Author Archive: Matt

Camcorder group test (Part 3) Toshiba Camileo H10 Review

Toshiba Camileo H10 Review

The H10 is Toshiba’s budget entry into the high definition camcorder market. The most remarkable thing about this camcorder is the fact that it’s a high definition camera (HD) for about £180. Not long ago this would have been much more expensive and out of the reach of most of us. Having been mildly impressed by the “handiness” of the SDR-S7 I was interested to see how the H10 would perform with its HD capability given that the two machines are virtually the same price.

The Toshiba Camileo H10

 

What’s in the box?

• H10 video camera
• Li-ion rechargeable battery, 3.7v/1050mAh
• USB cable
• AV cable
• HDMI cable
• Mains charger
• Remote control
• Strap
• Quick start guide
• Software CD

 

 

General

The H10 is a clean and uncluttered design with an encouraging lack of buttons to tweak and render it useless. Physically, it’s a bit of a brick, albeit a compact one with some decent features. A brick because it’s too big to fit into my pocket, compact because it feels dense in the hand. The dense feel also helps it to feel well-built despite the low price.

The H10 has a 5x optical zoom and can record video in 720p HD MPEG-4 format video on SD or SDHC Cards at frame rates of up to 30fps – this is a decent specification for an entry level camcorder and genuinely useful.

The Toshiba Camileo H10 controls

 

Rear: Video record; 5-way multi-function keypad for selecting modes and menu items

Top: Zoom in/out; still camera shutter release

Underneath: Battery compartment; SDHC card slot; tripod socket

Left: Power switch; AV-out socket; HDMI socket; USB2.0 socket

 

Toshiba Camileo H10 Specification:

• Image Sensor: 10.48 Mega Pixel CCD Sensor
• Operation Modes: Movie Record, Picture Record
• Lens: F3.5 – 3.7 (f = 6.8 – 34 mm)
• Focus Range Macro: 1 cm ~30cm
• Normal: 30 cm ~ infinity
• Optical Zoom: 5X
• Shutter: Mechanical Shutter
• LCD monitor: 2.7” LCD
• Storage Media: Built-in 64 MB, SD/MMC Card Slot
• Image Resolution
• High: 4608 x 3456 (16M pixels)
• Standard: 3648 x 2736 (10M pixels)
• Low: 2592 x 1944 (5M pixels)
• Movie Resolution HD: 1280 x 720, 30 fps
• D1: 720 x 480, 30 fps
• VGA: 640 x 480, 30 fps
• QVGA: 320 x 240, 30 fps
• White Balance: Auto/Manual (Daylight, Fluorescent, Tungsten)
• Exposure: ± 1EV in 0.3 steps
• Self-Timer: Approx. 10 second delay
• Flash: (for still) Auto/ On/Off/Red Eye Reduction
• File Format Image: JPEG
• Movie: AVI (H.264)
• Image play: Single Image/Thumbnails/Slideshow
• PC Interface: Mini USB2.0
• TV out Digital:: HDMI
• Analogue: Composite Video (NTSC/PAL Selectable)
• Battery: NP60 Lithium-ion Rechargeable Battery, 3.7v, 1050mAh
• Dimensions: 117mm x 65mm x 56 mm
• Weight: 314g (without battery), 340g(with battery)

Highlights:

• Simple
• Robust
• Uses SD cards
• Easy to use

Lowlights:

• A bit portly
• No conventional viewfinder
• Slow zoom
• Heat

Review

Although substantially smaller than many mini-DV cams, the first thing to strike me after using the compact SDR-S7 and Sanyo Xacti is just how chunky the Toshiba is. It certainly won’t fit in your trouser pocket. It could be used to as a weapon and it feels like it’s hewn from billet alloy. The upside is that the larger size does make the Tosh’ somewhat easier and more comfortable to hold at eye level when compared to the Panasonic SDR-S7.

Fold the screen out and it switches on automatically to either present you with the video filming mode or the still camera mode depending where it left off last time. Switching between the two is merely a single key press away. Video recording is simply a case of pointing it at the subject and then pressing the record button on the rear of the camera body.
There is plenty of control over shooting modes via the menu system, which is easy to navigate by virtue of the fact it is very simple and clear.

