Canon ZR25MC Digital Camcorder with Built-in Digital Still Mode

Canon's sleek and compact ZR25 MC camcorder provides almost everything you need to shoot both beautiful footage and digital stills. Small enough to fit in your pocket, the ZR25MC is equipped with a color LCD view screen and a color eyecup viewfinder, an image stabilization system to steady the jittery hand, and a digital zoom that magnifies up to 200 times.

To help ensure that you get the quality footage you want, Canon has included a number of preset shooting modes. These modes will automatically adjust the settings of your camcorder for a variety of shooting situations. There is also an additional set of special effects available during both recording and playback that will help add a little flavor to your movies. These effects include black-and-white, sepia, and mosaic, among others.

Also, using the ZR25 MC's Progressive Photo mode, you can take over 700 still photos with an 80-minute MiniDV tape or store it onto the portable 8 MB MultiMediaCard. With the IEEE 1394 port you can connect the ZR25 MC to a DV-ready personal computer to edit video or e-mail photos. Included in the package are an A/V cable, power adapter, shoulder strap, and battery pack.

1 Great while it lasted
We bought the Canon ZR25 right before our daughter was born. It took excellent video but was slightly grainy and did have some problems with it trying to focus on other objects. We could live with that because it was so easy to use.

However, now I've been working on doing some video capture with my PC and it just ate my daughters 6 month old tape. I figured I'd better not put any of her other tapes in until I tried it out with a new tape. That was a good decision. Now the camera won't play or record and just gives me a "remove tape" message.

I checked with the store where we purchased the camcorder and they say it starts at $199 to get it repaired.

From reading other reviews.... it's probably not worth it!!!!

2 Defective Product-Avoid
We bought this camera about 2 years ago. Shortly after buying it, the camera stopped functioning. The only way to fix Canon Camcorders is to send them to one of two Canon repair facilities. We sent it in and it was repaired under warranty. Annoying but fine. Now less than 1 1/2 later, and after light to moderate use, the SAME THING happened. We sent it back to be repaired and were told it would cost $145 to fix! What robbery. I might think of repairing it if I thought it wouldn't break again in a few months/years. Avoid Canon or at the very least buy an extended warranty.

3 Wonderful!
My husband and I were expecting our first baby in January of 02, so we started looking (and looking...) for a digital camcorder. The camcorder had to be able to take still pictures for e-mailing, because all of the grandparents live out of state. After checking Consumer Reports and reviews online, we decided that this camera would fulfill all of our needs for the price range we could afford.
We have had our Canon for almost 6 months now, and we absolutely love it. The video is crisp, and even transfers well to VHS (for the grandparents!) We haven't had any problems with a humming noise, like others have mentioned. We love the LCD screen, but sometimes it is hard to see well in bright light. The still pictures sometimes come out grainy, but that's only if it is really dark. We have found that we use the "fine" setting for the digital stills, and they turn out well, and if necessary, we use the "low light" function. Then they turn out great. We knew that we weren't going to get a high-end perfectly crisp picture from this (since it was first and foremost for video), but were surprised at how well the pictures do turn out. Originally, the Canon was just going to be for snapshots to send online, but we haven't used our "regular" camera since we got it!
All of the relatives love our camera too, and want one of their own now. We just need to get a Firewire in our computer to send video over the internet, and we'll be all set.

4 Tape jamming problem
I purchased this camcorder in November and have successfully used 4 tapes. Very easy to use and compact. Most still pictures ended up being dark, but in regular daylight most video was of good quality. Last month, I inserted a brand new tape and it ended up jammed. I couldn't eject it and the camera wouldn't perform any other function. I returned it to the place of purchase (where I had an extended warranty) and all they could do was send it back to Canon for repair. I figured this was no big deal, until I did some research. Seems that the tape jamming problem is a reoccurring problem. A friend has the same model and they have sent it to the factory twice and it still isn't working. If you surf the review boards on different sites you will see others reporting the same problem. I hope Canon can fix our camcorder, but if this is a known problem that can't be fixed, they should recall this model. I encourage anyone else who encounters this problem to post a review and pressure Canon to address the issue.

