Mini DV - World's Smallest High Resolution DV/Voice Camcorder

This "Mini DV" is not the Muvi branded one by any stretch of the imagination. And the included instructions are about as much good as a chocolate fire guard. But I'll do my best to help those struggling with it, you'll be surprised at it's capabilities.

Firstly - Charge it up! At a wall socket (not via USB) until the Red light (charging) stops flashing and you have a solid Blue light (charged). Once it has received a initial charge you can charge via USB later.

Secondly - SD card! Via your computer Format your chosen SD card to "FAT32" and NOT "NTFS", once that's done pop it into your camera brass contacts of the card facing the same way the lens does.

Thirdly - Install your drivers if you are having trouble with the driver disk as I did a quick google of "Mini DV D001" got me the drivers needed. Once installed connect your camera to the USB and it should find it as a removable drive.

Fourthly - Editing the time stamp. You will need to open a new document in "Note pad" and put in this.

[date]
2012/06/22
12:00:00=

Once you've edited the right time and date save it as TAG.txt and place the file on the SD card or save it to the SD card the choice is yours.

That should be the fiddly bit out of the way, now mount your camera where you want to. One press of the power switch should give you a Blue light indicating "ON" same thing to turn it off.

One press of the top button starts recording (be warned the lights go out when you do this :-/ so you don't realise it's recording) by pressing this button again stops recording. Simple really.

The Mode switch when recording will stop sound or video recording (bit daft really)
The Mode switch when not recording sets it to sound activated recording (cheeky surveillance)

Video can be removed from the SD card when you're done by simply connecting to USB and drag and drop from there DCIM folder.

I hope this helps. :-)

You get exactly what you would expect. It's cheap so I was not expecting much and that is exactly what I got, not much. Locating and removing a micro SD card was difficult and after 3 uses it failed to lock in position. When charged it runs for about 2 hours but after 3 charges both lights came on a stayed on and it would no longer record, not sure if this was due to the micro SD card no longer locking in position properly or some other fault. At under £10 it's not worth the effort of returning it. Picture quality was also what you would expect, i.e. wouldn't amaze you with it's definition but considering the price I thought it was very good in decent light. Obviously not so good as the light got poorer. Would have been perfect for what I wanted it for had it kept working but it didn't. I may have been unlucky and got a dud but at under a tenner I reckon there would be quite a few duds knocking about. Wasn't expecting much, but thought it was worth a gamble at the price. I lost.

Addition - Matrix Discounts contacted me out of the blue and offered a replacement after reading my rating, this was without me requesting a replacement (I didn't think it was worth the bother at under £10). Obviously they have faith in the product and a first class customer relations ethic. With that in mind I have upper my rating from 1 to 3 stars - assuming you get it from Matrix Discounts.

Small and neat, but doesn't work! The SD card slot is fiddly to use & it's difficult to ensure the card engages properly. The instructions mention red, green and yellow lights. It in fact has red and blue lights. So, no light combination marries up with the instructions. Oh, and it failed to record from the off and ruined the SD card. Avoid!