The Tosh’ is capable of recording in HD resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels at 30 frames per second (fps). This is quite some going for a budget model when you consider that most DV cams work at 720 x 576 and 25fps. You should be aware though that editing such large images is fairly demanding for any pc and some well-known photo-editing applications still aren’t HD ready. There’s plenty of other resolutions available that take up far less storage space if your needs are less demanding, however, it seems to be pointless using them unless you upload to a video mangling service like YouTube.

Accessing the menu system is not obvious initially and there is no menu key per se. It’s done via the centre-select key on the 5-way navigator keypad. The menu system has sensibly been kept simple and logical, but alas it has one really annoying flaw. Once you have selected an option it closes down the menu subsystem entirely to return you back to the camera view. What if you want to change another option or undo the changes you’ve just made? You have to navigate all the way there again.

The 5x optical zoom is quite limited when compared to conventional DV-cam opposition. This is typical for a budget camera. Unfortunately, the zoom control is extremely tardy and the lens is both slow to zoom and focus. This renders the camera less than idea for sports footage or fast moving subjects. In normal general filming it would be less noticeable.

I was pleased to see that the charging is done via the USB2.0 mini-socket. This means it should also be possible to charge from your computer when connected. The battery itself is a 3.7v/1050mAh item which gives a life of around 50 minutes – this was slightly less than I expected but probably reasonable given the higher definition. During charging and normal use I noticed that the entire camera got very warm – this is a bit disconcerting. The same heat was also transferred to the SD card which, doesn’t bode well for longevity of the card – another reason why a man might not wish to put it in his trouser pocket!

There is no conventional lens cover – instead the lens is protected by a large hard plastic cover. This is all very well, but the cover doesn’t appear to be replaceable so, if it gets scratched then you compromise image.

Toshiba Camileo H10 lens

 

Movie quality was entirely acceptable although I really didn’t notice any improvement in quality rendered by HD over SD. The whole thing is quite subjective really and depends upon so many things such as the quality of monitor it is viewed on, the physical size of the CCD, compression etc. I daresay if you had a HD tv then you would notice the difference. As a stills camera it makes a passable job and there’s no reason why it couldn’t be your only stills camera although the normal caveat still applies – if you want a stills camera then buy one.

You can download a sample video – taken straight from the H10 memory card with this link.

 

Conclusion:

The H10 is a versatile camera that should satisfy most users needs unless they are serious filmers. It’s easy to use, feels well put together and it’s not expensive. Really, for £180 the buyer is getting a decent machine for not much money and I feel it offers better value than the Panasonic SDR-S7 for a similar price. Having previously said I would be happy with the Panasonic as an everyday device, I am now having to revise that in favour of the Tosh’. Just beware of its bulk.

Join me again soon for the next camera in the Camcorder Group Test or head over and look at Part 1 to see which cameras we are including or have a look at my Panasonic SDR-S7 review or Sanyo Xacti HD700 review.

 

Review by: Nigel

Wacom Bamboo Fun tablet review

The Wacom Bamboo Fun is one of Wacom’s entry level graphics tablets.

For those who don’t know what a graphics tablet is, think of it as a pen and pad that replace the mouse as a way of controlling your computer. (You can use a special mouse on these pads as well, but I’ve yet to meet anyone who actually uses them)

Wacom Bamboo Fun (in blue obviously!)

 

Some people just use it as a replacement for their mouse as it can help with RSI or just because they prefer the pen input over a mouse, but most people will use it in art packages for everything from photo retouching to painting their own Mona Lisa.

 

What’s in the box?

• Bamboo Fun pen tablet
• Bamboo Fun mouse
• Bamboo Fun pen
• Pen stand
• USB cable
• Quick start guide
• Installation CD (includes tablet driver and electronic user manual)
• Adobe Photoshop Elements 5.0 Win/4.0 Mac
• Corel Painter Essentials 3.0
• Package of 3 replacement pen nibs

 

Wacom Bamboo Fun Specification:

• Tablet Size:
  Small: 8.4" W x 7.3" D x 0.3" H
  Medium: 11.0" W x 9.3" D x 0.3" H
• Active Area
  Small: 5.8" W x 3.7" D
  Medium: 8.5" W x 5.3" D
• Pressure Sensitivity
  512 Levels
• Resolution
  2,540 Lines Per Inch
• ExpressKeys
  4
• Finger-Sensitive Input
  Touch Ring
• Color
  Available in Black,
  Silver, White and Blue

Quick tour

The setup of the Bamboo Fun couldn’t be any easier – it just plugs into a free USB socket and after the installation of the drivers you open up your favourite art package (or install the included applications) and start drawing your very own masterpiece.