5 Major Audio annoyance
I purchased this Camcorder after reading every review I could find. I have to say that I love the size and function of the camera. The pictures are great and its solidly built. BUT.....and this is a BIG but, the humming on the audio is absolutely maddening. I have read maybe 5 reviewers that mentioned the Mic picking up the motor noise. Other reviewers stated that the heard no such noise. So believing that maybe it was an anomaly I went ahead and bought the camera. After watching the recording I cant believe that every single reviewer would not hear that humming. In fact, I have not read about the hum in any professional review of this camera. I cant imagine that all the models of this type do not have this problem. Im totally torn over this camera. If I had known that the problem was so noticable I would have looked at another model.

6 Excellent camera for price
The first thing to get out of the way is that this camera - like all other cameras that have ever existed and will continue till the end of the universe - will not produce good pictures in low light. Why is this surprising to so many of the users? The limitations of film and now electric storage are such that images in low light will not be as resolvable or as colorful in low light as in "normal" daylight. Any 1st grader would know this!!!
This so caled isue aside, I found the features and ergonomics of the canon far better than any other camera in this price range. I tried the Panasonic DV101, Sony TRV30 and an RCA , and the Canons layout of buttons, small size (it could literally fit in a large shirt pocket) , excellent lcd screen, and s-video output made this the best deal of the bunch. The differnece in sound between this and an analog recorder is astounding - its much more crisper and cleaner (contrary to another previous reviewers remarks about hum/whirring - I taped a very quiet room once and didn't hear a thing on replay). I also took this picture indoors for a family get together at a restaurant and had very little if any graininess.
I have only haad this camera a few weeks but wouldn't give it back for anything. Its so handy I can take it anywhere.

7 OK, I Changed My Mind
I never used a camcorder before and several people strongly recommended this one.

At first, I was impressed by how light it was and compact but between the instruction manual and what seemed liked 200 small switches, hidden doors and gadgets, it got confusing.

Last week was my birthday and I took it along figuring why not? Everybody who saw it was more than impressed by how small it was. But it began to show it's true colors when they also finally figured out how to use it (some of those switches are too small for even the smallest fingers). It did not do too well under low light conditions (even though the restaurant had patio windows and the sun was pouring in) but it picked up EVERY word and acted like a pro.

When I got home, I discovered how ultra-easy it was to put the recording onto my home computer (with the IEEE 1394 cable which really should have been included. Come on Canon!) I had to zip the file but it has impressed the daylights out of everybody who has gotten it. More impressed by this were the people who were at the party as they could not believe how something that small could do so many tricks.

So, if you want something that is easy to tote about and reliable, this is the one for you!

8 Missed Opportunity!
I purchased the ZR25 for the Christmas holidays. I was attracted by its snazzy design, compact size, great ergonomics and price (especially when considering Canon's free leather bag and battery pack xmas promotion). The camcorder's operation was extremely easy and intuitive. Exterior shots were outstanding in all conditions. Sound quality was excellent. Unfortunately, its performance in interior conditions was disappointing. The images always appeared to be grainy. Tough to understand why because my home's interior features white walls and has ample lighting i.e. not "low light" conditions. For comparison purposes, I shot similar interior scenes using my trusty, 12-year old RCA full size VHS camcorder (what a great workhorse!) and 6-year old entry level Samsung 8mm camcorder. Both produced superior images. I returned the ZR25 for this reason. What a missed opportunity! Canon could have really aced this market segment. It clearly has the best overall design. Hopefully, they will correct this deficiency with their next ZR generation.

