 A friendly video camera with a lot of extras. |
| Review Date: June 10, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Pop S, Oak Ridge, Tn USA |
I am not an expert at video recorders- this is the first one I have used in years. I have had the Sanyo Dual Camera Xacti TH1 camera for a few weeks, however, and have really put it through the paces, so perhaps my experience will be helpful.
General appearance and construction: I was pleased with the look and feel of the camera. The hinges all appear solid and well made. At first I was afraid that the screen would be loose after a while, but I no longer believe that to be a problem. The slots for the SD card and the batteries are good and solid- and the SD slot is sealed with a rubber gasket to be at least water resistant. I saw nothing to concern me about the mechanical side of things.
View Screen: The screen is good and bright. I used it in a variety of lighting conditions and had no problem telling what I was shooting. That said, the camera did not have a view finder. I am kind of old fashioned, I guess, but I like a view finder. Frequently I find that I can't use a camera screen in bright light- but then again, I didn't have any problem with this screen. The screen will flip around in all directions- by the way- so self portraits of "overhead" shots are easy to accomplish.
Controls: The controls are good and solid, but were not immediately intuitive. I deliberately did not read the manual in the beginning, and was able to figure everything out in a couple of hours- but it took some work. The menus make sense and I didn't have any issues figuring out what they were asking me.
Manual: I did eventually read the manual and found it reasonable. It did not contain some of the detailed information I was looking for- but it did describe how to do anything I would want to do.
Function: The camera works really well. The zoom is absolutely incredible. I loved the "take a photo while you are recoding video" feature. This means that if you wanted to record your kid's concert you could do so, but still occasionally snap a photo of the event that could be printed or e-mailed or whatever. I would rather have the photos than the videos- so this was a big deal.
I got really good photos and videos under a variety of conditions that I considered challenging. The first one, for example, I made a video of a live concert that was outdoors conducted at night. The stage was over 50 yards from where I set. The camera did very well. Admittedly, the image stabilization could not compensate for the extreme zoom, but with some leaning against a post, the video was acceptable. The sound was good for such a small unit- and sounded much better on the television (see later) than it did on the unit's built in speaker.
I then shot video from a moving car. Video inside a well lit room, video in poor light.. you name it. Everything came out good.
The photos that are taken while the video is recording do not make use of the flash. This causes some problems with quality in low light- but not as much as I was expecting. I don't know what the equivalent ASA rating of this thing would be, but I'm thinking it would be pretty good.
A couple of times I tried to take photos that simply did not take. I'm not sure what I did wrong. This was while I was experimenting with using the camera without reading the book. I didn't have these issues later.
I thought the battery life was very good- long enough to fill my memory card. When I traveled with the unit, I didn't even take the charger, I just used the batteries. There is a neat monitor inside that tells you how long the batter y has to go in minutes of operation. Really cool.
I transferred the photos taken to my computer and they look good. I played the video (and photo show) directly on my HD television and they looked very good as well. This reminds me of a minor irritation- the camera does not come with a SD card of any kind. I was expecting a small one of some kind so that I could play without making a trip to the store. The camera will hold a few photos or few seconds of video in its internal memory, but very few. With the price of SD cards so low now, this is a convenience, not cost issue.
All in all, if you're looking for a small, light video camera with a built in stop motion photo capability, I would recommend this unit. You have to get over not having a view finder, but I'm thinking that for most folks, the view finder is not something they have to have.
Good purchase! |
GREAT LITTLE CAMCORDER
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| Review Date: April 22, 2009 |
| Reviewer: R. Oxhorn, GRANADA HILLS, CA USA |
| I was given this camcorder as a gift because I am known for loving to take photos and videos of my kids, grandchildren and pets. I have to say that I absolutely love this little camcorder! First of all, its size and weight make it very convenient to keep in my handbag (at all times) for those special moments. I love the fact that it uses flash memory cards that I am confident will last a very long time unlike the old-fashion video tapes that are slowly disintegrating in my closet. There is no worry about the tapes getting caught up in the mechanisms with these flash cards either. This little "machine" feels solid in my hands and appears to be well built and sturdy. Oh, did I mention that it captures the moments beautifully? I highly recommend this little "machine." If you want an affordable camcorder that is easy to use, travels well, is reliable and does a great job recording, then I suggest you give it a try. |
Decent for the price.
