GoPro HERO3 Silver Edition 1080P Camera (CHDHN-301) $230 + Free Shipping

SDers,

I have a Hero2 and just bought a Hero3 Black from BB Sunday (used some RZ certs). Should I return my hero3 black and buy this? Also with regards, to my Hero2, should I purchase the wi-fi bacpac ~$50-$60 for it, or just sell it and buy this?

I've had the Hero 2, Hero 3 Silver, and now the Hero 3 Black.

The Hero 3 silver worked perfectly. My (and my friends) Hero 3 Black's both suffer from miserable battery life (1080p @ 60fps lasts maybe 70 minutes), freezing, random reboots, and sometimes not even charging when plugged in. If I hadn't gotten for almost half off from my friend who works @ Go Pro I would be incredibly pissed off. Even as it is I'm considering selling it for $350 and grabbing a Hero 3 again.

That doesn't sound like miserable battery life. 1080P/60 is producing twice the amount of data that 1080P/30 produces.

I understand the black model has some bugs, but it's also the only model with any interesting features IMO.

i got a black edition for christmas. i don't use 4k or 2k resolution for filming (a lot of computers can't even play back that resolution). but I LOVE having 1080p at 60fps...really amazing stills from the video. haven;t used the wifi remote though...

Maybe this is a dumb question, but why would you need WIFI on these? Isn't that just going to help drain your battery faster? Seems like it's something that would only be marginally useful at home for downloading the video. Anything else?

Any experience as to how long the battery lasts with this Silver Edition, using, say, 720p/30fps HD video?

Is it as bad as the Black Ed. (0.5-1.5 hr)?

TIA.

i believe so you can control it from you smart phone

Maybe this is a dumb question, but why would you need WIFI on these? Isn't that just going to help drain your battery faster? Seems like it's something that would only be marginally useful at home for downloading the video. Anything else?

Yes, I did see that. If battery power is an issue (like for a full day of skiing or biking), then it seems to me like you'd want that WIFI off.

This begs the question though - is the camera acting like a Wifi hotspot then? In other words, it would be the DHCP server and the smartphone/tablet would be a client? It would have to be in order for clients to connect, I believe.