Garmin, a company closely associated with outdoor and fitness products, plans to take on GoPro after releasing two budget-friendly action cams.
Garmin released VIRB X and the VIRB XE action camera and aims to rival GoPro's Hero 4. Garmin is not new when it comes to the action camera industry. The company previously released the VIRB Elite but the product did not gain enough sales attention.
The main selling point of Garmin's new set of action camera is its affordability. Prices for the VIRB X start at $299 and for the VIRB XE at $399. This price range could easily lure buyers away from the more expensive GoPro Hero 4 which cost between $400 and $500.
Garmin's new action camera also looks very rugged, a feature that will prove useful especially for extreme athletes. The base model, VIRB X, can record 1080p videos at 30fps and 720p videos at 60fps. The VIRB XE can capture 1440p videos at 30fps and 1080p at 60fps. Both models can capture photographs with a maximum resolution of 12 megapixels.
The VIRB XE model has an additional Pro mode. This allow users to tweak the camera's sharpness, white balance, color profile, ISO and exposure bias, according to The Next Web.
Instead of opting for a 4K video recording option, Garmin focused its camera's feature closely into sports. Additional features for the new VIRB action cameras include GPS, two hour battery life and a heart rate monitor. Garmin also installed it with speed, G-load and acceleration monitor.
Garmin also upgraded its overall design by making it smaller and added several features that makes the camera easier to mount on various sports equipment, according to Load The Game.