9 Disappointing...
Wish I had read a couple of the reviews here instead of the DV sites. I too purchased this camcorder based on its convenient size and decent reviews only to be shocked at the poor low light performance. Its not an anomally, its a REAL problem. My demands weren't very high: some pictures of the kid, maybe the dog, etc. Unfortunately the grainy video was just too noticable. I adjusted a lot of settings manually and I was able to improve the performance somewhat, but I didn't want to have to undo all the steps the next time I wanted to shoot outdoors. It would have been a real problem for my wife.

BTW: When I say low light, I'm talking indoors in my living room like some other reviewers. I was not shooting in a dark environment, which is what the low light feature is for.

Its a real shame, because it is a nice design and was relatively intuitive to use. And the price was certainly right...

I'd give it 2.5 stars but I don't have that option here. I will say that if you plan on doing all of your filming outdoors in great light (sporting events, etc.) then you may want to consider the ZR series based on price, but for well rounded performance, look elsewhere.

10 Terrific value and good performance.
A friend let me see this unit when she was over in Belfast from the States a few weeks ago. I was very impressed with its capabilities and thought it great value and to be solidly put together. It's also a very handy size.

A lot of other reviewers have commented on the poor low-light performance of this unit, claiming that it's not even as good as their old Hi8 machines. The mistake here is that Hi8 doesn't suffer from the black crushing* that DV's high compression codec imposes on the picture to be recovered from tape. Any DV machine will have this problem, except for three chip units, which will be slightly less compromised. The only way around this is to make sure that the scene to be captured is reasonably evenly and brightly lit.

*Black crushing occurs when a scene has many details tending towards dark grey to black, the DV process causing nearly black tones to be treated as black.

11 A Great Camera for the Average User
This was my first video camera, and I spent several weeks of researching before I purchased it. I wanted a general-purpose camera that I could use for vacation shots, family events, etc. The main features I was looking for were portability and price. The ZR25MC seemed to be the best alternative. I have used it for several months now and am totally satisfied. After reading some of the other reviews, I just wanted to add my two cents on a couple points...

* Low-light. The low-light recording of this camera is not bad, but it's not great either. I primarily use the camera in the Auto mode, though there are manual settings for shutter speed and white balance. The "Low-Light" mode is pretty effective, but it slows down the shutter speed which gives the video a pseudo slow-motion effect. This may not always be suitable for what you're filming. The auto-focus sometimes has trouble if things really get dark, but once it gets dialed in at a certain distance, it's ok. I have gotten acceptable recordings in a dimly lit church and on a city street at night. They looked a little dark the first time I viewed them through the LCD, but after I dubbed over to a VHS tape the picture was pretty good. Nevertheless, if low-light quality is critical, you'll want to look elsewhere (or at least invest in a light).

* Image stabilization. This has always worked pretty good for me. I've had it on the back of a motorcycle zipping through downtown Hanoi and cruising over the waves of Lake Minnetonka in a 15 foot boat. Both videos turned out great.

* Zoom. My brother's Sony Digital8 has a 450x zoom that really seemed to work good. The ZR25MC gets pixelized bad past about 80x. I've locked the zoom at 40x max and I have not yet had a reason to go past that. If you KNOW that the zoom is a critical feature, look elsewhere.

* Stills. The ZR25MC takes e-mail quality stills (I got a free MMC reader with my camera). They also look good in 'slideshow' mode when the camera's hooked up to a TV. This is typical of all camcorders I've looked at. If you need hi-res stills, you'll need a dedicated digital camera.

* Battery life. You'll get more than a tape's worth if you're using the viewfinder. Constant use of the LCD will suck the standard battery dry in about 30-40 minutes.

* Portability! As I mentioned earlier, this was the main reason I purchased this camera. I had hefted around the company's Floppy Disk Mavica on several business trips to take stills. Now I can get digital video and sound, PLUS decent-quality stills in about the same footprint. In fact, I carry it with me in a regular camera bag. My opinion is.. what good is a camera with a million features if it's so big you don't want to take it anywhere?