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| Review Date: May 15, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Joseph A. Underkoffler, Mechanicsburg, PA USA |
I just got this camera from Amazon yesterday. I was looking for a camcorder that had a couple of features in particular: HD (at least 720p), HDMI output, some sort of decent optical zoom, some sort of memory card capability, and a reasonable price. The Sanyo VCP-TH1 fit the mold. It was also VERY important to me to get a camera that recorded files compatible with my MacBook and iMovie 08. I just did some random shooting with the camera and tried importing the files for the first time, and it seemed to work really well. I was sort of expecting it to take a long time to import, but, to my pleasant surprise, it didn't!
Although I haven't had much time to tinker with it yet, I feel that the pros are far outweighing the cons. The price is very reasonable and it was worth the extra $100+ to go with this camera opposed to the smaller handheld HD camcorders that FLIP or Kodak make for about $150-$200. I wish the camcorder came with a mini HDMI to HDMI cable. I also wish it came with another battery. You'll have to purchase those separately if you desire to have a spare battery and a true easy and instant way to view your HD footage on your new HDTV too.
2 weeks later.... I just got a mini HDMI cable to hook to my 720p Plasma TV. The recording looks a little grainy for some reason. It seems that I got a better recording quality when recording outdoors on a sunny day and inside in natural lighting. I think I would downgrade my initial rating down to a 4 due to this. |
Best Choice for a Low End HD Flash Camera
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| Review Date: June 23, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Clank, Iowa - USA |
| If you are considering the Flip Video Mino HD or any other $200 range HD camera, spend the extra $60 and get this. It has much better features and video quality but don't expect to put this in your pocket. It's video quality won't be on par with high end cams but great for the price. You are better off getting a less than perfect video quality HD camera than a non HD cam for the same price. Low light conditions aren't the best and it gets a little choppy if you pan around at all, plus the digital (not optical) image stablization isn't the greatest, especially when zooming at all. But like I said, it's better than what is offered on any other HD cam in this price range. I got what I expected and am very happy with it. |
It is HD - not bad for under $300
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| Review Date: April 14, 2009 |
| Reviewer: A. Chan, Cerritos, CA |
I also bought this camera without doing much research. I was looking for a camcorder that was HD "quality", uses SDHC memory card and for a price around $300. The Sanyo met all the criteria so I purchased it from Amazon.
I also picked up a 16 gb Transcend memory card.
Let's go over the PROS first --
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++ It is really easy to use. Just point and shoot. Just like using a digital camera, except it's a digital video camera.
++ Having the memory card is so much better than using mini-DV tapes. There is no longer a need to plug the camcorder into your computer fireport or USB port. After I am done shooting, I just pop out the memory card, put it in my memory card reader and copy it onto the hard driver. Doesn't get much better than that!
++ Transferring files are a lot faster than mini-DV tapes. Before, you had to play/record in real time. Due to fact that everything is digital, the transfer is quite fast!
++ Battery life is very good. You can get around 200 minutes of video time. I also like the fact that the battery indicator tells you the approximate MINUTES left. I hate it when they just show a battery symbol and start deducting "spaces/icons" from the battery. I need to know the numerical time value, which this camera provides
++ YouTube uploads are amazingly easy. Just click on the file you want to use, and upload. Make sure you watch in HQ quality on YouTUbe
++ Size is perfect. It's a lot smaller than my mini-DV camcorder, but not too small where it feels like a toy.
++ Build/Construction. I bought the blue version and the blue looks very good. It feels solid in your hands and appear that it could take some abuse. It's not too light and not too heavy. It just feels good in your hands.
++ Quality - overall, quality of the video is good for a $300 video camera. You cannot expect true HD quality from this. However, I do have a problem with the focus (see the CONS below)
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OK - here's the CONS
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- Focus ---- the although the camera has face recogition, there is no way to "lock" onto one person. In other words, if there are 3 or 4 people in the same shot, the camera tends to jump around with the focus between the different faces and it gets annoying during playback. It seems like the camera keeps searching for the right focus. If there is a way to "lock" onto a face, please let me know so I can use that feature.
- Indoor quality not good. There seems to be more noise than usual while shooting indoors. Of course, I should have turned on more lights indoors but I am still working on improving my indoor shots.
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Would I buy this camera knowing what I know? Absolutely!! The price is right. If they could fix the focus issue, this camera would have met all my expectations |
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