At the top of the pad are ‘Express keys’ that you can customise in the drivers to do common shortcuts, and the big circular thing is the ‘Touch Ring’. This is used for things like zoom in and out, or scrolling – all very useful.

The thing that will take some people a little time to get used to is that the surface of the pad represents the whole of your monitor, so top left on the pad is the top left of the monitor and bottom right is bottom right. So unlike your mouse where you lift it and the cursor stays put, when you put the pen to the surface the cursor jumps straight there.

When you are just in normal applications or on the desktop then you can use the pen to single or double click just like you would with a mouse – the pen also has left and right click buttons built in.

This natural mapping and the use of a pen instead of a mouse make graphics tablets good for people who suffer from RSI as tablets provide a less physically stressful input method.

The pen is also pressure sensitive – in this case 512 levels of sensitivity – so in programs that support pressure information, they can translate the pressure that you applying and change the affects on the program. The simplest example of this is when you are in an art program and set it to use the pressure to set the transparency of the strokes – light pressure with the pen produce light marks, pressing harder with the pen produces heavier marks, very cool and very different to using a mouse.

Some other examples of things that the pressure can control include brush width and brush colour,  and these options differ from program to program, so I won’t even attempt to list all the possibilities here.

What this means is that using the pen is very much like using a normal pencil or paintbrush – with the big advantage that on a computer you can press UNDO 😀

 

Wacom Pen

 

The pen also has an ‘eraser’ on the other end, which is also pressure sensitive – so if you want to rub out part of your art then just flip the pen upside down, exactly as you would if you were using a pencil in the real world. Very useful for erasing mistakes or softening edges.

The eraser is really a second tip, so if you want to tell the program to use that end of the pen for something different then you can.

And it’s not just traditional painting programs that can use these tablets either, some of the 3d art packages also support the pressure information to allow things like sculpting.

For anyone who’s worried about the pen nib wearing down, don’t as you can replace the nibs very easily – there are even 3 included in the package.

Bamboo Fun Controls

 

The Review

I’m primarily a programmer, but every now and again I do things like photo retouching, website design, game art etc, and so a couple of years ago I decided to have a look at graphics tablets.

Without question the most respected name out there was Wacom – but I couldn’t really justify anything expensive and in the end I picked up a cheap tablet from another manufacturer. I use it occasionally and it’s functional at best, and I’ve always wondered what a real Wacom tablet would be like.

The Bamboo Fun is targeting people just like me in many respects – people who don’t want to spend lots of cash, but like the idea of having a graphics tablet as an input device for doing their doodles or photo retouching. As the name says, Bamboo Fun.

The pad is dead simple to install, and once I’d realised that Wacom pens don’t actually need batteries, I was good to go. (Wacom tablets use their own technology that is different to other manufacturers)

I opened up my trusty art package and away I doodled. I tested out the pressure sensitivity input in all it’s various guises and generally made a very pretty mess of the screen. The ExpressKeys are useful for commonly used tasks, as is the Touch Ring, but being placed at the top of the tablet isn’t ideal – I realise that it’s there as otherwise they’d have to put 2 sets on (for left and right handed people) but they are just a little awkward at the top.

After a bit of playing I realised that something didn’t quite feeling right with the pen interaction. I decided to try the included software instead, as that would obviously show the pen at it’s best.

So I installed Photoshop Elements and once I’d worked out how to use the program and enable the pressure sensitivity stuff, I was away and doodling again.

Again something wasn’t quite right. The sensitivity of the pen at the light pressure end of the scale was a little poor, so it went from near zero to mid pressure with very little change in actual pressure on the pen. I tried holding the pen differently and tinkering with driver settings, but I couldn’t get it quite where I wanted it to be.

In a general input sense the pen was accurate enough though, so for actual input, the tablet is fine. The size of the working area might frustrate some, but at the end of the day if you want a bigger area, you buy a bigger tablet.

On a personal note, the other slight niggle was the feeling of the nib on the surface of the tablet. It felt a little ‘scratchy’ to me – but this might be improved with a different type of nib.

 

Highlights

• draw directly into your PC, very cool
• accuracy of the pen’s movement is something Wacom are well known for

Lowlights

• it would be nice if the USB cable was a little longer
• surface feels a little ‘scratchy’ in use – might be fixable with new nibs

 

Conclusion

As an input device to just replace a mouse the Bamboo Fun is fine. As a tablet for the occasional photo retouching or just messing around in art packages, kids will love it, then again it’s fine.

