Customer Reviews

Vivitar Dvr810 8.0 Megapixel Hd Digital Video Recorder

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

Pros: Uses 4 AAA penlight batteries. Uses an 8 GB HDSD card. Cons: Many - See text. I bought this camera because past Vivitar 35mm film cameras I have owned have been very good. I wanted a small light weight rugged video camera to keep on my motorcycle to video weekend excursions in the mountains. This camcorder seemed ideal until I got it home and started working with it. This camera is supposed to have 720P HD quality. It does not. It does have the correct picture size but the picture quality is very poor and when panning it is jerky. The lens is fixed focus and the image on this camera is always slightly out of focus both in video and picture mode. The camera will adjust to light variations but the adjustments are very jerky and pronounced. The color is washed out. The video is pixilated on a computer monitor screen even in the highest resolution settings when viewing the movies at full screen. The file format is AVI which is not the best in the world. The camera will record about 1.5 hours on an 8 GB HDSD card in the "720P" mode and a little over 2 hours in the 640X480 mode. There is a joy stick sticking out of the back of the camera that is used to change various settings and features. This Joy stick is very flimsy and will probably break fairly soon. There is no built in protection (guards) to keep from hitting it against anything. The record button is beside it and it creates a very loud CLICK on the movie when you hit STOP. The Zoom feature is also a very flimsy control on top of the camera. The Zoom feature is a digital CROP only and at 25% zoom the image is very out of focus. Much above 25% and the image is so pixilated that it is barely recognizable. There is a low light setting but most of the indoor video I shot in normal room light was fairly poor. This camera has unacceptable low light capability. The viewing screen will only move horizontally. You can not pivot the screen up or down. I found that to be annoying. Also, the speaker is inside the camera covered by the viewing screen when the screen is folded against the camera. I was not able to find a volume control. My suggestion is to consider buying a little more expensive camera. The reason you are buying a camcorder is to save memories. Keep your memories with the best quality you can afford. Please note, this review is only based on this one camera. I was not able to find any reviews on this model before I bought it. I wish I could have. I am going to return this one with no intentions of swapping for another one like it. Good Luck. I hope this helps you on your quest.

Pros: small and easy to handle .. ("woooo", good for the kiddies to handle..)

Cons: MANY ! No mic input, AAA battery size (wish it was AA for more life and easier usage for rechargeables), software was my biggest issue: Got the "Blue Screen of Death" after installing the software - totally crashed my system! If more time was spent on this camera from Vivitar, it would have been a lot better camera .. oh, the slot underneath to put the SD chip is a total joke!

Run, do not walk, AWAY from this camcorder.

Cons-

packaging - no where does it tell you what type of batteries, if any it needs. It does tell you that it is HD video 720, it fails to mention that it only gets this "quality" at 20 FPS. REALLY?? 20 FPS for HD?? HAHAHA, you are joking right? Nope, unfortunately I am not.

Battery cover - Cannot be removed while this was attached to my tripod. Fortunately I figured this out before I needed the information, I had to take the cover off completely before securing it to my tripod mount in case I needed to change the batteries.

Power - does not have a port for an external power source.

Zoom - Why do manufacturers even put digital zoom on any cameras? Worthless. Also, my zoom button will zoom in, but not back out. Likely a defect and not representitave of this product. The only way I was able to get the zoom back out to fully wide, was to turn the power off then back on. (I am sooo glad that I monkey around with things before I actually need them)...

Focus - it is fixed and it is off with no way to resolve it.

Build - No bones about it - it is flimsy! And the flip out screen only flips out, does not swivel. For $100 I guess that is what I should expect though.

Pros - um....can use AAA batteries and not a propriatary battery. Has a slot for a SD card - only up to 8GB...

Overall I am extreemely dissappointed with this camera. I went to the store for a Kodak Zi6, and if they were not out of them *and* if i didn't need to capture my childrens play today, I would not be writing this review. I will be returning this camera and looking for the Kodak.

Not HD. Very Poor picture quality. Any digital camera can beat this for video quality.

Digital ZOOM has no resolution. No optical zoom. Audio is ok with built in mic but no external mic input--something every video camera should have.

JUNK. Not worthy of your consideration.

Returning this today.

Not worth owning, my 7meg digital camera is 3 years old and takes better video then the vivitar 870. Don't know what genius came up with this camera but would suggest a career change. Have owned other Vivitar products in the past and they worked very well this one is a total flop, the pictures are out of focus with no way to adjust, bad resolution very pixelated, any movement of the camera even a slow pan results in very jerky and blurred pictures. was looking for an inexpensive camera to use while camping and hiking this isn't it. Thought about giving it to the Grand kids to play with but too many breakable parts.

I couldn't agree with the other reviewers more. I paid over $100 for this piece of garbage at Target and thought I was getting a steal. The only thing good about this camera is its anti-shaking feature. Otherwise, picture-quality is horrible and most definitely NOT high-definition. There ought to be a class-action lawsuit against Vivitar for their blatant false advertising. The picture quality is comparable to a cheap webcam, and nothing I've found on the setup screen can adjust it to make it any better.

You live, you learn, I guess.

The only thing HD about this camera are the two letters on the camera. Color - There is a tint of color, but overall everything is brown. Image Quality - The earliest digital camcorders of any level never recorded so poorly. The image is pixelated beyond belief.

Do not buy this product thinking it can't be that bad. It really is that bad.

Bought this because we've had good experiences with other Vivitar products. I noticed after we'd gotten it home that this is NOT the Vivitar we grew up with. This camera brand is now manufactured by Sakar, a company that buys older trademarked names to attach to their junk products. Check the packaging of all your consumer electronics, and if the name SAKAR appears anywhere on it, stay away!

Butch picked up most of what I found except the short battery life. I can only get 25 minutes out of a set of new alkline batteries. It uses the right amount of memory for HD, but the pin hole fixed focus lens is still not sharp enough to read the numbers on the soccer jerseys from even 50 feet away. Don't be fooled by the size of the lens cap. The lens is tiny.

I purchased this video camera for a project for school because I needed an SD card video camera, and was excited to use it to also film my granddaughter. We spent HOURS filming our school project, only to find out on playback that there was a loud hissing noise and BARELY audible sound. WE called customer service, who suggested that we had the sound turned off even after telling them that there was sound, but it was so faint, it was barely recognizable. Then they told us that this camera is only designed to pick up sound within 5 ft. We were indoors, a totally quiet setting and within 5-6 ft away. They finally suggested that we return it to the store. I am VERY disappointed and would hate for someone to purchase this to record an important event only to find out that you can't hear anything.