Customer Reviews

Argus Bean 5MP 16MB 1.5IN LCD USB Li-on Battery Blue

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

More than I expected. This camera is perfect as my 2yr. old is constantly wanting to play and hang on daddy I can clip this thing to my belt when holding him and it takes great pictures and video. Up to 2gig sd card. I love it so far . Feels like a toy but is super cool. Great Buy!!

We bought this camera for our 6 year old son after being disappointed with the quality of the Fisher-Price Digital Camera. We are very happy with our purchase. The resolution of the photos is very good and my son loves that he can shoot video, too. I would definitely recommend this camera to others.

Overall, I am pleased with the bean camera. It is very lightweight, and the clip is great for keeping it close at hand when you want it. It has just enough picture options to make it enjoyable, and even the video mode is good. I think it's a good camera for the price, and will probably buy another one for my daughter.

My wife bought me this camera for a cruise we're taking next year. Since we'll be kayaking, hiking, sea-planing, etc. on our excursions, I wanted a rugged camera that would take decent pictures and not fall apart.

Construction on the Bean seems to be very solid. I thunked it around several times with no ill effect. The camera is a good bit bulkier than I was expecting, so plan to use the belt clip to carry it around. It does not sit comfortably in pants pockets.

Picture quality for outdoor photos is fantastic! Much better than anything my 1.3MP camera phone (or my wife's 3MP camera phone) can take. At the highest quality/resolution settings (not the default, so make sure to change it first thing), the pictures are 2592x1944 so very nice 5x7s can be printed. 8x11s are doable, though not as good of quality. Hard to notice unless you're up close though.

Indoor though, the Bean completely fails unless the room is VERY well lit. I'm not sure if the rubberized lens hood is not letting enough light or just poor AWB software, but indoor pics that normally come out decent on my 1.3MP camera phone come out very, very dark on the Bean. Turning the flash on is no better, as the pictures just end up washed out. I mainly care about outdoor photos, so this doesn't bother me much, but I would be very disappointed had I bought this camera to take family pictures around the house.

Without a memory card, the camera can only hold about 15 pictures at the highest quality/resolution settings. Adding a 2GB SD card (the biggest it supports) gives you room for about 1200 pictures, though. One of the other reviews mentioned no Mac support, but iPhoto had no problems downloading my files.

The UI is a little unpolished, but easy enough to work with once you learn the quirks. The only major complaint I have about usability is the lack of on-the-fly picture review. After you've taken a picture, most digital cameras will show you the picture for 5-10 seconds and let you decide if you want to keep or delete it before switching back to the live viewfinder. This feature is absent from the Bean. Pictures you take are shown for what seems like only half a second and then the viewfinder switches back to the live view. Switching to review mode to find the picture, then delete it, then cycling through video mode to finally get back to picture mode becomes tedious. I don't bother reviewing anymore and just snap 3 or 4 of the same shot and hope one was good when I download later.

So for what I want, something to take pictures of Alaskan wildlife while kayaking, it's a great buy. If you want to capture your New Year's Eve party memories with it, you're better off with a different camera.

I wanted a nice digital camera for each of my children (ages 5 & 6). I didn't want the bulky Fisher-Price or V-Tech with poor quality: I wanted a decent quality picture with an LCD viewer so they could see the picture after they took them and one that was rugged. With the Argus bean I got much more: great value, quality, durability and stylish. My 5 year old son picked up on most of the features. He knows how to use the video recorder too. It's amazing what kids take pictures of (have you ever seen a pix of your ceiling fan taken from the floor?) They love to show off their work on the the TV. The RCA plugs are easy to use. And another bonus: no more buying batteries-- just plug it into the USB port. AND, I was able to get them each a different color, so no fighting over whose is whose. Not just for kids: when we went on our weekend vacation to the indoor-waterpark, we didn't take our camera, we just used theirs.

I bought this camera as a gift for my six year old son. It is rather small which is good in this case since it fits his hands. Its LCD screen is also small, but good enough for a child to see the pics. It tends to take overexposed pics when the flash is in use. The controllers for the flash and camera settings have to be set by an adult, and the covers for the SD card and battery are flimsy. This one did not come with an SD card, so pick one up separately. Overall, this camera is good for use by young children with some assistance from adults, and it has been used far more than similarly priced toys which he received. Since this model does have an LCD screen, my son looks at the pics immediately then forgets about them (no downloading files to computer for viewing).

This camera looks like it might be built to take a bit of abuse, but I discovered this is not the case. My daughter got it as a birthday gift (she is 8), and within an hour, I saw her drop it from about waist level (maybe 2 feet?) onto a wood floor. She gave an "Oh, no!", but I thought certainly this was not the type of drop that would break it. I've dropped regular compact digital cameras from worse, with no harm done.

But it turns out that this drop did in fact break something inside, as evidenced by a rattling noise, which turned out to be the on/off switch (apparently the actual switch underneath the plastic on/off button, because there was no visible damage that we could see from the outside, but pushing the on/off button there was no resistance or the "click" feel that was there before the incident).

I actually took apart the camera carefully to see what was going on, and found that all the switches are held on by their solder connections to the camera circuit board, nothing else. Think of it like a shelf on a wall, and every time you press the button, you are pushing down on the shelf, but the shelf is only held onto the wall by tiny solder connections. Just an intrinsically poor design for the mechanicals. I'm not surprised other buyers have had lots of failures of the buttons and other parts. Inside it is a very cheaply constructed product, wrapped in a "rugged" looking package.

We bought this camera for my 5 yr old son. It takes great photos and it has a good, rugged case to protect from those accidental drops. Unfortunately, after only 1 day, the toggle switch on the back broke, but we got the camera exchanged and hope that was a fluke. As for quality, the indoor flash shots are a little bright, but you can adjust the exposure slightly which helps. Outdoor shots are great. The video feature is a hit with my son (no audio). Overall, I would recommend.

This is a very nice camera for a child. If you learn how to properly use this camera, you should have no problems at all. Everything should work out well and benefit you like a well-oiled machine if you read all the instructions and learn how to use this camera right.

I bought one of these to bring along when riding horses. It gets banged around, in dusty areas and generally is treated pretty roughly...and it still keeps working. The still photos are good and there's little lag between the shutter button and the picture being shot. The movies are also pretty darn good.

Complaints...the video screen is pretty washed out when it's really sunny and it's coming from behind you...but I have the same complaint with any camera/camcorder without a viewfinder.

All in all, I'm very pleased, the camera has a solid feel and it works as advertised. Ultimately, it's a digital disposable camera with a design to help you hold onto it when things "get interesting"...the carabiner ring sure keeps it in hand.

I don't consider it a kid camera though...there are simpler cameras out there for kids, it's more of a bring along snapshot/memory camera.