it but will only appear when you're shooting into the sun. The company told me in an email: "This was a compromise we had to make to get the 170 degree wide angle lens."

The X170 can shoot 5 megapixel stills or hi-res video at 720 by 480 pixel quality, 30 frames per second.

There's some onboard memory but fit a 16 GB SD card for grabbing your footage.

The dead easy screen menu lets you toggle tons of stuff, like recording to AVI or MP4, or auto switching off the screen after you've lined up your shot. The X170's screen is a boon, of course, but it's a battery hog. Power is supplied by two AA batteries.

The lens rotates so you can fit the camera to any plane and still line up the shot correctly.

The X170 can be started and stopped with the included wireless remote control, dead useful for when you strap the camera to your helmet or when you're in stealth mode, ten metres from your bike.

The camera's auto exposure control is very good, switching quickly between contrasty scenes. The 170 degree lens is nearly but not quite a fisheye lens and there's some barrel distortion of vertical objects.

In use, the X170 has been childs' play to operate. The controls and menu are intuitive, the screen is a dream and - black dot aside - the video quality is top-notch. The X170 costs a touch under £200 and is available from http://www.actioncameras.co.uk/X170

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• bike
• bicycle
• camera
• video
• bikecam
• helmet-cam

[a06275]

That looks really good. Shame about the price, but if you want quality video, you have to pay for it, and even bad video cameras aren't that much cheaper!

[carltonreid]

Quite. ContourHD is more expensive still; Muvi is just £80. They all have their good and bad points.

[downfader2]

Should imagine that would be a bit of a hinderance on a helmet, might be better on a motorcycle helmet where you could have front and back cams LOL

[carltonreid]

You're right. It's waaay too big to be a bicycle helmet-cam. The Muvi, reviewed earlier, is fraction of the size and unobtrusive. But no screen of course. And I like the X170's ultra wide angle.

[downfader2]

A good place to stick that would be on the underside of the toptube. Then you get to see knees moving and the steering.

[carltonreid]

I was thinking that too. I'm going to get a clamp - as you suggested on the last vid - and mount the camera(s) on forks, top-tubes etc. Got a video project coming up in Italy which will be a perfect test for all the jaunty angle shots.

[labyonnette]

You only want a camera because you are paranoid

[moneymayhem2000]

That black dot did it for me...

Hello go pro

[simon44]

@NineShagnasty If it was recorded in NTSC and then changed to PAL then you'll lose every sixth frame to make it compatible. Always make sure you record in PAL (if in the PAL region) from the start and you wont have this issue and you'll also get 576p instead of 480p.

[simon44]

@Ojthemighty agreed

[wtfmickey]

the lens? I thought it had to do with over exposer?

[HostileHST]

What type of brake handles are those? Never seen it done that way, very interesting for sure.

[Thunderous71]

@exup1k check your memory card speed

[Ojthemighty]

Looks crap I would only pay £30 for that

[dazzassti]

I found that really hard to watch... ist as choppy as hell. is that normal? :-/

[NineShagnasty]

You appear to have a dropped frame every second. Did you lose it during production or is this a fault with the camera?

Have you perhaps recorded @ 30fps and then re-encoded @29fps?