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Comment by Florin_Andrei | Hacker News Reader

The GoPro cameras are overpriced.

The Xiaomi Yi is under $100 and can do 1080p60.

The Mobius ActionCam is even cheaper than the Xiaomi, and it's true that can only do 1080p30, but the very low price and the extremely small size (matchbox) make it perfect to carry around all the time on a keychain, or install it on a small drone without much lift capability.

I have both these cameras. I made a helmet mount for the Xiaomi and I carry it sometimes when riding my motorcycle. The Mobius recently went up on a model rocket and captured a PoV of the whole flight.

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The Xiaomi Yi also has some community and collections of simple startup scripts to modify the camera's capabilities simply by placing a file on the MicroSD card. For example: shooting 1600x1200(4:3) video, or adjusting noise reduction etc..

https://github.com/PJanisio/Xiaomi_Yi_autoexec

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/forums/yi-action-camera.153/

http://fpvlab.com/forums/showthread.php?45118-Xiaomi-Yi-Enha...

Nice! CHDK The Sequel!

Thanks. I bought a GoPro as a gift a year or so back, and thought about buying one for myself at the same time. I didn't, but I'm seriously considering a Xiaomi Yi after seeing these links. In China, it costs 61 USD.

Oh, wow, thanks for the links. I tried the denoise reduction hack. It turns out the camera performs massive amounts of denoise - and of course the result is that the image is a bit softer than it should be.

I turned denoise down to 1024, and the image is quite a bit sharper; that's great! There's a bit of noise visible now in low light (whereas before it was squeaky-clean), but it's comparable to my handheld camcorder, which is okay. I think they just made the decision that they don't want to show any noise, no matter what, and that impacted image sharpness out of the box.

I can't wait to test it under normal daylight. Also, the focus to infinity hack - since the camera appears to be optimally focused on a closer range.

As a fellow motorcyclist looking at cameras, I'd be really interested in seeing / hearing more about your helmet mount.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3w-twe4seQ

Please be careful with helmet mounts. There have been some serious injuries attributed (maybe incorrectly!) to rigid mounts transferring energy in ways helmets aren't designed for.

Motorcyclist here. I have a Drift Stealth 2 [1] and have it mounted on the side of my helmet. I like it because the form factor is just so good. All the GoPro mounts I've seen seem to stick out from the side of your head awkwardly and look like some kind of antenna. You can get it here [2] with a 10% discount if you use the code VLOGHIM.

1: http://store.driftinnovation.com/cameras/drift-stealth-2 2: http://actioncameras.co.uk/

Ditto with a Drift HD Ghost, although the Contour cameras seem like they have an even better form factor. I like the fact that the Drift is waterproof out of the box too, no case needed.

Or try a pocket mount: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2O9aLYSntTQ

Techmoan has extremely detailed action camera reviews, with raw sample footage, and often takes them out for a ride (weather permitting, he's in the UK after all!). http://www.techmoan.com/blog/category/action-cameras

A both of those still don't have the image quality a higher end GoPro does. They're close and a lot of people won't care - but a lot of people also do.

Yeah, I have a Yi and for the price, I think it's great. I'd like better quality but I'm not sure paying the extra $300 is worth a maybe 30% increase in quality.

I don't have a GoPro. I've looked at comparisons online. The Xiaomi is not visibly "softer" than the GoPro, AFAICT. Its low light performance is not great, but again, I don't know how the GoPro performs in low light. In any case, at $90 online, it's okay if it's a little below the GoPro in terms of performance.

The Mobius ActionCam is surprisingly sharp for its price and size. But it's only 30fps and therefore quite choppy. Also has a bit of rolling shutter. Here it is riding an RC car and a model rocket. I'd say it's good enough for that sort of thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psu8JkJYwBs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbh2O4_UWT0

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