BOTTOM LINE: If you're an average Joe looking for a compact camera that you can record good quality video, sound, and stills, you will not be disappointed with the ZR25MC.

12 Poor low light - I returned camera
I ended up returning this camcorder because of poor low light performance.

I looked long and hard at many digital camcorders. I did a couple weeks research and narrowed it down to about six choices, then my wife and I spent an entire day going to all the local camera shops and playing with the cameras and we narrowed it down to three, the Canon ZR-25, the Sony DRC-PC9, and the Sony DCR-TRV30.

We liked the size of the small Sony DRC-PC9, but it was too awkward to hold and the buttons were hard to reach while filming. The Sony DCR-TRV30 seems like an awesome camera, the resolution was obviously better than any of the others (we did a lot of A/B testing on video monitors), however it's nearly as big as our 10 year old 8mm Sony (...).

The Canon was nifty to hold, ergonomically it felt the best in our hands (...). So as far as low light, we did some testing in a relatively dark store and aimed the cameras into a dark corner painted black and spent time focusing on some dark camera bags that were in the corners. All the cameras seemed to do just fine. Of course the night vision was cool on the Sony's, but we weren't sure how useful that would be for us. And this was a dark store, a mellow upper end audio/video store, not a brightly lit super store. So for the cost and ergonomics, we bought the Canon ZR-25MC. We choose it over the ZR-10 for the multimedia card. We liked the idea of snapping quick low-res pictures of the kids that we could send as emails, plus the ZR-25MC hasprogressive scan.

OK, so we get it home and start to take pictures that night. It was in our living room and we had two bright lights on and a Christmas tree lit, also this room is painted white. So I took about 10 minutes of video and snapped a bunch of photos. First gripe, you have to switch between the video tape and the multimedia card via a toggle switch. So if you hit the picture button while you are using the video tape "mode" the camera will send the picture to the tape for 5 seconds, instead of just sending it to the card! How stupid! I bought the camera to send video to the video tape and pictures to the multimedia card. True, we should have noticed this before we bought it, but we didn't. There is no way to change this,it should at least be a set-up option. I could understand capturing pictures to the tape if the card was full, but I don't want to have to flip a toggle switch that I have to stop and look for when I want to snap picture. I think that was a poor design on Canon's part. I don't know if the Sony's behave the same way. OK, second gripe, and the reason we returned the camera, the low light is terrible. I had read user reviews on every web site I could find (a lot of them) and had read about this issue, but some reviews said the low light was OK. So I figured it would be OK for taking pictures of my kids. But these indoor videos were shockingly grainy. I'm not a resolution or quality freak, I'm a casual video user and these indoor shoots were un-usable. I had expected this camera to do at least as well as our 10 year old Sony 8mm camcorder and it was no where near as good, the 10 year old Sony ROCKS side-by-side to this brand new digital camcorder in low light. OK, so we decided to reserve judgment until the daytime. I took about another 10 minutes of video in our house during the daytime. All the dark areas (not in direct light) had grain and even the shadowed areas in a room with four skylights had grain (at was a cloudy/rainy day - without direct sunlight). We were flabbergasted. This was exactly what we bought the camera for, to take pictures of our kids playing (at least 50% of the time indoors) and the camera was virtually useless. There aren't many times we can film outside in the sunshine here in the Pacific Northwest! We decided to return the camera. Believe me, I hate returning things and it was a big deal for us to decide this. So after about an hour of badgering the salesman that we bought it from, he agreed to return our money without the restocking fee. He actually took me aside and said all the digital cameras did this. He picked up a three CCD (...) JVC camera and said it too was bad. He said that some of the three CCD Sony's (big $$) were pretty good, but basically that consumer digital cameras aren't as good as they should be yet.

Wow, I was surprised by this. I guess they can't use that as a sales pitch before you buy the camera. Well that's our MiniDV camcorder tale. We are still using our 10 year Sony 8mm camcorder.

