I bought this camera for backpacking, where size and space is critical and any equipment is subject to harsh conditions so expensive cameras can be a bad idea.My main computer is a Mac, so I had some reservations about the MZ-DV, since it uses Microsoft's proprietary ASF video format. That's right: it says "MPEG-4", and MPEG-4 is indeed based on QuickTime, but the MPEG-4 standard is implemented as more of a framework than a specific codec, so any vendor who doesn't like to play ball with open standards (sound like our friends in Redmond?) can make their own proprietary variants and it's left to the consumer to sort out the confusion.
Fortunately, I found a handy little software tool called EasyWMV which is dirt cheap and does a great job of easily converting ASF files for use on a Mac with any QuickTime-based program like iMovie.
And the photo format is JPEG, requiring no conversion at all to use on any computer.
I've only had the camera a couple days, but so far it seems a good value for what it does. With all of its features at such a low price it isn't best-of-breed with any one of them, but to have them all in one convenient device is pretty nifty, and the folks at Aiptek have done a competent job with this model.
The quality of low-light video is as reported by the others here: There is a low-light setting, and it's good for pictures but the video is indeed of much lower quality. But in all fairness, I've not seen any hybrid camcorder that didn't have similar issues. You'd have to go up in price and abandon other features if shooting in low-light conditions is important to you.
So far the only limitation I've seen is the one disclosed on the packaging: when mounted on a Mac, the camera acts as a read-only volume. This means you can't load MP3s into it, or use it as a portable drive. I've written Aiptek technical support on this, and if I learn anything useful I'll post it here. I also run Windows under Parallels, and have no trouble loading MP3s and other files into the camera from there.
But aside from the download limitation, everything else on the camera works a treat, with very intuitive controls that often provide multiple ways to change modes conveniently. And with EasyWMV, it's a breeze to use video from it on my MacBook.
I would rate it higher, at least a 4, if I was using Windows primarily. But even for Mac users, if you need something inexpensive that offers these features, I shopped around and couldn't find a better model.
For what it's worth, I took great indoor video and photos, and the pictures came out just fine.
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This camcorder is terrible in just about every way:Cons:
Unacceptably blurry video; the specs say it records at 640x480, but it looks more like 320x240 (if that!) blown up to VGA.
Noticeable aura around any dark shape on a lighter background.
Awful light sensitivity; forget about recording indoors--no matter how brightly the room is lit, faces will come out too dark. The built-in LED's don't help much (and not at all at distances over 4 feet from the subject).
Noisy zoom that gets picked up loud and clear by the microphone.
Zooming goes in irregular steps--completely useless while recording.
Video lags noticeably behind camera movement; when image stabilization is turned on, the lag becomes so atrocious that you can't tell when to stop panning--UTTERLY USELESS!
When using AV-in and AV-out cables, the firmware has frozen on me a couple of times; the only way to reset the camera was to remove the battery.
Video encoding (through the AV-in cable) produces an unacceptably noisy and undersaturated result.
The LCD display has a very narrow viewing angle; anything more than about 10% and you can't make out a thing.
Still photos taken at the native 5MP resolution come out strangely grainy and uneven--something like a "sharpen" effect gone wrong. I can get better looking pictures with my 2MP Canon Powershot A40 camera.
The manual recommends keeping the camera motionless for 2-3 seconds AFTER snapping a picture (that's on top of the 3-4 seconds it takes the thing to focus BEFORE it snaps); but you can't keep THE SUBJECT from moving, folks! Welcome to the psychedelic land of image trails...
Flash photos come out with wildly different color balance depending on the color of the background.
The manual is a sorry affair--only 17 pages long and doesn't go much beyond identifying external controls and menu options.
I could go on and on, but I'll stop now, as you probably get the picture...
Pros:
The camera body seems sturdily built; the controls also have a sturdy feel to them, as do the battery and the USB port covers. Hmm... it's the only nice thing I can think to say about it.
Maybe a child (think pre-teen) could find this "camcorder" exciting as a toy, but I don't see how it can be enough even for an undemanding person looking to capture occasional life's moments on video.
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All I wanted when I bought this camera was something easy to use every now and then, sadly this camera fails so bad that I'm looking for something new now. I go to conventions every now and then and like to snap shots while there, however this becomes an issue with this particular camera. It may be that I'm not doing something (even though I've fiddled with all the controls) anyway when trying to film in areas with lots of people the video comes out awful. The camera attempts to focus on everything or something and you end up with all these blurs of light moving around on screen.Then if you try to take stationary pictures your target must remain perfectly still or there will be a blurred effect to the picture. Another annoying thing about the pictures is how long it takes to take a single one. First you have to wait for the camera to focus, then you must hold down the button for a second or two, THEN after the camera makes the sound to let you know the picture is taken you must keep the camera aimed at your target or it will blur. If you are trying to take a picture of someone who is in a hurry good luck keeping them still that long.
