Summary: I bought this camera mainly because it was on sale for less than $80 ...and..... seems I got just what I paid for :(
1. The camera takes fairly good pictures in many different types of settings and lightings - as good as any other easyclick digital camera models.
2. However it falls short of "my" expectations from Kodak about photography and camera ownershi (more on that below).
If you are a photographer of any seriousness this model may not suit your needs.
3. Being one of the lowest priced cameras with similar specifications, it is surely an "excelleny value".
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So first, why did it fall short of "my" expectations?
To be fair to Kodak, I owned one of their excellent models
from many years ago and then later other great Cameras from different vendors and so I am comparing this model to many other excellent but higher price models but purely on quality of product and its output and ownership without much regard to price.
Still I judge my conclusions as fair to anyone else
buying this as a first time camera.
Some real shortcomings :
1. The camera does not come with charger!
The battery is no the normal AA or AAA model but
needs to the camera to be hooked up through USB
port (like iPod) for charging. In my experience
this a great problem and completely takes away the
joy of using the lightweight camera anywhere you go
because most of the time the charger will be out
(esp. if you zoom, take video like normal folks do).
To charge battery you have 3 options :
a. buy their charger paying mucho $
b. buy their docking station paying even more $$$
c. attach the camera to a USB based PC
I tried option #c and it did not work in 2 of my PCs
(one PC was old with only USB1.1 but 2nd had USB2.0).
It finally charged with a third and newer PC.
So getting the USB charging right is going to be
a big problem for many folks on the go.
I have not tried the wall/car chargers for iPod but
if they work it could be an option for owners of iPod.
All said, a lightweight camera that cannot be easily
charged on the go is simply useless.
Quite furstrating indeed.
2. The photo lag times are very bad.
a. The shutter lag time (time between your button click
and when photo is actually taken by camera) is bad.
It is about 1 second or more.
b. Even worse is the time between clicks
- it takes an average of 5 to 10 seconds after
taking a photo to take next photo - this is even
with flash being off.
This is quite unacceptable for many normal folks
and will indeed spoil a party/group picture event.
3. The camera is complete box shaped and smooth finish
all over - so there is no real easy place to hold the
camera when taking pics and there is a great chance
of dropping it and breaking it unless you put the
camera strap around your wrist.
4. The top of the camera has the mode selection knob
(ie. modes like AUTO, VIDEO etc) and this knob
does not turn 360degrees - so if you are in say
AUTO mode and want to go to VIDEO mode, you have
to turn it clockwise about 270degrees and if you
have to go back to AUTO you have to go 270degrees
anti-clockwise instead of just turning it 90deg
clockwise again which is the way in Canon cameras
and this is quite painful if you do switch modes.
Now the good things about this camera :
1. The camera is "very" light and fits into half of
a shirt pocket making is easily mobile.
If you forget/ignore the issue about how to charge
the battery, the camera can easily beat most models
including the lightweight Canon as being the
choice that the owner will want to carry all the time.
(Who wants to lug the SLR types all the time unless
you are a photo enthusiast).
2. The camera takes reasonably good pictures and video
in various settings and lightings including low-light.
The pictures can go upto 7MP and video to VGA and
it even takes the 4G SD card.
3. Tough it may sound silly at first - one nice thing
about this model is the easy open/close of the SD
card/battery compartment lending to longer camera life.
(this is a major pitfall in many other cameras like
canon and even other Kodak models like C613 etc where
one can be assured that the battery compartment
closing will break in a short time lending the camera
quite useless).
4. Kodak customer service has always been top-notch
(though I have not tried it in recent years) and
this is definitely a plus point compared to others
like Canon.
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