If you are looking to do lots of artwork and need delicate control from the pen, then I’d try another of the Wacom pads instead.

 

Review by: Iain

Eten Glofiish V900 review

Introduction

As Matt mentioned earlier I have been playing with the Eten Glofiish for the past week or so. This was the first time I had used a Windows Mobile device that wasn’t manufactured by HTC which was one of the main reasons for wanting a shot of this phone. Another reason was the full DVB TV which I’ll tell you more about as the review moves forward.

 

Eten Glofiish V900

The 10 second review:
Device: Eten GlofiishV900
Cost: SIM free only: £464.13 (Inc VAT) from Clove Technology.
Available to pre-order from: CLOVE technology (Go and buy one from here)
Summary: As far as Windows Mobile devices go this is fairly bog standard but then we look at the phone and see there’s just a little more to this than meets the eye.
Best of: DVB TV, Box & Packaging, GPS Folder (See below), FM Radio, SMS Service
Worst of: Screen Flicker, Bottom App Section

What’s in the box?

Well we wont go into too much detail about what’s in the box as we have an Unboxing Video already online.

Specification

Matt has posted the specs along with the  Unboxing Video already so have a look there before reading on.

General

The Eten Glofiish V900 didn’t really follow in the same design the other Glofiish handsets out there (not that there is a specific Glofiish design). Weighing in at 147g it’s not quite the lightest handset out there but saying that it really isn’t heavy either.

The front end of the phone boasts a large 2.8" 480 x 640 touch screen. Sitting at the top of the screen there is a front facing VGA camera for 3G Video calls and an earpiece grill which houses two system indicator lights.

 

Angled view of Glofiish V900

The left hand side of the phone has just 2 buttons and the DVB antenna which looks like a stylus when tucked away. The button at the top is the rocker volume switch which I have to admit would have been better on the right hand side for comfort. The second button is defaulted as Voice Command but can be customised.

The Left Hand Side

Moving over to the opposite side we find the power button, reset pin hole, MicroSD slot, camera button and the Stylus.

The Right Hand Side

The top of the handset has nothing but a simple GPS logo etched in.

Top View

At the bottom we find (from left to right) the 2.5mm Jack socket (please stop this device manufacturers), miniUSB port and the microphone.

Bottom View

At the top left hand side on the back of the phone 3.1MP auto focus camera with the self portrait mirror, LED flash, and large speaker sitting just to the right of it. Underneath this lot we see the Glofiish name and windows logo printed on the removable part of the back cover.

Back View

Removing the back from the phone allows you access to the Li-Ion 1530 mAh battery and simcard area. The first thing I noticed when removing the back cover was a label saying "Don’t Tear" which if I’m being honest I have no idea what it relates to but can only guess that its talking about a piece of plastic film that’s been stuck to the battery to make it easier to remove.. 

Highlights and Lowlights

+ DVB TV

+ GPS

+ FM Radio

+ Screen Size

– Screen seems to get brighter every now and again causing a flicker effect.

– Flimsy Antenna

– No full paper version of instructions

Review

The phone is priced quite highly which for me was a downside, even with the DVB and GPS. If I was to pick a group of people that would be interested in this phone I would go with the Windows Mobile fan who just wants a little more tech in his technology.

When I took the phone box out of its very nice "Special Delivery" pack and bubble wrap the first thing that caught my eye was a very simplistic yet eye catching box. In saying that I found it funny that the box told you where to buy it despite the fact that by having it you have already bought it (or had it for Free like us). Opening the box was very refreshing, no confuddle of leaflets, cables etc… just a very plain cardboard insert housing the phone which did however take me a wee while to get the phone out of there as I had not seen Matt’s video at this point. Underneath the initial cardboard insert lay a cardboard box which was very neatly packed with the cables and leaflets that normally clutter every other box.

Powering on the phone gave a very bright orange background which if you look at the glofiish website seems to be their trade colour. After running through the normal Windows Mobile set up it loaded the spb Shell interface which in general I am not a fan of but it was nice for a change to see it coming built in.

Navigation was very simple as you’ll find that all Windows Mobile systems handle the same way. The D-Pad wasn’t however just as easy to navigate with. I found this quite cumbersome and slow to respond. I decided that for the remainder of my trial I would only use it if needed.

