A Cheap 4K Action Camera for Under $40? XDV V3 4K Review

WIFI AND APP

The QR code on the box wouldn’t scan using my Samsung Galaxy S4 Android smartphone. I had to search in the Google Play store for the right app. Searching for “XDV” gives you several choices. Choose the “wisdomplus” version. Scanning the QR code with my Apple iPad Mini 2 worked fine. The app downloaded easily.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the WiFi connection was rock solid for both my Android and iOS devices.  They always connected the first time and never froze or disconnected.  The range was over 15m (50ft) outside and over 8m (25ft) inside through two interior walls.  There’s no lag with either app and the user interface is simple and intuitive.  With my iPad it was especially easy to use because of the larger screen compared to my smartphone. I could rotate either of them to landscape orientation to take full advantage of their screens.

The downside?  When shooting 4K video with the apps the camera only records at 15fps frame rate.  It’s too bad that such excellent WiFi performance and simple apps are spoiled by the lousy frame rate.  Plus the iOS app doesn’t work right in another respect: you can’t download files to your iOS device. The app looks exactly like the Android app but when you go through the same steps it simply doesn’t download.

Then the day before this review was published the Android app stopped working altogether.  My smartphone indicated it was connected to the camera, the amber light on the camera was steady (thus indicating it was connected) and the app opened on my phone.  However it had a message on top, “Offline” and I couldn’t do anything with it.

To verify the problem wasn’t with my phone I checked a different app with a different camera and it worked fine.  I tried again with the XDV several times but it wouldn’t work.  By then I wanted to take a sledgehammer to the camera!  Fortunately I didn’t.  Instead I checked the iOS app and it worked fine.  Only the Android app went kaput.