Flip Ultra Series Camcorder, 60-Minutes (Black) OLD MODEL
by Flip Video
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List Price: Our Price: $79.99 You Save: $70.00 (47%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $53.88 (click here) Category: Digital Camera See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Flip Ultra Series Camcorder, 60-Minutes (Black) OLD MODEL
Customer Review: Too Expensive For What You Get. Convenient, Clear Picture, but No Image Stabilization & Uploading Probs
Summary: 3 Stars
I received this for Christmas from my wife.
First of all the pluses. As advertised and on several reviews, this is an extremely easy video camera to use. Probably the easiest out there. It is compact enough to fit in your pocket, and the picture is clear with adequate sound. I found it easy to download on to my computer 8 out of 10 times. The other two times, the recording wouldn't download no matter what I tried.
Now for the cons. I was disappointed by the shakey image. I have used several cameras all with steady pictures. I tried to keep my hand steady, but could only get a stable picture when I used my second hand. For me, this really detracted from what I was shooting. The whole time I was watching the video, I was distracted by the instability of the image.
This camera is great for teenagers or adults shooting videos for "You-Tube", but not very good if you want to capture memories. In my opinion, this camera is too expensive for what you get. I also don't like being limited to an internal flash card. If something goes wrong with the card, the camera is shot. I think they really need to look at having an expansion SD card port.
I purchased a Vupoint dv-da1-vp as a replacement. It was the same price, but has several additional features. The video quality is better, and the size is exactly the same as the Flip Ultra. MOST IMPORTANTLY, IT HAS IMAGE STABILIZATION!! The videos of my kids don't make me seasick anymore! The creators of the Flip Ultra should look at this camera and try to duplicate. It has a place for an expansion SD card, an MP3 player, a 5.0 MP camera, a larger viewing screen, built in lens cap, better sound than the flip camera, a voice recorder, and you can record TV or movies on it to be viewed later. This camera is slightly more complicated to work than the Flip Ultra, but only takes about 30 minutes to learn.
Bottom line: If you are looking for simplicity, pick the Flip Ultra. If you are looking for a better quality pocket-sized video camera at the same price, look at the Vupoint dv-da1-vp.
Customer Review: I *Now* Believe the Hype
Summary: 5 Stars
I have never posted a review before, even though I am a gadget-hound and have purchased them aplenty. This came to an end once I purchased the Flip. I work at an electronics retailer, and after spending my downtime at work playing with the Flip on display I got that "I have to have it" compulsion. Being much cheaper on amazon than at my workplace I ordered one and recieved it in 2 days.
Already being familiar with the function of the flip, I wasn't floored by that once I took mine out of the box. What *did* floor me was how fun, and extremely accessible the Flip is. Within no time I was recording footage of my dogs playing in the backyard, and that was a cute novelty, but the real fun came when I plugged it into my computer.
I run Windows Xp, and the unit installed the movie software without a problem and immediately let me review the footage I had taken. The usb arm is a bit flimsy as many reviewers have already said so I plan on buying the $6 usb male to female connector so that will no longer be an issue. I strngly suggest you do the same if you are sing a desktop rather than a laptop. Exploring the Muvee program, I decided to make a "movie mix". Using one of the "presets", it produced one of the cutest video montages of my footage complete with background music, which totally fit the subject at hand. It also lets you specify your own music file (mp3 or wma I believe) or none at all. I was just amazed at the great project that this little camera yielded that I have had tons of fun creating clips and mixes.
The video quality at 640x480 and audio is very acceptable for computer-only viewing. I myself bought it just so I could take footage and be able to email clips back home to relatives. I would not rely on it to record those once-in-a-lifetime events like the birth of a baby or anything, but what this thing does is allow you to make your own memories and show them off just as easily.
If you are looking for an easy to use, and extremely fun way to capture even the tiniest of memory this is definately a must have.
Customer Review: Disappointing when trying to get video to computer.
Summary: 1 Stars
I would post a video review, but I can't. I have the flip video and it works great at home. I have the flip video software on my computer and it is very good for fast, easy, decent-quality video.
I brought it with me to my parents' house in Florida and wanted to play the video on my dad's computer. He does not have an accessible USB port (the flip video's USB connector is not long enough to reach past the trim on the computer to get to it) but he has a laptop and network.
So I uploaded the videos to the laptop, then copied them over the network to his desktop.
