Customer Reviews

Gateway DC-M42 4.0 MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(15)

 

 

This camera was sadly disappointing. It is powered by only two AA batteries, which last only one photo taking and sometimes less. In Gateway's defence, they do provide two rechargable batteries with the camera, but that doesn't make up for having to change the batteries daily.

I have had the camera only a week and have already had trouble with it accepting the memory card. At times, it said that there were no images. . . I jiggled the memory card around a bit and my hundred+ images reappeared. Very annoying!

As for quality. . . No, this is no 4.0 megapixel camera. My older 3.0 camera takes better quality photos than this one. They tend to be grainy and fuzzy, regardless of settings, and close-up shots simply are NOT possible--despite the macro settings.

It does have some nice "bells and whistles" with lighting and color options, but that simply doesn't make up for poor quality photos. If you are taking photos for more than family snapshots, this is NOT the camera for you.

Let's start with the very first issue... batteries. I plugged in the rechargeable batteries that came with it, programmed the time and date, and took seven pictures then the batteries were dead. I am not a new digital camera owner. I have the Hewlett Packard PhotoSmart C215xi 1.3MP Digital Camera. I thought that it was time to upgrade to a camera with more MPs so I bought the Gateway 4.1. I took my HP to Maui and took over 150 pictures on one set of batteries on the medium setting. And I couldn't even get 10 out of the Gateway! Pathetic! Put in some Duracel batteries, same deal... got 5 pics when the low bat signaled.

My next issue with this camera is picture quality. Took some landscape shots to test the "scenic" feature of this camera along with portrait and auto since these are the features that I would use the most. I then downloaded the pics from the camera to the pc *using yet again another set of batteries*. Picture quality at best with the brand new 4.1 MP Gateway was on an equal par with the LOWEST setting on the HP *that was purchased 6 years ago*. Picture quality on all were grainy and poor. Not even the portrait pictures were acceptable. SAVE YOUR MONEY! DO NOT PURCHASE THIS CAMERA!

Pros:
Easy to connect to PC

Cons:
Terrible grain even at 4.0 MP Fine setting
Poor colour saturation
Auto white balance cant adapt to flourescent lighting
Focus does not work well indoors
Very weak flash
Lengthy delay to achieve focus and between shots
High battery drain (even Ni-MH)

Conclusion:
An inexpensive 4.0 MP digital camera, but one that underperforms in every aspect. I have since returned mine and opted to spend an extra $75 to get an Olympus or Minolta instead. Other buyers would be wise to do the same.

This is not a good quality product. Do not expect even fair pictures. After I bought it, pictures was not coming good. I thought "it can't be camera, probably I am making some mistakes". I tried everything for one week. No progress at all. Finally I invited one of my friend who has 2 Mpixel Minolta Camera. We set the tripod. We took same pictures with two different cameras. You should see the differences. His pictures far better than mine. (If anyone want to see them I can send via E-mail and all other pictures I took.)

Battery life is another story. It does not hold any battery even Ni-MH.

Costumer service is not satisfactory. They deliberately does not discuss the quality. All they talk is "policy". I wonder "is there a policy about sending inferior product and labeling it 4 megapixel".
Now, I have to pay restocking fee. Instead of getting an apology, it cost me money and lots of time.

If you like purchasing batteries then this is the camera for you. You cant even download all your pics onto the computer before the batteries die. The camera does not even come with a wall plug in so you have to spend more $$. I have had this camera since Christmas and I dont like using it because of the battery issues. Save your $$ on this product. The pics dont even look good the quality is worse then my old 2 Mega pixel camera

I purchased this product to replace a 1.2 MP Olympus camera. In every aspect it is an inferior product. The 4 year old 1.2 MP camera has far superior image quality under all operating conditions. Battery life is a major issue and represents a serious design flaw. After following advice from Gateway to return the product for repair, I received a replacement which was no better. At this point, they refused to allow me to return the product stating that they do not accept returns for replaced units. They have no concept of customer service. I am now stuck with an inferior product that is essentially useless for its intended purpose.