13 Compact and Economical ZR25MC Leaves Much To Be Desired
When used as a camcorder, the image quality is quite good. And overall, it's quite easy to use. The following drawbacks, however, are noteworthy: 1. The built-in microphone sits too close to the tape deck and unless you use an external microphone, you will record into your video a constant annoying whirl/winding/humming noise that is *very* noticeable -- the whirling of the tape deck. 2. Digital still image quality is simply bad. Very bad. Furthermore, unless you have a separate MultiMedia Card reader, there is no way to transfer your digital still images to your computer as an image file. You would have to "playback" the digital still via the IEEE 1394 "FireWire" interface and capture it there. This product is very unsuitable for use as a digital camera. The strengths of this product: (a) relatively compact design, (b) light weight, (c) comparatively cheap. Bottom line: I will not choose to buy this product again nor recommend it to others.

14 Very Disappointing
The only positive thing I can say about this video camera is that it is small and easy to use. The outdoor picture quality is mediocre and the indoor quality is awful. One of the biggest problems is the fact that the auto focus takes far too long to activate and even when activated, the picture is not as sharp and in focus as I would expect from a digital video camera. This problem is even worse indoors. In average to bright indoor light, the picture is grainy and out of focus. My old Sony Hi-8 Handycam took much better videos. Unfortunately, it broke. While I would not recommend the Canon ZR25, I didn't see any other digital video cameras in the stores that looked any better. The Sony pictures looked even worse than the Canon, as the reviews here on ...(the website)support. Perhaps the consumer digital video cameras are not "ready for prime time." I would recommend sticking with Hi-8.

15 Great set of features, but flawed
I've recorded about 20 minutes with my brand new ZR25 and have already had to send it back to Canon twice for repairs for an identical issue.

When the camera was brand new, I had recorded 15 minutes worth of tape when the recording and playback became distorted. While playing tapes back, four horizontal, pixelated lines would scroll down the screen and render the image unwatchable. The sound playback was also garbled beyond comprehension.

I called Canon and they said to try a head cleaner. A $16 head cleaning tape later, the problem persisted. I called back and Canon said to try a new tape. I bought two brand new tapes ($14) and neither made a difference.

Then I called Canon back and asked them if they would replace the camera and reimburse me for the cost of the head cleaning tape, which did not solve the problem. They refused on both counts. Though I had used it for a mere 15 minutes, Canon insisted I send the camera in for repair--and they would not reimburse me for the cost of shipping, thank you very much.

$25 worth of shipping and insurance (and related hassle) later, I got the camera back from Canon. For the first 6.5 minutes of recording, the problem seemed resolved...and then the garble came back. Once again, the images have pixelated distorted bars running across the screen. Canon says I have to send the camera back yet again--shipping at my expense--for a second round of "repairs."

Considering that I bought this camera when our child was born three months ago, and that the camera has not allowed me to record more than 10 minutes of our baby without 4 giant stripes perforating his body, I'm not satisfied. The camera's low reliability, failure to serve me in recording my child's infancy, and Canon's unwillingness to replace the camera or pick up shipping costs show a surprising Canon unwillingness to do right by their customers.

I'd pass on this model and go with one of the other brands and models available on Amazon.

16 Great camcorder/camera
The ZR25MC is a great camcorder and camera. The pictures do not have the resolution that you would find on your digital cameras. It only supports still pictures up to something like 640 X 480 (this is true with most DV camcorders). Everything is absolutely great about this camera except for indoor recording. It's VERY grainy and doesn't have near the quality that it could have. Outdoor shots are awesome. You can tweak so many settings on this thing it's unreal. Manual focus is a bit bogus because it is done with a small scroller thingy on the left side of the camera. This should be done with the lens or somewhere where your right hand (which is already on the camera) can reach it. You can fit about 50+ pictures on the memory that comes with the camera (8 mb). Taking pictures is SLOW. Once a picture is taken, you must wait 5+ seconds for the camcorder to do something about it (i.e. Save it). To transfer the pictures from your card to your computer, you must do one of two things.
1. Buy a Multimedia card reader
2. copy the images from the card to the tape and capture the tape onto your computer. Once it is captured on your computer, you'll have to grab the frame and save it.

