VholdR Camera

First Impressions
Straight out of the box, the first thing I noticed was the size and weight. At under 5 ounces and less than 5 inches in total length, it's hard to remember you're even wearing a camera on your helmet. Once I got past the initial "cool" factor of the VholdR, the true simplicity and beauty of it's design starts to shine through. With an aluminum housing, this thing is tough enough to handle mud flying, small tree branches, and just about anything else you're going to throw at it. And with it's simplistic two button controls (on/off power button and a stop/start record switch) it's sure to be a breeze for even the worst technophobe to operate.

Mounting
The VholdR uses a rail mounting system (TRail). The camera comes standard with a weatherproof adhesive pad mount that works great on any flat surface, or slightly contoured surfaces like the side of your helmet. The mount rotates 360 degrees allowing unlimited height adjustment angles. There is no side-to-side adjustment so it's important to position the mount on your helmet correctly to ensure the camera is pointing where you want it, however thanks to the built in dual aiming lasers, positioning the mount is a breeze. I found the aiming lasers to be one VholdR's great features that help separate it from other cameras on the market. When activated, the camera sends out dual laser pointers that allow you to easily aim and level the camera. This makes mounting in the correct position a snap, and removes all guess work of where the camera is pointing.

Aside from the standard flat surface mount, VholdR also offers several optional mounts that can be purchased separately. Including vented helmet mount (such as a bicycle helmet), goggle strap mount, and handle bar mount.

Use
Before heading out to capture the action for the first time, the 2 hour battery needs to be fully charged. Just plug in to any USB port, and go check out some of the user uploaded videos on www.vholdr.com while you wait. Additional batteries are available from VholdR, so for the hard core rider that wants to record the entire day, that won't be a problem. However, you will also need to purchase additional SD memory cards. The VholdR comes standard with a 1GB SD card, which is good for about 50 minutes of recorded video. But a maximum of 2GB cards are supported and available directly from VholdR or just about any store that sells computer accessories, cameras, film, etc. and can be had for as little at $15-$20.

Now that the camera is charged up, operation is a breeze. There are 3 LED indicator lights (memory usage, battery power and recording status). And while the lights are simple and easy to understand, I found them to be very difficult to see in the daylight (especially the recording indicator). But to be fair, it's not like you can see the lights when the camera is strapped to the side of your helmet anyway.

Once the camera has been powered on, to start and stop recording there is a large slide switch on the top of the camera housing. The switch is huge, and very easy to operate with riding gloves. Slide the switch forward, the camera beeps once, and you're recording. Slide the switch towards the back, recording stops and you hear two audible beeps indicating recording has stopped. The large switch combined with the audible beeps makes for easy operation. It's so simple to operate I had no trouble turning the camera on and off while riding, in fact I've had goggle lens tear-offs that were harder to use than the VholdR.

The Video
VholdR includes free video download/upload software for downloading videos from the camera to your PC or Mac. You can organize, tag, clip, and even upload videos to the VholdR website to share with the world. But if you're in a hurry to see yourself in action, just plug the VholdR into any USB port, and windows will recognize the SD memory card allowing you to download and view your video with no special software required.

The 640x480 30fps video was quite impressive compared to other helmet cameras I've seen. The picture is crisp, and steady without excessive shaking. Colors are vivid, and best of all the 90 degree viewing angle lens captures a wide area so you don't miss that great shot of your buddy taking a header over the bars.

While the video quality of this camera is excellent, I found the waterproof microphone to be far too sensitive. Even when covering the microphone hole with tape, the wind noise was overwhelming, and it's obvious the engine noise picked up by the mic was overloading it. VholdR is aware of this, and plans to address it in later versions of this camera.

VholdR Desktop
Another great feature that sets VholdR apart from the competition is the free VholdR Desktop software (for PC & Mac) that is included with the camera. The software makes downloading, viewing, clipping, and sharing your videos fast and simple. You can organize your video library, watch your videos in full screen, tag your videos with descriptions, dates and locations, and best of all you can upload your videos to www.vholdr.com for free and share them with your friends and family. All from one, easy to use application.

Check out some footage from my VholdR test here.

Conclusion
Gone are the days of carrying a bulky camcorder connected with wires to a bullet camera on you head. Even mini hard drive recorders have now become obsolete. With ever shrinking technology, and constantly falling digital media (SD Card) prices, it's finally possible to build an easy to use, compact, all in one helmet camera at a price the average weekend warrior can afford.

Twenty20 has made a solid attempt to capitalize on the new, less expensive, smaller technology available with their VholdR camera.

Overall, I have to give the VholdR a for quality, design, durability, and ease of use. If not for the overly sensitive microphone, I would have given this camera a 5 out of 5 for performance. With a suggested retail price of $349.95 I couldn't call this a great value, but when compared with other less expensive models on the market you certainly do get what you pay for.