sduck
Mr. Duck
I actually use 2 ssd's, one for teslacam, the other for music. They're both 250gb. But again, it's up to you - I would consider 64gb to be a minimum size for teslacam.
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[V9] How to Format USB into 2 Partitions for DashCam and Music [Windows]
- Thread starter SomeJoe7777
- Start date
Tesla camera footage for Autopilot 2.5 hardware uses 30 MB of space per minute per camera.
Currently, the dashcam records on a 1-hour loop that it then writes over, and currently, the system records from 4 of the car's 8 cameras. That means you need:
30 MB/min-cam * 4 cam * 60 min = 7200 MB = 7.2 GB to store the rolling 1-hour footage.
The Sentry cam records on a 10-minute rolling loop, so you need:
30 MB/min-cam * 4 cam * 10 min = 1200 MB = 1.2 GB to store the rolling 10-minute footage.
Any dashcam footage that is saved by pressing the camera button on the screen or any sentry videos that are stored because of detected movement are a dump of the last 10 minutes of footage from all cameras, which we just calculated as 1.2 GB.
Let's say you want to be able to store 5 dumps of dashcam videos per month, that would use 1.2 GB * 5 = 6 GB.
Let's say you do 3 trips per day, with 1 Sentry detection on each trip, so each day saved Sentry videos would use 3 * 1.2 GB = 3.6 GB. For a month, that would be 30 * 3.6 GB = 108 GB.
Total space you need to be able to clean the drive only once per month is therefore:
7.2 GB dashcam 1-hour rolling loop
+ 1.2 GB Sentry 10-minute rolling loop
+ 6 GB Saved dashcam videos (5)
+ 108 GB Saved Sentry videos (3 per day, 30 days)
= 122.4 GB.
So at the current time, I would allocate 128 GB to the camera partition.
Caveats:
- Autopilot Hardware 3 uses the H.265 video codec rather than the H.264 video codec, resulting in less space consumption. I don't have exact figures because I do not own a HW3 vehicle, but I would estimate that the video uses more like 20 MB/min-cam instead of 30 MB/min-cam. So all of the values in the above calculations should be about 2/3rds.
- If Tesla releases software that records from more cameras simultaneously then the storage requirements will go up proportionally. If 8 cameras are recording instead of only 4, then total space needed will double.
Knightshade
Well-Known Member
AFAIK the HW2.5/3 using different codecs was briefly true, but has not been in quite some time now.
No kidding.
Wondering: Couldn't this all be done using gparted (either on a live CD/USB or as run on any Linux OS)?
Yes, it could, but when I wrote this guide I wanted to make it the most accessible to everyone that I could, and therefore chose to use as many components that were built into the OS as possible, rather than rely on 3rd-party tools.
Thanks again for the addon guide for larger Teslacam partition.
Recent updates to my Model S seem to have STOPPED this from working. My drive with the two
partitions worked great for a LONG time, but now the dashcam system simply does not recognize
the drive and the onscreen button goes away when I put the car into gear. I've confirmed the
formatting and partitioning in Windows is perfect and error-free. The Music partition works fine.
Can you confirm if this is no longer supported? If it still works for everyone else, how
can I get it to work for me, since re-doing this whole system continues to fail?
Thanks.
partitions worked great for a LONG time, but now the dashcam system simply does not recognize
the drive and the onscreen button goes away when I put the car into gear. I've confirmed the
formatting and partitioning in Windows is perfect and error-free. The Music partition works fine.
Can you confirm if this is no longer supported? If it still works for everyone else, how
can I get it to work for me, since re-doing this whole system continues to fail?
Thanks.
JCtx
Member
Oh man. Does anybody know if 2021 M3 LRs still function with a partition? My car came with a Tesla 128Gb stick. I only need 4.34Gb for my music, but just in case, want to partition 10Gb, and leave the rest (118Gb or so) for the cameras, since I guess Tesla included a 128Gb (up from a 64Gb) for a reason. I PMed the OP for the easiest way to accomplish that. But want to know all the time I'd waste doing that would be worth it. He he.
If the stupid ports were deep and up into the new center console cavity, I'd just buy a USB-C stick and call it a day. But with those long sticks, I'd be hitting it every time we need something from there, possibly damaging something, so rather use the Tesla stick, since I'll never use all of that volume anyway, so might as well use it for both functions. Or all 3, since it'd be dash cam, sentry, and music. Thanks gang.
JCtx
Member
After reading post #1 carefully again, it's clear I cannot used the format utility mentioned there for more than 32Gb, and since I want to leave around 118Gb for the cameras (just need 10Gb for music), it wouldn't work anyway. So the project is officially abandoned now. Will look for a short USB-C stick, which would be the only one I'd consider buying. Plus I'd need a USB to USB-C adapter, since my computer doesn't have a USB-C port.
Going back to the Tesla USB stick, tried to store a Sentry recording during my test using only the screen icon (feature turned off on security menu), where the screen turned red, with a warning sentry was recording, so I know it at least tried to record something. So formatted it with the car, but haven't tested it again. If it gives me grief, will try to format it on my computer with windows (right click on the drive, then format), and see if the recording issues go away. And will also remove the stick every once in a while, and erase all error files mentioned, which supposedly can cause that issue.
