 Awesome camera! |
| Review Date: March 22, 2010 |
| Reviewer: JFLY, New York, NY |
The video quality is great! The touchscreen is very easy to use, the internal memory is great! This is a better buy than the HDR-CX110 which has no internal memory.
The camera is very small which I love, it fits perfectly in my pocket. It turns on when you open the screen and it turns off when you close the screen, very convenient.
The zoom works great and the steadyshot feature is very good and it really works.
If you set the camera to manual focus you can touch the subject on the screen that you want the camera to focus on, very cool.
Overall I love this camera because the video quality and of its size. |
Amazing performance in a small package
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| Review Date: April 26, 2010 |
| Reviewer: CoolV, Midwest USA |
Where do I begin? I'm not sure. I didn't know what to expect when I order this camera, but the minute I powered it up, I was amazed at the clarity. I mean right out of the box, this thing is practically set up for you to succeed with your project.
The camera has many adjustable settings, but many of them a buried within the menu system, which is accessible via it's touchscreen.
Sony was even nice enough to give you a quick menu area where you access the features or settings that you may use more often. I
wish there were more than one screen of these as I often have found myself needing more quick buttons than this.
However, the real reason I am so pleased with this camera is because you don't need to fool around with anything to take good video.
The intelligent auto feature is activated by default and it pretty much has you covered, as the camera will quickly detect scenes
and select the proper settings based on the environment. What this means is, if you are a point-and-shoot type of person (like me),
this camera will not let you down.
And did I mention the picture quality? It is incredible!!!!
The camera has 4 HD modes and 1 SD mode. They are FX,FH,HQ, LP (all for HD), and STD HQ for SD.
I have only tried the different HD modes and I must say they are great, but I found that I often need to shoot longer videos, so
I am currently using FH mode, which allows me a bit more recording. BTW, this camera has 16Gb internal flash memory, plus a
slot for an SD card or Sony's memory stick duo.
And did I mention the picture quality?
No matter which of the recording modes you choose, the quality is absolutely stellar!
Battery life is pretty good. You get a battery that you nearly squeeze 2 hours out of. What I like best is that the battery is
external, meaning you can buy a larger capacity battery (Sony has at least 2 additional batteries that will fit).
What I liked about this camera:
1. Quick and easy to use
2. Excellent picture quality regardless of recording mode (1080i)
3. built in flash memory
4. adjustable microphone (recording is dolby digital 2 channel)
5. small and compact
6. zoom is smooth and steady
7. has touch focus
8. has face recognition, including priority of one face in the picture
9. smile detection will take a photo if one of the faces smiles (and smile detection is adjustable)
10. shoots photos while filming
11. reasonably good low light performance (not great, but the colors still looked like themselves)
What I didn't like:
I waited a while before writing the review to see if I had an issue that I could complain about with this camera.
I don't have any complaints. It exceeded my expectations in every area. I read some complaints about not having 1080p....
whatever.
Video Formats:
For HD this camera produces MPEG4 H.264 AVC/AVCHD files (files have .m2ts extention when imported by PMB, .mts if you browse
the camera)
For SD I believe the format is MPEG2 (I haven't shot much SD footage, but what I have was very good)
Make sure your computer is loaded with the proper codecs and you should have no problems.
The camera came with Sony's PMB software, which I use to download my footage to the computer. It allows you some manipulation
of the files and the ability to burn to DVD in AVCHD format, where it can be played on a Blue-ray player. You can also burn
normal DVDs with PMB as well. However, I only use PMB to import from the camera. I have other software to produce videos.
I would mention the picture quality shot with this camera again, but I think I'll close the review by saying that, this is an
excellent camcorder and it was worth every penny. |
Big Features packed in a small body.
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| Review Date: May 4, 2010 |
| Reviewer: chrisghemm, |
I purchased this camcorder (HDR-CX150 Black) yesterday from Costco for $449 including a bonus camera bag. A month ago, I purchased the Panasonic TM10 and was not happy with the results on indoor shooting so, I decided to look around and found the CX110 at Walmart which have great reviews online including Amazon. Luckily my wife and I went to Costco to look for a DSLR camera. I saw the guy setting this camcorder up. He said that it just arrived. I quickly went to Amazon when we got home and found that the CX150 is the same as the CX110 with the 16GB memory built-in so, I returned to Costco the next day to get this camcorder.
Our purpose for this camcorder is to record precious moments from our 2 kids (3 year old and 1 year old). We have our camcorder ready all time to shoot video when they start dancing or having fun and this usually happens inside our home. This camcorder performs excellent indoor with just a flourecent or a lamp as a source of light. I set the panasonic TM10 and this Sony CX150 side by side and record my 3 year old walking, running and jumping around and going to the different part of the house. The difference is night and day on scenes with only the lamp as source of light. The CX150 is sharp and clear while the TM10 are already grainy. When I have my daughter turned off the light, the CX150 looks a lot darker but is more viewable than the TM10. This is because the TM10 though clearer, shows a lot grain. The CX150 also exhibit some grain at this point but is more acceptable. Anyway, who will be shooting videos with no light? The test I did is set to HD|HQ which is the third quality down. Maybe the highest resolution will give better result.