I cannot play any of the videos on his laptop. Apparenty, after a great deal of wasted time researching this, the Flip Video uses a codec from 3ivx to compress their video.
No problem, I just need to install the codec and I should be able to view the videos.
Except the Flip Video pages seem to have no codec to install, and the only codec available at 3ivx's page is a commercial application that costs $$ and allows you to encode and edit videos. I do not want to do that.
I just want to view Flip Videos on my dad's computer. I don't want to edit them with 3ivx's software, I don't want to pay to watch videos from a device that I already paid for - and most of all I wanted this to be easy. That is the whole point of Flip Video, right? You are't paying for a super high quality camera, you are paying for EASY with capital letters.
It is really hard for me to imagine that there aren't people at Pure Digital who wince every time they read this sort of complaint and wonder why the powers that be chose to use 3ivx's codecs. I understand that they needed a quality compression codec as part of the basic design of this device, but not to have purchased or licensed the ability to freely distribute a playback codec is inexcusable and greatly complicates using the videos at a later date.
I have a gigabyte of unplayable videos of my son that his grandparents cannot watch on their computer. That gets you one star.
Customer Review: This camera has a universe of potential.
Summary: 4 Stars
The flip video was given to me as a christmas present and right away I could see the many things I could do with it being forcasted in my head...
Ok the ease of use and "what it is is what it is." Makes up for the lack of some features. What I'd really like to see is AUDIO INPUT! Nothing suites me more like being able to record a 480 video with my own microphone. Okay, I know the mic is great, but think if I were at a preformance for an indie rock band and I wanted to have their set shown on myspace and all I could get was just the shortwaves of overbearing loudness being jerked around in binary mis-mixing and screeches. It's like everyone camera phone video you've ever listened to the audio off of, horrid. Okay, so besides the fact that digital isn't like analog and has a limit to decibals you can input, (following sony's handycam audio mishaps) there was one other feature I would have liked to have seen, STILLS! Okay, come on. there is no reason I can't have a still setting. I could have photos and video at 480! That's been my standard since I was born, 480! I don't even care about high definition at this point, 480 isn't distracting and the photos for what they are would appear nice. I guess you can isolate frames, but I am pretty sure this records in MPEG, which FILLS IN some frames, rendering a compression to minimize hard drive usage. So you can get stills, but not really like a digital camera and certainly not as effective.
This camera is great, there is an underwater attatchment for 50 bucks and it's now my primary video recorder. Screw DVC, there is no imperative reason for not replacing tape stock with recorded dvds or thumb drives. I'd like to see this thing in future models have a mic input so I can use a shotgun to record interviews with it. I hope panasonic buys flip video, they'd be making a good decision.
Welcome to the future, I would have killed for something like this for 145 dollars when I was a kid. Time to show the world what you can do!
Customer Review: It blows but it's great.
Summary: 5 Stars
Let's get one thing out of the way. As an all around video camera the Flip blows. However as a "Video Notebook" this is the greatest thing in the world.
Wallyworld knocked the price down to $75.00 (30 minute model) so I grabbed one. I love it. I absolutely love it! If I see something cool while I'm out I can record it. If I want to make a note to myself I record it. If somebody tells me something I say "Tell the camera. It has a better memory than I do". When the boss wants me to do something I have her tell the camera. When a customer makes a complaint I ask him/her to tell the camera and I'll show the video to the manager. When I am out shopping for something I just make little demo recordings of all the possibilities and go over them at leisure when I get home. If I want to show somebody something I just record it and show them.
The video quality in decent light is good. Quite good enough for temporary notes and great for Youtube and Ebay auction demo videos. Actually if the light it good the video quality is very good. It lacks white balance and color adjustments and macro and telephoto and....but what do you want for $75.00 or even $149.00?
As an all-around camcorder though it's very limited but I have my fancy Sony camcorder for doing the good stuff. The Flip is my carry-around fun pocket recorder. It's the one I can hide in my pocket and pull out quick when I need to record something. It's the one that I could lose or drop and not cry too much about it. It's the one that doesn't look much like a camcorder and hopefully won't attract a thief's attention. It's the one I can trust the kids with.It's the one that Grandma can operate because basically it's just two buttons; Power and Start/Stop Recording. Get one. You want one.
You can get a nice waterproof (and therefore dustproof) case for it at a nice price so that makes the camera even better for carrying around everywhere. IE: A Pocket-sized Video Notebook. Sweet!