 

Angled D-Pad View

There were lots on nice things sitting inside the programs menu like the GPS folder which had a GPS viewer, Location SMS and Satelite Data Update tucked inside it. The next "nice thing" was the Multimedia folder which had the FM Transmitter, FM Tuner and Mobile TV Player inside. I played a lot with all of these tools and loved everyone of them. The FM radio needed no headset to play which was a great feature and the Location SMS was simply fun to use.

If asked to describe the Mobile TV Player I would say I have mixed feelings. After speaking with Matt we thought that it might only be possible to get this service working on London or Birmingham as those were the only 2 cities in the UK listed in the presets however after fiddling about with the settings a little more I eventually found a section that would allow me to scan deeper and low and behold I had Digitial TV working on the phone. This was met with a little annoyance as it did take over 10 minutes to scan and load the channel lists.

At the bottom of the today screen there is a section that contains nearly every app / program the phone has, I found this really annoying as I prefer to have a clean desktop but would admit that this could come in handy if your not as fussy as I am.

The MicroSD slot was a nightmare! I had to use the stylus to insert and remove my 8gb MicroSD as the slot was sunken so deep a mere mortals fingers would struggle to get anything in our out of it.

If you were to ask me what I would change on this phone I would say remove the D-Pad, remove the app /program launcher at the bottom of the today screen, include a paper user manual, fix the software on the Mobile TV to allow for a quick scan, sort out the MicroSD slot and more preset Cities and strengthen the antenna. Having said all that there are a number of features I would hate to have changed such as GPS, SMS and FM radio.

Antenna View

Conclusion

I used the phone for over a week and found it very easy to use. Having never used another manufactures windows mobile device I was surprised to see that there was so much that could be tweaked / customised from one device to another and that Eten took advantage of this. I enjoyed using the phone and despite it’s downsides and would honest still buy one for the TV & Radio systems alone. I think it was a very bold move for Eten to include the TV on the phone but I think it was a move which will pay off for them.

If you are interested in this handset then why not pop over to CLOVE technology where you can pre-order this handset for £464.13 (Inc VAT).

Posted by: John

Sony Rolly (mini) review and video

I have to say, when Sony asked me to review the Sony Rolly I’d never heard of it, when they then explained it to me it sounded like a terrible idea. However, when it arrived a week ago and I’d had time to play with it I decided that it was actually quite cool.

The Sony Rolly

 

So what is the Sony Rolly? It’s actually quite difficult to define. Is it an MP3 player? Is it a toy? Is it a bluetooth speaker system? The answer to all of these questions is yes.

Looking a little like a rugby ball with wheels I expected the Rolly to be about that size, however, it actually fits comfortably in the palm of your hand.

The Rolly has 1 or 2GB of internal memory (depending on the model) which can hold your MP3 music. To transfer the music to the Rolly though you’ll have to use the supplied PC software called Rolly Choreographer. There’s no MAC version of this. The Automatic Choreography feature uses 12 tone analysis and beat analysis technology to analyse music on your Rolly, and then automatically creates motion that matches the music. You can manually work on the choreography if you want using the software too.

Sony Rolly on its Cradle

 

When you turn Rolly on its arms open to reveal the built in loudspeakers that are on each end. Now Rolly can be used as media player without any dance movements or you can press the play button again and Rolly enters dance mode.

The display-less Rolly will play MP3 files, as well as ATRAC, streamed via Bluetooth from your computer or mobile phone. It also contains sensors that know which way is up, so that volume can be adjusted by turning the player clockwise or anti-clockwise, tracks can be changed by rolling the player forwards or backwards or shaking it.

It’s probably easier to show you what the Rolly is all about rather than tell you so have a look at the video below:

 

 

So how do we define the Sony Rolly? I guess you’d have to call it an entertainment gadget. Everyone seems to like it but then goes on to ask what it’s for!

Rolly with its stand

 

Whether or not it’s worth the £175 price tag personally I would have to say no. Sony’s robot technology is spectacular and you’ll want to watch Rolly dance for a little while before it simple turns into and expensive set of bluetooth speakers. Granted the audio quality is good but for the price you could by a high capacity MP3 player and basic bluetooth speakers and still find change from the £175. I guess if you are a DJ or Club owner then the cost maybe more justifiable. Or maybe you just want to own one of R2-D2’s distant cousins?

 

Review by: Matt