The only thing I noticed with the CX150 is that it tends to get out of focus when you zoom too fast to an object. Something I did not see on TM10. Also, the TM10 have a simpler menu option. I was able to figure it out within 5 minutes after opening the box. For the CX150, I'm still trying to figure out how to change video quality. I can change HD to Std but I could not select the other HD options like HD|FX to try the highest resolution.
Other features that I like:
1. Slow motion is great, I will be using this a lot with my kids.
2. "My Menu" option. This will let you set up to 6 favorite menu item.
3. Battery life shows 125 minutes when fully charged.
4. Image are stable even when you walk around while taking video.
5. 25X Optical Zoom
6. Clear LCD
7. Built in lens cover
8. Direct copy. Let's you copy to a portable harddrive without the need for computer.
Features I don't like:
1. No viewfinder. Newer HD camcorder at this price range does not offer viewfinder but I just hope that there is one available as my kids likes to watch at themselves while doing their stunts. I have to hold it to my side so I can also see if they are at the center of the camera.
2. Cover design for ports (Memory, cable, power) looks easy to break. It looks great with the body but I like the rubber type better as I feel that I protects the ports more from dust.
3. Battery charger is sold separately. Need to plan ahead to make sure you have enough battery on big events. Current package will only let you charge battery with the camcorder so camcorder will be out of commission for a couple of hours.
4. You need to dig deep into the menu if you need to change some settings. Maybe this is why they setup the "My Menu" option but I don't have time to play with it yet.
Those are the things I noticed so far after 1 day of ownership. I will update when I find more things here.
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UPDATE - JULY 8, 2010
----------------------
Still happy with the product after over 2 months of having it. I was able to figure out all the menus and setup the camera to my preferred setting after looking at the manual. The videos are great and I like the fact that it creates a new file on each new clips that you take. I learned to control the when to cut and create a new video file for easier editing.
We went to Alaska cruise at the end of may and this camcorder continues to work even on extreme changes in temperature. From inside the boat with room temperature to going outside at the Glacier Bay, I was expecting the lens to fog up but it did not.
Battery life is adequate. I never run out of battery as long as I charge it at night during our vacation. Also, the battery seem to hold its charge really well. I have it fully charged and just keep it inside its case and pull it out when I need to take videos. So far, I have only recharge it once in a months time.
Memory: 16GB memory can hold up to 4 hours of HD|HQ and around 2 hours for the highest quality. LP mode will give you close to 7 hours of recording time. I currently have it set at HD|HQ since I only do small edit and convert it to DVD. Will use the highest quality when BlueRay disk becomes cheaper. Also, it is fast and easy to tranfer the files compare to the old MiniDV tapes so I just transfer the files to the computer often and delete the memory.
Lens: I added a wide angle lens VCL-0630X as I found out that the widest angle is sometimes not enough when taking video of kids inside the house. Kids moves a lot and it forces you to move back or they will get off the frame. With the wide angle lens, I can just stay in one place and adjust the zoom using my fingers. The wide angle lens also help me take videos inside the ships cabin without any problem.
|
Great little camera
|
| Review Date: May 5, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Mark A. Stover, Evergreen, Co USA |
| We received this camera 2 days ago. The first night was spent charging it and looking through the manual, but last night I actually got to use it for the first time. So far, I love it. It's strange going from a heavy 1990s era 8mm tape camera to this as this is so much lighter and actually does more. My big concern had been connecting it to our Mac as I've heard there were many issues with Macs and Sony not working well together. I was pleasantly surprised to see that when I connected the camera to my mac via the included USB cable, it was recognized right away and iphoto popped up asking if I wanted to import the pictures I had taken...gotta love a Mac! (I had told the camera to use the smile detector feature which takes a picture of a specific person each time he/she smiles...worked great by the way). I imported them with no problem, then called up iMovie to see how it would do with the video. In this case I simply used the iMovie pull down menu "import from camera". It imported all the video perfectly. So, if working with a Mac was a concern of yours, have no fear. I've ordered a mini-hdmi cable (although the port is on the camera, a cable isn't included) so I can easily connect to our HDTV so I can't say how well that works yet. I also have only recorded to the internal memory and haven't tried an SDHC card yet. One thing I am worried a bit about is that the stability control is a bit iffy when you zoom way in. I'm thinking for my daughters upcoming graduation I may want to bring along a mono-pole to brace it on. This Amazon purchase came with a free battery which made be believe the camera itself didn't come with a battery, but that was incorrect. I now have two batteries which will be nice for long days on vacation as I'm sure it will come in quite handy. So, if you are looking to upgrade to a new camera like we were, this is a very nice option. It's small, light, fits your hand nicely and seems to work great. No, it doesn't have every bell and whistle of the $800 - $1000 cameras out there, but we didn't need that. Watch Amazon if you want to purchase this as the price seemed to change daily when I was shopping. I got the free shipping, but please realize that the free shipping seems to be used as an excuse to wait a week before shipping, so if you need it soon, pay for the shipping yourself. |
Amazing everything you could want.
|
| Review Date: May 16, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Felicia Levinson, |
| You could not ask for a better camera for everyday use. It starts up in about three seconds which I think is one of the most important things. It's auto focous is great. And it keeps the shot steady and works great with low light. The only problem is that the software doesn't seem to work very well with the camera. But you can always use another cheap software or even movie maker and it works fine. GET THIS CAMERA!!!!!! |
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