I didn't expect this camera to be top of the line and ignored the bad reviews because of it's cheap price, however I seriously wish I had spent the extra money for an overall better camera, the only plus for this thing is that it's durable and easy to carry.
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For starters, 5+ stars to Amazon for delivering this in about 14 hours (literally) when I opted for 2-day shipping. I'm going on vacation in a week and speed was of the essence.This is my first experience with a "hybrid" camera so I had no preconceptions.
Appearance: Sleek. High tech. So intuitive I barely opened the manual (which is good because, while at least being in English (with proper grammar and everything!), it's about as bare-bones as you can get). Attractive graphics on the menu screens with buttons/icons logically placed for maximum ease of use. And so compact -I've seen bigger cellphones.
Performance: The still photos are acceptable quality to me. There is the annoying delay between shutter press and release (and true, your hand can't move a millimeter in that time). I like how the still camera and video camera operate in the same mode (different buttons) so no need to switch back and forth in between.
Video. Well for this price, as others have noticed, the videos aren't exactly high-def. If you're in full sunlight they're more than acceptable (to me). Only minor complaint is the constant auto-focusing that can be heard on the video, but again, at this price for taking simple, fun videos I didn't have high expectations.
Lower light does create the annoying trails with movement, and this is where I encountered my first real problem: With the Night Shot feature enabled (which doesn't remove the trails, but makes the difference between normal quality and a "Ghost Hunters" effect), the camera started freezing every time I stopped recording. When it didn't freeze, the videos it did create appeared blank on the camera, and showed up on the computer but without sound (please don't stop reading at this point though).
I emailed and called tech support, desperate for a simple solution before my trip. Email was a waste of time, but I did speak to a person on the phone. He made a few (unsuccessful) suggestions, told me sending it in for repair would take much longer than the week I had before my trip, but assured me I could wait until after the trip to do so. I figured I would just shoot in daylight so I would at least have a camera.
After experimenting a lot, I made some discoveries of my own: My previous attempts were on an A-Data "turbo" SDHC and a Kingston regular SD card. Using a Hewlett Packard SDHC "high-speed" card, the problem seemed to resolve -as long as I made sure to aim the camera somewhere stationary when I stopped recording. My theory is trying to simultaneously auto-focus and stop recording probably overwhelms the camera (or the card? These aren't top-of-the-line cards as I didn't want to spend tons of money if it didn't work out). It's the best I can come up with, having no experience, but at least I know if I HAVE to record in lower light it's not completely impossible.
The biggest reason I chose the MZ-DV was for the media player. It seemed like the perfect way to travel light and still bring along videos to watch on the plane. This is what makes this camera exciting. Getting the computer file to the camera is involved, but well worth it. (Again, this was learned through dogged trial-and-error, the manual is purely decorative): It has to be converted to an .asf type, which can be done with the handy bundled software. You also can't rename the file, it has to stay in the "CLIP0001" etc. format -a bit of a pain for locating later, but those are the rules. I needed tech support again for this revelation, but I was just so happy to get it working I didn't really care. Then you drag and drop into the removable drive/DCIM/100MEDIA folder and voila! Instant portable DVD player.
Recording from a DVD is much easier, though takes longer since obviously it has to be done in real time. Just the fact that it's possible is pretty thrilling.
Watching the video isn't trouble-free. I've noticed if you attempt to fast-forward or rewind you lose audio/video synchronization, and of course any kind of "resume from last stop" feature is too much to expect for this price. Last night I realized using the camera's external speakers also results in audio/visual mismatch, but using headphones fixes it. Quite a quirky machine (perhaps too quirky for some).
I haven't tried the mp3 player yet, I'm more of a video fan. If that disappoints, it's not like my iPod Nano takes up so much luggage space.
The battery life seems respectable. I played with it off and on for at least a couple of days before it ran out. It took awhile to recharge (about 3 hours). I don't know if that will go down over time, but spares are pretty cheap from the manufacturer's site (aiptek.com).
The bundled software is half useless (ArcSoft PhotoImpression and Muvee autoProducer), 1/4 useful (ArcSoft Media Card Companion for extracting files to the computer) and 1/4 essential (ArcSoft Media Converter, for converting files to the correct format to use in the camera).
Customer service: Very satisfactory. I had to sit on hold to get one, but both times they were very helpful and friendly. I think it's a little rare these days to even get a person when dealing with off-brand products.
Conclusion: For the price, the versatility of this camera repeatedly amazes me. Playing with it and figuring out all that it can do is extremely fun. "Fun" is the operative word here. I wouldn't use this to film someone's wedding professionally (or your child's first steps, just in case). But for a couple of days in the Big Apple with not much luggage space, I think this is just about the perfect machine.
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