There's a lot to like about this little hybrid camera and camcorder. The size, the price, the zoom range, that its sand and splash proof & the fact it records everything to SD Card.

However most people reading reviews are interested in the problems - so here goes with my opinion.

The unusual vertical design means you'll struggle a bit if you're left handed or have small hands. You're expected to operate it by gripping with the right hand and pushing the button with your thumb. For the still picture button, this can be quite a stretch. The screen only swivels in one direction (it's also effectively the on switch!) & this contributes to it being hard for left handed people to wrap their fingers around it.

Even if you have large hands & are right handed it takes some getting used to. When I've given it to friends to take a picture of me, they're always failed - the button needs a far harder push than people expect, and the zoom rocker gets in the way. This often means you wobble the camera while taking the picture or starting & stopping the video.

The screen does not have a great viewing angle, and because it only swivels in and out, it means I am often taking high and low pictures nearly blind. Its unusual design also means it's surprising hard to hold square onto the horizon!

I found what the scene settings actually did quite surprising & disappointing. For example low light "lamp" mode restricts the image size to just 0.3 Mega Pixels! I could also see no benefit from the 10 Mega Pixel mode.

There doesn't seem to be image stabilisation for stills, but stabilisation works quite well for video.

That all said, the pictures were good, and the video FAR better than I expected - even with MPEG4 compression. And of course, it being an SD Card means downloading is easy. Many still cameras can take MPEG4 video to SD Card, but few have 5x zoom which can be used while filming - making this a true still/video hybrid.

I've never used the in-camera still or video editing - I do it all on my PC.

The bundled software is so-so, but the included MPEG4 codex means I can use the video editor of my choice.

All this makes it sound as if I don't like it - but for the price, size and convenience it's great, and I can take it to "rough" environments without worry. If I lost it, I'd buy another - what more can I say!

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42 of 42 people found the following review helpful

Great gadget 20 Jun 2007

By Mrs. G. Langridge

This a super little camera, my original video camera got a little damp and stopped working properly so I bought this. It is so very portable, just pop it in a pocket and it is there when anything interesting happens. I have videod cricket, dressage and horses running in a field - a little unsteady due to small size but good fun to play with. The photos are excellent quality and so much better than a phone camera but just as convenient. it will not replace a larger camera for those wishing to take serious video footage, but they look ok on a computer - I convert them for Apple TV as it stops the jerkiness that occures when played as a Quick Time movie. As it is SD card based it is easy to transfer files to a computer or you can edit them in the camera. Very happy with this device.

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27 of 27 people found the following review helpful

This is a great camcorder 3 Sep 2007

By London John

Amazon Verified Purchase

I bought this camcorder recently and absolutely love it! What I wanted was a camera that could go anywhere, is small enough to fit in a pocket and rugged enough to survive rain, snow etc. This camera is perfect for that: I recently took it on an expedition up three mountains and the movies are great and best of all, the camera survived!

To be clear, if you are planning to make the world's greatest movies, this camera isn't for you, but for short clips, capturing memories and overall versatility, this is great.

Finally, it is very flexible: the high quality settings are good enough to watch on a TV, but the lower resolution settings are perfect for uploading onto blogs etc.

All in all, highly recommended.

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