I know that most of the things I've mentioned here are negative, but I must emphasize that this is a good camera otherwise! Now, I just need some creative people around so that I can make some movies!

17 Great performer - easy-to-use
Canon strikes again. This little camcorder picks up where the ZR10 left off. Easiest camcorder to use. High quality of DV - you gotta love those little tapes. Functions that put it above the rest...Analog input, long battery life, media card. Use the still mode instead of a still camera. No more carrying multiple big cameras on my vacation. Just one little versatile ZR25

18 First Impressions
First I want to say I'm not very knowledgeable at all about Mini-DV, and as this being my first camera as such any opinions I express are only very amateurish and I cannot compare this camera to others as I have not had the experience of using any other DV devices, and I have not had alot of time lately to play with it. But I'll say my first impressions here of it for what they are worth.

First, I'll have to say my impressions about the Image Stabilisation, as far as I can tell. It's not much to be desired. If I don't hold the camera very steady in my hands or use a tripod the "shakes" are very noticeable. I have been using the camera to take footage of rural Alaska, on trails and mountains, and as you can probably guess it's rather hard to climb a rough trail without considerable shaking. It's not horrendous, but I really don't see any help from it. Again, I don't really know what to expect from it either, but so far, it's not been what I expected. But, it's also not the more desireable optical stabilisation as opposed to this cameras digital, and it is also better to just turn this feature completely off anyway when using zoom in extended ranges.

Also, the low light feature does work, but is very grainy when taking indoor shots especially. It seems the camera does best in bright outdoor light, and to take decent footage of indoor scenes your lighting better be good. The various options for lighting adjustment in the menu for outdoor/indoor lighting however work great, and adjust for the different conditions well.

The camera seems VERY well built. I have knocked it around considerably on the trails, thrown it in a bag and out without overdue care, and subjected it to high winds, mist, and rough handling. No problems. It feels very solid in the hands and does'nt give me any impression of fragileness. The LCD door clicks open and shut with certainty, as does the battery. The covers for the DC jack and S/DV in-out jacks are'nt though, they are made of rubber and do not seem to be very reliable, and hang by a thin rubber strip when open. They also don't seem to want to stay closed alot, and I'm always afraid of ripping them off when opening them for access. Otherwise, the cam seems very solid and able to withstand abuse. The camera fits snugly and comfortably in the right hand using the supplied strap, and it also comes with a neck strap for additional security. The controls are easily accessible considering this cameras very small size, though the main power switch is hard to move due to it's extremely small center lock button. The footage/shutter stop/start button is very nicely located and can be quickly found with the thumb. Same is true for the zoom rocker with the index finger.

The Optical zoom (10X) is superb. No degradation in image quality whatsoever either all the way up to 40X in the digital zoom. This thing is like a telescope, I can zoom in on things the naked eye could never pick up even past the 40X. However......past the 40X, the image gets grainy, and is practically worthless past 100X. It gets so pixelated past 100 that I turned the option off and only use the 40X digital zoom option. Again, it is best to turn stabilisation off when using zoom past 10X optical.

The image quality so far is excellent. Very clear, the colors are accurate and vibrant, and noticeably improved over Hi-8 when dubbed to a VHS tape. The zoom is smooth, and very fast/slow according to how much pressure you place on the rocker swith.

The DV out/in works flawlessly with my firewire terminal, and I've been using MGI Videowave 3 for editing and compression. BTW, I can also highly recommend that program, very user friendly and works great. I may someday want to graduate to a more robust application, but for now it's awesome. I also called their tech support for a question I had regarding capture (I was being an idiot, enough said of that!) and the support person was very friendly, patient and helpful.

