Another automotive offering from the redoubtable Pyle Company. This seems to be the nearest equivalent to the 9 LED UK device I reviewed before, that I have been able to find thus far on this side of the pond.

It uses the  RCA connectors that all of these standalone cameras have as standard and has ten IR-LEDs for low light use all the way down to half a LUX rating (Dim moonlight) Interestingly this comes with a drill bit (by blue box in picture) for boring out a hole in the bodywork of your car as a standard feature. Nice touch as long as you feel ok about punching a 1.25″ hole in the trunk (or wherever) of your car yourself…

The camera quality is overall superior to most, the flush fitment of the camera means you can almost see the edges of your own bumper (Depending on vehicle of course!) with it. The Low light capability is very good though one or two people have reported problems with the night LED’s.  And a few more stated that the special drill bit was missing in their package.  However if installed as recommended, this camera will withstand the harshest weather your likely to get which is a very good thing with any piece of consumer electronics like this. Overall a solid contender and at a bargain price.

Here is a stand alone camera for the USA that has gotten some good press of late.

Designed to fit across the top or bottom bolts of your licence tag the VTL 400 has a swivel mounted camera for fine tuning the angle of view all wrapped up in a chromed finish.  It uses standard RCA connectors so will easily fit onto the vast majority of video inputs out there and has a very impressive low light rating – despite not being fitted with IR Leds. Its view angle is a decent 130 degrees and the camera auto compensates for light changes swiftly.

On the down side a few folks have reported that the camera does not like to get wet despite its “resistant” rating by the manufacturer, so discretion is advised if you live in a particularly wet area of the US. However should this prove to be the case it is reassuring to see that the manufacturer is offering a 2 year guarantee for this item. I find this a very good sign as any free guarantee over the statutory one year is a good indicator of the manufacturers faith in their product.  The best prices I could find were about $65-$70 but beware this camera is being offered for a LOT more than that elsewhere. The highest I saw was $190! How on earth there could be such a variation escapes me for the moment. But you can rest assured that here on this site you’ll only be offered the best deals I could find.

After a request I have been doing some looking into stand alone cameras for those of you with a screen of some kind already. It seems like that their is much more interest back in the UK for these than I realised, the recent RAC Backup camera device being just one of the most popularised, but hardly the only thing out there, (more on that later).

So I found this, a cheap but well made camera from BV electronics.  Its a nice enough piece of kit, the whole thing is about 1.5″ long and made from weatherproofed materials throughout so it shouldn’t be too hard to mount in a concealed spot on the back of your vehicle. It includes as the description says, nine IR type LED’s that will greatly assist the device during low or no light operations. It connects via some industry standard RCA (phono type) jacks sending a composite type video signal out that is compatible with just about anything capable of displaying a picture. Best of all its less than £20 – including shipping!

Naturally there is a down side, but only the logical one. Namely that if you have an independent camera you have to decide what your going to plug it into manually.  Likewise you’ll have to discover for yourself how best to mount it on your particular vehicle. I wouldn’t recommend setting this or any camera in the rear bumper!  If it were me I’d consider making a careful hole in the plastic of the reversing light (assuming I had two) That way you’d be right on top of the standard power supply of this type of system.

So if you have a built in video display – like a DVD player or a fancy Sat Nav that has external input and don’t mind running a bit of wiring then this is a perfect solution for you to add a backup camera system as well to your vehicle. The vendor will ship overseas and as of this writing the cost of this item would be about $18 + $8 shipping still making it a competitive buy over here in the US. So if you have a decent grasp of car fixing up this is the most economic way to get that extra bit of safety a backup camera system provides into your vehicle today.