This camera is a piece of junk. I am kicking myself for buying it. Shoulda followed conventional wisdom and bought a Canon or Olympus instead.

Problems :

- Battery life : Having been warned about using AA (or Alkaline) cells, I went ahead and bought 4 NiMH batteries and a charger. Sadly, even the NiMH batteries are not enough to take more than 20 or so pictures, far fewer if you turn on the LCD screen. All the while, I see people with Canons snapping away all day without changing batteries.
- Image Quality : Image quality is very poor. Indoor snap almost always turn out grainy or ruined in some other way. Outdoor photos (in bright daylight) come out OK.
- Bulky : The camera is quite bulky relative to the competition.

I borrowed a (4 year old) 2 MP canon from a friend of mine. The Canon beat this piece of junk on the features that matter to me - picture quality and battery life.

If you're in the market for a camera, do yourself a big favor. Pass on this museum piece. If price is a consideration for you, get a 2 MP Canon or Olympus. That is guaranteed to be better.

I'll keep it brief, as it disgusts me to think about this p.o.s.:

- horrible battery life. will drain regular aa's by taking four pictures, no joke.

- corrupts memory card/deletes pictures at will. lost well over 300 pictures due to something! - I don't know what.

- shuts off randomly. you will be in the middle of taking a picture with new batteries and the thing will just turn off. sometimes, if youre lucky, it'll turn back on.

- poor picture quality/manual controls. i know this is not a professional camera, but I've seen better picture quality on cameras in the same price range.

Finally, after I put up with all this, it decided to stop working all together. So, the moral of the story is, no matter how cheap this thing is, DO NOT BUY THIS CAMERA!!!! For that matter, I would never buy any camera from Gateway.

Instead, let me recommed the Canon Powershot 3.2 camera. It has much better battery life (i never changed them for three weeks while in Italy) and it takes better pictures, even with lower resoultion.

Had this camera for just under a year, and encountered similar problems to other users.

Now, I'm no photogropher so while others comlained about its poor photo quality, with valid reason, that didn't bother me as badly since it was my first digital camera.

However, the
1)loss of a 100+ photos,
2)corruption of mem. cards,
3)sudden loss of power with difficult reboots
4)horrible and gahstly battery life, and
5)the now total loss of power with no reboots,
Makes this a just an awful buy and total waste of money. Even for a first time simple user like me. This camera should be max $50.

Bottom line, PLEASE-DO NOT BUY!!!

I was so happy when I bought my first digital camera! It was a huge expense for me when I got it (college student, part time worker) and I made a huge deal about getting the best camera for my buck. Sure, sometimes the picture quality is bad, but I can get that with any camera. The problem with this one? The BATTERIES!!!

Oh man, the batteries. How many types have I tried now? Alkaline, NiMH, rechargeable and not, heavy duty camera batteries, etc. It kills my rechargeables within 5 minutes of being on (taking pictures or not). I often will take a couple pictures then turn it off for a minute, then turn it back on since that seems to actually stretch out the life for a little. The heavy duty ones I have in now lasted for about 10 minutes of "on" time. That, again, is turning on and off to stretch out the time it's on. If you leave it on straight it will seriously kill the batteries within about 3 minutes.

I seriously want to like this camera! I really do! But it's just not worth the upkeep at all. I've gone on several vacations now where I'll bring tons of extra batteries along to keep switching out and the camera will just die on my anyway. I've missed pictures of birthdays and family vacations and seriously, I just can't stand it anymore. She is a good camera, she really is, but I can't keep buying batteries that will die near instantly. I'm sorry to say I have to give this camera a bad review. I'm sure there are some of this type that come out without the battery sucking problem, and if you have one of those then congrats, you got lucky. As for me, it's off to Kodak for an Easyshare, where the battery life seems to be about 8 million times longer.