- Average user rating: 4.0 stars out of 8 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
Full user review
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25 out of 25 people found this review helpful
4.0 stars
"Very solid performer, only minor downsides..."
Pros: Excellent build quality. Excellent video quality
Cons: No included software or cables
Summary: Cons First:
I had to use my own software in order to retrieve and edit the video from the device. The next model up (GS59) comes with the software but this one doesnt. That annoys me but isn't a huge deal. As far as I could tell, that's the only difference between the two models and the other one is 30 bucks more.
Also, it would have been really nice if they included a firewire cable in the package. I had a USB cable that was compaible but the quality using one is awful compared to firewire. I bought a firewire cable which worked fine. This is a grip of mine because firewire cables are ridiculously overpriced. I can't imagine them costing more then 50 cents or a buck to make and then they sell them for 25 bucks. It's awful.
Pros:
The quality of the camera is what you'd expect from panasonic. It's very solid and feels very good to hold. The physical design is what caught my eye at first. Panasonic is up there with sony when it comes to style. (of course this is all subject to a persons opinion. I just happen to like it a lot)
The ease of use is about what i'd expect from a camcorder. It's got a picture mode that works if you have an SD card installed, but if you don't it just won't work. I don't really have any desire to take 640x480 pictures (i have a 4mp digital camera) so i didn't try this out.
One of my favorite things about the camera is that it supports 16:9 aspect ratio video. I am a big fan of widescreen.
I used my firewire cable and pulled 15 minutes of video off of it on to my computer. I set the capture resolution to the full 720x480 widescreen. I then used Sonic DVDit to create a DVD from the footage. I used the actual created DVD for my video quality review because this could be considered the "final product." I was honestly very impressed by the quality of the video. My folks have a miniDV digital camcorder as well and I was expecting video quality similar to theirs. I was pleasantly surprised to find that this camera provided me with vibrant colors and a very sharp picture.
It may be worth noting to some that you can connect the camcorder to a PC and use it as a webcam. I'd imagine many digital camcorders have this feature, but i thought it was worth mentioning.
All in all, i'm very happy with my purchase.
