Customer Reviews

HP PS320 2 MP Digital Camera

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

This is a great 2.0 megapix range camera in a lower price range and a snap to use. This camera is a upgrade from the 318 model.

Pros:
Great features and quality for the price range these camera's are selling at:
-2.1 megapix with good quality shots
-8 MB internal memory - with option to add more
-4X digital zoom
-can store up to 30 secs of live motion shots
-can purchase a optional docking station which includes
rechargable batteries and adds the ability to view pics on a TV
- auto red eye reduction and lighting adjustments
- If you want more memory, recharable batteries, ablitity to view on TV ,you can up-grade/purchase it later instead of buying it upfront, which is one reason this camera nicely priced.

Cons:
- if you use the best picture quality mode, the camera only holds 7 shots- but you can purchase a extra memory card to store more and they not too expensive. The built in memory can hold around 80 shots using the other picture quality modes
- can eat up batteries if you keep the LCD display on alot
- Does not have any optical zoom. The 4x digital zoom is pretty good though. Optical zoom tends to be more sharp and less pixel distortions (though optical zoom tends to be more costly and found more in the higher priced camera's)

Summary: If you want at least a 2.0 megapixel quality camera with quality features without going overboard on the price, this camera is for you. This camera isn't the best at taking shots with low light but if your looking for that you really should be looking at the higher price range digital camera's.

My goal was to get a digital camera for under $. I tried the equivalent model Vivitar, and Kodak, and finally settled on this HP. For all the features I wanted, and all the hassle I didn't,this camera is the best of all worlds.

To start with, I wanted SD/MMC as my memory medium. I own a Palm m125, and it also takes SD, so the memory could be interchangeable. I wasn't too concerned with the megapixels, since most of what I use the shots for is web applications, but 2MP made the pictures look nice, even when printed to 4" X 6".

The movie feature is great, and with minimal effort you can burn your movies to a CD-RW and watch them on your dvd player, if your dvd player will show VCD. It's great for us, because my husband does medieval re-enactment, and the movies are neat to show people what he does in motion, instead of just poses.

This camera also has direct print and email capabilities. I've not used them as of yet, but the gist is that when you take a pic that you can queue it to send email to so-and-so, or print copies of this particular print when you plug it in.

The zoom works well, although I wish it was an optical zoom. I feel like I traded the coolness of the movie mode for any optical zoom, and I'm fine with that.

The usability of the camera is awesome. The buttons on the camera are kept to a minimum, and most actions use menus. This makes it easy to learn how to use all the features, I tought my technology-deficient husband how to use it in minutes.

It integrates seamlessly with my Windows XP Home. I plugged in the camera and the PC recognized it immediately (even to the model number) and led me through the options of how to upload.

Altogether, for someone on a budget, this camera is a great buy.

I got this camera for my 13 year old daughter for Christmas and I am simply amazed by the quality of pictures she takes with it! It was only a little more expensive than a cheap 35mm film camera but I figured the extra cost of film for the 35mm cam might outweigh the additional up front cost of the digital. What an understimation on my part! My daughter has taken at least five hundred pictures already with this little wonder and is still going strong!
The flash has proven to be strong enough for almost every shot and it does a pretty good job reducing or eliminating red eye most of the time. (When it doesn't work we use i-photo on the Mac to remove the red eye) While the flash is not perfect, it's more than adequate for most shots.
The original alk. batteries lasted through probably the first 200 photo's or so and we got another 100 out of them after a re-charge. It's on the second set of 4 now so the camera doesn't seem to go through them quite as quickly as other reviewers have stated with other models of cameras.
The camera uses a "star rating system" for its three levels of photo quality. One star for "economy", two for "good" and three for "fine". Rotating through the choices is very easily accomplished by pushing the star button on the camera back.
The display on the back of the camera is not very big and is a little on the dark side but the nice thing is that the actual photo's always look far better than what you saw in the display. The fact that it has an SD (Secure Digital) media slot is probably the reason I initially chose this particular camera. My Panasonic DV cam also uses SD cards for its built in still camera. Getting this HP with SD capability means I don't have competing digital media with different media readers around the house. It also meant that I could give my no-longer-used 16MB card to my daughter and did not have to buy another one for her!
The camera also can take "movies" of limited length...maybe 20 seconds or so. I don't find this feature to be too useful though since no sound gets recorded. I suppose it could be used to capture a specific moment that might happen too fast to catch with a still photo but you'd have to use some software to select out the frame you wanted. While not a bad thing, it's just not a feature that played into my purchase decision.
2.0MP resolution was impressive just a short time ago on high-end cameras and it is still very good for digital albums or sharing photo's via email.
If you're a "pro" or a "pro-am" at photography, pass this one up and spend the $$ for a 4MP+ camera that has interchangeable lenses etc.
If you're looking for a very easy to use, relatively in expensive point and shoot digital camera that takes impressive pic's you will probably be happy with this one.

