Polaroid Cube Tips and Tricks

Since I released the Extended version of the Polaroid Cube software, I have spoken with some interesting people, who could tell be a trick or two for for Polaroid Cube action camera.

These tricks I would like to share with the rest of you fellow Cube owners.

1) Use a Power bank to extend recording time - confirmed.

According to Polaroid, it is possible to record up to 90 minutes, less if recorded in 1080P. But if you attach a Power bank to your Polarpoid Cube, the limit should be either the capacity of your SDcard or your Powerbank. I did a test record, and stopped after 5 hours, still with lot of space left on SDcard and still 75% remaining on my Power bank.

Depending on how your Powerbank works, there are some different ways to get this to work. I have a Xiaomi Mi Powerbank, and I just plug the camera to the Powerbank, turn on the camera and then click twice on record button and we are recording...
But maybe it is the other way round for you, first start recording and then plug the Powerbank into the camera. As I mentioned, I think it depends on your Powerbank.

2) Use Polaroid Cube camera as WebCam - almost comfirmed.

Yes, I know that the FAQ on Polaroid Cube page says something like this:

>>Can the Polaroid Cube be used as a webcam?

>>Unfortunately, the Polaroid Cube can’t be used as a webcam.

So maybe somebody should tell Polaroid otherwise - here is the hack:

1. Keep the SD and insert a new SD (FAT32 formatted) into your Cube and connect it to PC.
2. Create web_cam.txt on SD using PC.
3. Safety disconnect Cube from PC and reconnect it again. Wait until Windows sound and reconnect Cube once again.
4. If everything is OK, you'll see a camera named CUBE in your web cameras in Windows device manager. And should be able to capture the image from your working 1080p CUBE web camera via special software which can perforam a video capturing. For example, via VideoDub software.

I have only tried this on a Windows 10 (Anniversary Update) and yes, Windows detects the Cube WebCam but only with black screen, but no errors. I suppose, it has something to with the WebCam bug Microsoft released together with the Anniversary Update, but I have not tested it on other versions of Windows, sorry. I will test it again, when the fix arrives.

3) Use a SDcard larger than 32GB - confirmed.

Again, I know the Polaroid Cube website says "Your Polaroid CUBE camera takes microSD cards up to 32GB.", but according a fellow Cube user, he says that using a 64GB SDcard is not a problem. That was until he discoved that max. size of using FAT32 formatted SDcard is, yes you quessed it: 32GB.
But the limit of 32Gb seems to be a Windows OS issue, so according to Techrepublic.com is possible to use a formatting tool to overcome the 32GB limit. See article at Techrepublic.com for further info. 
So 1until someone try formatting a 64GB SDcard with this tool, this tip will remain unconfirmed.

UPDATE 19. july 2018: I have now formatted a 64GB SDcard as FAT32, used a 5 volt powersupply from a Raspberry Pi to power the Polaroid Cube and then started recording.

The result after appx. 17 hours of recording I now have 58GB of video recording files split info 69 files, each containing 15 minutes of video. 

So it is possible to use a SDcard larger than 32 GB.

One minor drawback using a SDcard larger than 32 GB, it is not possible to see content of the SDcard, when connecting the Polariod Cube to the computer using a USB cable.
I have to take out the SDcard and use a SDcard adapter or a USB card reader, then it's possible to see the content of the SDcard. I can live with that.

Check out my high-up version (30 secs) of the video here: