SlashGear Japan
This new digital camcorder from Vivitar isn’t giving up the goods, so we don’t have much information. However we do know that it’s an SD card recorder working with up to 4GB SD cards and it can record in H.264 at up to 720p.
At the 720p recording size you get 30 frames per second and can choose to play it back at up to 1080i resolutions using the included HDMI cable. There is a 3-inch LCD display that flips out so you can see what you are recording.
Overall it’s a very thin, sleek unit, but I don’t think it comes anywhere near competing with Sanyo’s Xacti. However for a more consumer oriented market this thing would to great, we’ll just have to wait and see where the price places it and when/where its going to go on sale, more details to come as soon as we get them.
[via Pocket-Lint]
One Response to “Vivitar DVR565HD – shiny, but not quite a Xacti”
Drain July 6, 2008
Bought from Newegg over the weekend and tested indoors, outdoors, different lighting, etc. Not the best video but for a little over $100.00 it makes a nice pocket camcorder. Very small form factor, looks awesomely cool. I bought the black model. There’s a silver version as well. Under the best lighting HD looks ok, not awesome, just ok. Worth watching. In less than best lighting you get grainy, pixelated video. Photos say 11 MP interpolated or 5 MP normal. Technically that is probably true, but look more like 2 or 3 MP. Not awful but not impressive. Color washed out as well. Again the best lighting makes a huge difference with this camera. Also noticed the flash is more of a , light on, snap, light off. Not a flash. It could be that using some manual options for exposure, lighting, etc. could improve things greatly so others may have better luck trying some of those. Playing video via the HDMI worked but showed more pixelation than converting to DVD and then playing on the same HDTV. Maybe the HDMI is just for a quick fix but I expected upconverted video that would look great.
Again for a little over $100.00 this camera performs but if it were even $200.00 it would get an “awful” review from me. I wonder, though, how it performs against similar models by DXG, etc.? My guess is about the same. So, for its price point and type it may be considered “great”.
+1