This camera does a good job for the money. The pictures are plenty clear to print unless you want to enlarge. The zoom is somewhat annoying since it puts a box around a piece of the picture in the viewer rather than erasing the part you won't see. This leaves you to imagine what the picture will look like once the outside of the box is cut off. Other than that, this camera has worked well during heavy use.

I looked up this camera here and all I can say is the guy who put up one star because he couldn't get the wrist strap on has skewed the stars unfairly. I don't know about you but I buy a camera for what it can do, not for the wrist strap! (I got mine on with some patience)

The camera out of the box worked great, took great pics and I can hook it right up to my HP printer and printe directly from camera to printer - no computer needed!

I got mine elsewhere (won't say where -...).

LCD is dark and not too clear but pics do turn out excellent displayed on PC or once printed (this depends obviously on your printer as well). No optical zoom but digital is zoom is very good. No sound for movies but it is very nice and length depends on your storage media size. Comes with 4 Energizer E2 batteries which have amazing battery life. I'm still using them after > 80 shots and 4 weeks. If you get low battery indicator turn the camera off, wait awhile (couple seconds to 1 minute) and turn on again and you're good to go. This is apparently a little trick with Photo Lithium batteries, they need a rest. Major problem is that the battery compartment is too easily opened. Several times I've accidentally opened it. It's also not meant to take night shots where the subject is > 6 feet.

It's about the size of a medium sized palm but does fit nicely in my hand. Simple and easy uploading to PC. Camera use is so simple you won't even need the manual. It's an entry level so there's no advanced controls. Simple point and shoot camera for the entry level masses. Considering the low price and the intended market it's a good buy.

After having this camera for about a week i'm throughly pleased. I had previously had a cheap $20 camera with .3mp resolution. I immediatly found the difference amazing. The price was just right for the HP PS320 (i had bought it in a bundle with printer and memory card). I had been researching for about a month, and finally decided to buy the Kodak ES4530 but realized that I didn't even need a 5mp if I only wanted to get 4" by 6" pictures. The screen is kinda fuzzy and takes a while to take the next picture, but that is liveable. Also the screen is incredebly easy to use, it took a while to figure out how to delete. Now that i found out that the delete button is not directly on the camera but in menu mode I feel safer that my pictures will not be deleted. When you get the camera, don't forget extra memory. The camera only has about 8 pictures with the internal memory; but with a SD64 card you can take about 64 pictures at highest resolution. Since I am in high school mostly this camera was to take pictures of my friends and it has worked very well for this task. One problem is that when I upload the pictures to my website they turned out VERY blurry. Another complaint is that the software would not load onto my computer. Luckily my computer is also a HP so it recognized the model and I found an old program that lets me upload pictures. Over all this is a great camera. I've tried to work other camera's that my friends have, but they are to complicated. Just some things to remember to get
-extra memory (YOU WILL NEED IT!!!!!!)
-photo printer (the prints come out better than the disposable photos and is great for you money)
-BATTERIES!! (after A DAY AND A HALF!!! my battereies were gone! I did take alot of pictures but that seems to short of a life for the batteries.)

I bought this camera for E-Bay listings, and I am greatly disappointed. If you have to take a picture of anything closer than three feet away, forget about it. For close-ups, the manual (and HP) recommends using the zoom feature and cropping with the included photo program. Trouble is, the zoom looses so much detail, the close-up is a waste. I have an old I/O 420 that blows this camera away, and it's ancient technology now. Regular outdoor pictures are ok, but why bother if that's the only thing you can use it for? I'm also in the process of finding out why Amazon.com only refunded 1/2 of the purchase price when I returned the thing after two weeks for a refund. My recommendation is to spend an extra $30 to by the Olympus D-390 at chiefvalue.com It's a vastly superior camera in every respect, for just a little more money.

Received an email from my dad with great pictures he just took with the HP PS320. That's a great sign considering he doesn't know what a URL is.

I just started playing with my new camera. I notice the batteries don't last very long, especially when doing many functions. I started to price the AC Adapter (HP $49.99) and found that most on eBay are generic multi voltage units (around $30). Then while looking at the HP Photosmart 8881 Camera Dock (HP $79.99) I noticed that it too included a AC Adapter. I called HP and found out that it is the identical adapter that will hook directly to the camera. So I was able to get the HP Adapter AND the Docking Station for just a little more than the generic adapter alone.