Viviatar DVR508 HD DVC

tidy little pocket camera ,_____________FIRST IMPRESSION____________
with its better build quality ( better plastic / paint ) it looks more grown up and smarter than the chinise unbranded ones but the insides are more or less the same ,
_______________________AC​KILLIES HEEL (becides my spelling)_________________ 3aa bats mean the low battery warning is never far away , 4aa cameras seem more tolerant of old batterys ,see experiment.

____________________VIDEO​__________________________
video is a bit light hungry and the onboard led light looks nice , but is more suited to the blair witch style shooting . hd symbol on the side ? someones got a sence of humor menu claims a resolution of that near to hd ready tvs .

__________________STILLS_​_______________________
the stills mode is adequet but suffers from the usural cheap camera traits ,

________________________S​CREEN_________________________​____
the screen is nice but would be better if it fliped so you could self cam , it is also
easy to grab open could be opend in a bag if thing are floating about loose

___________________OTHER BITS__________________
the red blue and green filters are good fun and make interesting results with a bit of imagiation . ideal for the digital lomographer . lomo do a digital cam with these effects but at more than double the price of this splended creature . optional time stamp also woohoo . the button leyout is a bit all over the place but youll get used to it . as there are not that many buttons . easy to use and get pics and vids on your computer via sd card or usb , it can also be a webcam

________________WHATS THE POINT______________________
can do pictures and vids just like your phone , but you dont have to wave all your friends numbers and emails ect about to do so , and costs a fair bit less , great holiday camera uses easy to get batterys doesnt need funny ƃnןd adapter and its not the end of the world if it gets lost stolen dropped , good kids camera . you could also selotape it to a bike, scateboard , helmet or car bumper , i dont think that its at all waterproof though, take some spair batterys with you

_________________________​__ALTERNATIVES________________​__________
i have a few varients of this type camera the one i choose to use is the cheaper (and it looks a lot cheaper) chinise dv137 that uses 4 aaa is the same size , does the same stuff but has a much smaller screen which folds in flush so its safely out of harms way ,

_________________________​EXPERIMENT____________________​______
i did a simple test took 3 old batterys out of my dv137 put them in the vivitar soon got the low battery shutdown returned them to the dv137 and it was quite happy to continue using them , anyway alkaline batterys are sold primarilly in 4s and other even numbers

_________________________​__SUMMERY_____________________
if you want a simple cheap camera to save your mobile phone from disaster but dont want to look like you got your camera at poundland then get yourself a vivitar

I bought this camcorder like a present for my daughter, she have 9 years, so it is good enough for her. It have not built in battery what is good for child, just replace batteries & go. Quality of video not meets HD standard, but everything is visible, sound is terrible. No optical zoom, 4x digital. It is pretty small & light. It came with all cables, manual, no SD card included, it needs more than 2GB card in full resolution. My smartphone making better quality video, but cost 10x more used.So this is toy only, but working properly, fast.

NICE CAMCORDER VERY COMPACT AND EASY TO USE.
THE PICTURE QUALITY IS SUPERB.
I WOULD HIGHLY RECCOMEND IT.

Absolute rubbish rubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishru​bbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubb​ishrubbishrubbishrubbish

easy to use.bought for 11 year old daughter.she loves it.she never leaves home without it.was cheap and delivery was very very fast.would use again.