The ZR25's battery life seems excellent. I have not yet ever completely depleted it using the included Li-ion BP-512 pack, even using the LCD constantly. Canon has available a higher capacity pack as an accessory, but I see no need for it for my uses.

The LCD quality is not what I expected. According to specs, it's 2.5 inch LCD is approximately 112,000 pixels. I'm not sure how that compares to other screens in it's class but I'm sure it's low. I always have to keep in mind that my footage is going to look 3X better than what I'm previewing on it. It's also terrible in sunlight (I imagine this may be common with most DVcams, but the LCD on my Kodak digicam spanks it big time). The viewfinder however is more than adequate. Nice color, and seems to be accurate according to the actual footage taken. It also swings up and away from the battery pack for easy replacement of the battery, and it's angle is good for comfort of use when extended.

Overall, though the CCD is admittedly of lower resolution compared to the Allura's, (1/4 inch CCD, approx. 460,000 pixels, approx. 290,000 effective) but the quality of footage is so far excellent and more than satisfactory to me as long as the lighting is adequate. I have not yet tried the still image mode, but I did not buy this camera for that feature as I have two digital cameras for that purpose (Kodak DC-4800's, which, by the way, I can personally highly vouch for, they take superb images, have a full range of manual exposure settings, and offered with optional lenses with lens adapter accessory). I'm pleased with it more than not.

I'll write more on this camera as I gain more experience with it, and I hope this somewhat helps others who might be considering purchasing this model.

19 First impressions
First I want to say I'm not very knowledgeable at all about Mini-DV, and as this being my first camera as such any opinions I express are only very amateurish and I cannot compare this camera to others as I have not had the experience of using any other DV devices, and I have not had alot of time lately to play with it. But I'll say my first impressions here of it for what they are worth.

First, I'll have to say my first impressions about the Image Stabilisation are'nt ideal as far as I can tell. It's not much to be desired. If I don't hold the camera very steady in my hands or use a tripod the "shakes" are very noticeable. I have been using the camera to take footage of rural Alaska, on trails and mountains, and as you can probably guess it's rather hard to climb a rough trail without considerable shaking. It's not horrendous, but I really don't see any help from it. Again, I don't really know what to expect from it either, but so far, it's not been what I expected. However, it IS a digital stabilisation method as opposed to the more desireable optical kind, and it is better to turn this off actually when using zoom in extended ranges.

The Optical zoom (10X) is superb. No degradation in image quality whatsoever either all the way up to 40X in the digital zoom. This thing is like a telescope, I can zoom in on things the naked eye could never pick up even past the 40X. However......past the 40X, the image gets grainy, and is practically worthless past 100X. It gets so pixelated past 100 that I turned the option off and only use the 40X digital zoom option. Once again, it is also better to turn off the image stabilisation when using digital zoom past the 10X optical.

Overall, though the CCD is admittedly of lower resolution compared to the Allura's, (1/4 inch CCD, approx. 460,000 pixels, approx. 290,000 effective) but the quality of footage is so far excellent and more than satisfactory to me as long as the lighting is adequate. I have not yet tried the still image mode, but I did not buy this camera for that feature as I have two digital cameras for that purpose (Kodak DC-4800's, 3.1MP. I also by the way EXTREMELY recommend these digital cams, they take superb images and have the best price going in their class, as well come loaded with extra features including full manual control over exposure settings plus a limited range of acessory lenses with optional adapter). I'm pleased with it more than not.

I'll write more on this camera as I gain more experience with it, and I hope this somewhat helps others who might be considering purchasing this model.

20 Bright, light and zooms in tight
I'm very impressed with the image quality, the display quality and the combination of intelligent automatic settings with the freedom to adjust the picture how you'd like it. The camera is unobstrusive in its weight and size. It works perfectly with the firewire card/DV editing package that I bought. A great tool for a new (and addictive) hobby.