Sony Webbie HD MHS-PM1 user reviews (purple)

4.0 stars

"Wow! Sony got it perfect (almost)" on March 27, 2009 by aspielman

Pros: Excellent video quality 1080P
Total ease of use
Creates standards based files Mpeg4
Easy to use software (if you need it)
Small, light, and attractive

Cons: Only missing a steadycam feature so you need to have a smooth grip and smooth motion

Summary: I just got this Wednesday March 25th. I went to a friends house and we took his Canon HF10 and the Sony PM1 and shot the same scenes concurrently we then played them back on his 60" HDTV in 1080P (we did use tripods) and we were unable to tell the difference between the two video clips. He was so impressed that he plans to return the Canon and buy two MP1's one for him and one for his wife. I also lent it to my wife who is a technophobe and she found it so easy to use that I had a hard time getting it back from her. We also tried using the Roxio software and it produced great looking standard DVDs, now I wish I had a Blueray burner. For $169 you can't beat it. This is one of the best tech buys I have made in a long time.

Updated on Mar 27, 2009

Just wanted to add I would have given 5 stars if it had image stabilization and I did check out the Flip HD, the Creative Vado HD, and the Kodak Zi6 and this beats them all for picture quality. I also like the software, simple, easy to use, and it just works. This is one device I will probably carry all the time just like my iPhone.

3.5 stars

"Great Vlogging and fast film-making camcorder." on March 4, 2011 by Chris3037

Pros: Lightweight
Fast boot up
Great quality
Great price
Lens you can swivel while recording

Cons: No auto-focus
No flash
Microphone placed where a hand would go

Summary: I got this when I first got in to making videos for YouTube and I now have a Canon I am going to use this and my Canon for tech related videos.

1.0 stars

"Display has to much glare." on November 29, 2009 by eostwmt

Pros: it's small

Cons: Display has to much glare. not enough device memory. I can't power up unit from USB. video has not stabilization feature.
memory card is a pain to find and costly because in is Sony's(which it was the generic SD)

Summary: If I could do it all over I would not buy this device; well maybe is it was half the price and came with an 8G memory stick.

3.0 stars

"Great as daylight camcorder, very bad in low-light" on August 11, 2009 by afdaddy

Pros: I'm happy with the picture quality in both video and picture modes, actually great in picture mode. Expandable storage capacity. Good battery life. Very light weight, swivel lens is great for self video.

Cons: Very poor quality in low light, anything, but daylight is almost useless. Zoom is choppy, not smooth, sometimes looks weird on video. Camera button has to be pressed and held to take photos (lost the first few photos).

Summary: I chose the Sony over the Flip options because of the Photo option and expandable memory. Looking back on it, I'd like to know more about the Flip's performance in low-light, as I'm disappointed that the Webbie is all but useless in low light. Both the camera and video functions actually record darker than the LCD screen on the camera. I've tried some lightening add-ins for iMovie, but any lightening means more noise so it doesn't really help at all. Otherwise, I'm happy with daylight performance of the Webbie, the videos are great quality, easy to upload to YouTube, and the picture quality is much better than I expected given good lighting. The HD files can be problematic though, I've got a top-of-the-line iMac with added RAM, etc, and it still takes 20 min or more to load files for video editing.