Going back to the Tesla USB stick, tried to store a Sentry recording during my test using only the screen icon (feature turned off on security menu), where the screen turned red, with a warning sentry was recording, so I know it at least tried to record something. So formatted it with the car, but haven't tested it again. If it gives me grief, will try to format it on my computer with windows (right click on the drive, then format), and see if the recording issues go away. And will also remove the stick every once in a while, and erase all error files mentioned, which supposedly can cause that issue.
Knightshade
Well-Known Member
No, you don't.
Sentry doesn't record things-at all.
Though that screen you cite can be misleading.
dashcam records things.
Sentry, if alerted, will move the last 10 minutes of dashcam recording off to the sentry folder.
Unless you see the dashcam icon with a red dot on (the rectangular camera icon... not the round sentry icon) the car is not recording video.
JCtx
Member
I didn't look for that, but it was recording now when I was messing with other settings a moment ago (in the garage). So I'm almost sure it was also on when I did my test, since I haven't changed anything. But will check on my next test. And I wouldn't be the first with that issue; many others have reported the sentry not recording due to either software or USB stick issues. And same thing with the dash cam, turning off by itself and not recording.
Yes, I re-partitioned and formatted . All is well in Windows, but fails in the car; Music always is fine. I gave up and let the Tesla reformat the entire 100gb card for the dashcam and it works. I'll just get another drive for the music. Luckily I seldom need to charge my phone anymore, which was why I went to the trouble to do the partitioning in the first place.
Did you make sure you are formatting with the right file system? The car can only read exFAT or FAT32. By default Windows formats stuff in NTFS format and Mac format stuff in APFS.
Nothing was NTFS. There's no clue as to why it stopped working, but at least one
mistake in my last shot at re-formatting was to create the drive LABEL as TeslaCam, but
then forgot to create the FOLDER with the same name.
Ultimately I got it to work !
I re-did everything including Formatting just with DiskPart.exe and no other tools, with exFAT for both partitions,
32GB for Music and 84GB for dashcam.
Thanks for all the help.
mistake in my last shot at re-formatting was to create the drive LABEL as TeslaCam, but
then forgot to create the FOLDER with the same name.
Ultimately I got it to work !
I re-did everything including Formatting just with DiskPart.exe and no other tools, with exFAT for both partitions,
32GB for Music and 84GB for dashcam.
Thanks for all the help.
JCtx
Member
Thank you. But I now have a better option... IF possible, and that is to buy a 'Y' adapter for the glovebox, so I can connect both the Tesla 128Gb stick, and my 8Gb music USB stick. Would that work???
And how did you do that? A link with the details would be greatly appreciated. I thought we had to use Fat32, which is limited to 32Gb in a partition, as clearly explained in detail on post #1. Hopefully a 'Y' adapter works, so I don't have to mess with this crap
. Thx.
@SomeJoe7777, thank you for your excellent work! I'm a kind of experienced Windows user, but I almost forgot about disk partitions.
I have an issue and would like to hear your thoughts. My USB stick is Samsung 256GB, and I want 128GB for TeslaCam for more capacity for Sentry and the rest for my music. I followed your instructions and formatted both partitions as FAT32 with the Ridgecrop utility.
I also created the TeslaCam folder in the first partition.
Now, my dashcam icon has an X. Music works fine. My car is a 2017 Model X with upgraded MCU2 and AP3, firmware 2021.4.16. From the menu in the car, I tried formatting the dashcam disk - after that, TeslaCam started working. When I insert the USB stick into my PC, the TeslaCam folder was created on the second drive, and all the music files are gone.
So, I'm guessing that there might be a possibly stupid logic to determine which partition to use for the TeslaCam, in the car firmware. In my case, the size of the TeslaCam partition is larger than the music - do you think that would matter at all?
I have an issue and would like to hear your thoughts. My USB stick is Samsung 256GB, and I want 128GB for TeslaCam for more capacity for Sentry and the rest for my music. I followed your instructions and formatted both partitions as FAT32 with the Ridgecrop utility.
I also created the TeslaCam folder in the first partition.
Now, my dashcam icon has an X. Music works fine. My car is a 2017 Model X with upgraded MCU2 and AP3, firmware 2021.4.16. From the menu in the car, I tried formatting the dashcam disk - after that, TeslaCam started working. When I insert the USB stick into my PC, the TeslaCam folder was created on the second drive, and all the music files are gone.
So, I'm guessing that there might be a possibly stupid logic to determine which partition to use for the TeslaCam, in the car firmware. In my case, the size of the TeslaCam partition is larger than the music - do you think that would matter at all?
It should not. The partitions can be any size.
Note that the car is case-sensitive when it comes to the volume name as well as the folder name for the TeslaCam partition. Make sure if you set it up again manually that you use the proper casing for the names otherwise the TeslaCam drive will not be recognized.
Hi @hiroshiy
I dont think its a requirement to use FAT32 any longer... at least on model 3s its not. I believe the car now formats in exFat. If you continue to have issues, try formating your teslacam partition in exfat.
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