Cheap Digital Camcorder
 

I got a Pure Digital Point & Shoot Video Camcorder as a gift at a baby shower. It's not a product aimed at techno-files (the literature all about how easy it is to use). It has 512mb of built-in flash memory (not expandable) and I don't have very high expectations of it. But, before I open it, I do want to know that it isn't shooting in some proprietary format, because it looks like they want me to take it to "an authorized dealer" and pay $13 to have a DVD made. So what format does it record in? Well...

This review says "The video is recorded using a special version of the DivX compression format at 640x480 resolution, and the audio is mono."

This review says "It uses MPEG-4 encoding to ensure small file sizes" but then says "the Point & Shoot Digital stored the video clips as AVI files" ???

Not getting a very straight answer here. The manufacturer includes zero technical info on their site.
Their business model seems aimed at having people drop these things off at the developer for $13 a pop.

If all else fails, I guess I can run the video through a media PC and re-capture it.

I hope I don't have to do that . . . but, after all, this thing was free.

Anybody have any idea how these cheapie video recorders are configured?

Isn't AVI an msWindows and MPEG-4 an Apple thing?:confused:

You can find anything on the Internet. Here is the PCmag full review.

Considering the overall quality of the video, my Canon digital camera with a 1GB chip would probably do as good of a job.

The best I think of is that MPEG-4 is a compression and AVI is a format. I still have a hard time playing mix and match with all of the elements in video.

Product Q & A had the answers I was looking for (more or less).

It's funny, richlevy, I also noticed that this thing isn't as good at being a video camera as my Canon PowerShot camera is. For this reason, as well: this thing can't edit it's own videos. You can't even fast forward or rewind while viewing. Pretty stripped down. But, it is small. And free.

AVI (audio-video interleaved) is a "wrapper format". MPEG4 is an ecoding scheme ("code"). so anAVI format file may be MPEG4 encoded....and it's not particularly an Apple encoding.

AVI (audio-video interleaved) is a "wrapper format". MPEG4 is an ecoding scheme ("code"). so anAVI format file may be MPEG4 encoded....and it's not particularly an Apple encoding.
This post has an image of the little still/video camera I carry. Not fancy, and not killer quality, but very inexpensive and it got me though my UK trip. Most of the stuff on my Flickr were made with it.

Well, here is a noname brand on Overstock. What I can't figure out is what 12MP interpolated means in terms of quality since the camera is listed as a 3 MP recorder.

If I really wanted to focus on videos and chuck my Canon Powershot (which I can't find), I might look at something like this.

I love the flip-out LCD on my PowerShot! Dude, you lost yours?

Update: I decide to open this thing and start playing with it. After I try connecting it to the TV with the provided cable (which works) when I disconnect it the little screen goes white, and I have to power cycle. Okay, that was strange. Next day, I decide to video our neighborhood while I'm driving to the store. Driving along...hmmm what's this...the counter is still at 0:00... Did I not hit the button? No, hitting the button doesn't do anything. Hitting any of the buttons doesn't do anything - I can't even turn it off, it's completely frozen!

I'm thinking...defect in workmanship? They can't all be this crappy...can they?