bonglo11 wrote:Naw - Flip is a great choice. Small, fits in the pocket, goes anywhere, and fantastic video quality. Isn't that criteria #1 - the quality of the video?
You failed to separate your reply from my original message, making your post incredibly difficult to read. In fact, most people probably won't even read your reply, thinking that the green area was a mere quote of my post. You need to separate your reply from my original post next time. Here is my reply, with your points in Italics and Bold.
"Chinese Junk - They take godawful videos. Best to let them stay in China..
No - you download it. Who has time to watch more than an hrs worth of home video?"
You ignored the points of my post. I was not recommending those cheap Chinese palmcorders. My point was that expandability is standard, and even the worst models have it, yet the Flip doesn't.
And who said anything about having time to watch 1 hr of videos? Someone on vacation can easily take over 1 hr of footage in a few days. Many people don't want to take a laptop with them on vacation, and many senior citizens don't even have a laptop. And seniors are the people who can benefit most from such a basic camera. So how are these vacationers without a laptop supposed to free their Flips?
"Silly - DPFrames can't play HD video..
NOr can you easily give your videos to a friend until you're by a computer.
Aren't you by a computer right now ?"
Again, you ignore my points. The fact that the Flip can't do non-HD videos is exactly one of the criticisms I have. So you're basically slamming the Flip as I did. Basically, you don't have the flexibility to adjust the videos to your needs. Plus, you forget that many people use their tablets like a digital photo frame. In fact, the Cruz's come with a stand. And tablets play 720P just fine.
As for your other two points, they make no sense. With memory cards, I can easy give the videos to my friends for viewing or editing right after recording. And so what if I'm by a computer now? I'm not presently on vacation. Nor am I on the street. What's your point?
"You mean to say the win 8, 9, 10 etc won't have mass storage support? Who needs support?"
One of my other posts explains why it's not as simple as recognizing USB memory. I gave a very specific example of the Zvue Spirit 1GB MP3 Player, which is recognized on my XP and Vista machines, but not on any of my Win 7 machines. Just how do you know that this Flip is identical to any other USB memory device? Do you have a reference for that? Just because it is recognized as such by one OS doesn't mean that it would be by another OS, or that the architectures are identical. I gave a real life example, tested on MULTIPLE computers.
"Yet to spot a $39 HD camcorder that takes great still photos.
Do they take great still photos? Do they take watchable video's??? Chinese junk - Leave it back in China please.. Ni Ha
You're arguing against a point that no one ever made. Did I ever say that they take "great still photos"? Yet, if I need to capture a still image, I'd rather have a bad still photo than no still photo. Does that make sense to you? There have been times where I wanted to write down info from a poster yet I had no pen. And I had a patient who needed photos of an accident to give to police on the spot. And no, cheap phone's camera is no substitute.
Again, you seem to have problems understanding my point -- which was, even cheap Chinese cameras have this feature so why not the Flip? YOu can rant against Chinese products all you want, but that's not the point of this thread. Why don't you stay on point and compare the Flip with the Kodaks, Vados, Bloggies, etc, that do take great videos and good stills>
"An extension is always dangling off my desktop."
So? What does that have to do with other users? What does that have to do with laptop users and vacationers? Once again, you ignored my point and just gave useless information. My point being: Cisco highlights their Flip arm for eliminating the need for cords that are easy to lose. If you need to use the USB extension to plug in the Flip, then the Cisco's argument is moot. In fact, USB extension cords are harder to find and more expensive than USB connectors. So I'd much rather lose a standard USB connector than a USB extension.
"No waste mate - 4 gigs for an hr of HD - that is pretty good compression. No chinese junk ebay stuff does it as well.
This reply has nothing to do with my post. Read it again carefully. Where exactly did I say that Flip's H.264 is not good compression? It's standard, and most efficient CODEC in general use. Read carefully; I wrote: "you really don't need 60fps unless there is fast movement, i.e sports. What a waste of space." My point is that being forced to use 60fps is a waste of space. Did you completely miss that???
And I see that the anti-Chinese obsession continues! The paragraph you were replying to made no mention of Chinese products, yet you saw a need to write that pointless sentence.
BTW, your ignorance of compression is obvious. I can easily find you a generic Chinese camera on eBay that uses H.264 compression. So it too can put 1 hr of HD footage on 4gb. Flip may have better sensors and optics but they don't own the H.264 CODEC, and didn't do anything special to implement it. So any product using the same CODEC will achieve similar compression ratios. Seriously, read my original post and then read your reply.
"Ok - so why blame flip. Doesn't your Chinese Junk Corders find a way around them. Simple solution - use the Divx encoder (free) and join them all up into an MKV. Non Issue. Makes editing easier by discarding clips I don't want.
And one last time, you ignored my point. First, I never blamed Flip. I clearly said that this is a problem in ALL palmcorders and most digital cameras. Second, I clearly said that you need to concatenate (aka join) the snippets so I didn't need your advice to do so. In fact, you can join them with many free programs, including my choice, Avidemux. So that was never the issue.
The issue was exactly what I said -- none of which you addressed: it takes time to join them and organization is more difficult (since the names don't tell you which files are related; you must guess based on time stamp). If teh entire session was in one file, I can simply copy or attach that one file to give to a friend. I don't need to zip them, or join them, or do any sort of processing.
And of course, you ignored the entire section where I said that you can't just play all the snippets sequentially (like a slide show), without having to press Play to advance to the next snippet. If everything was in one file, it's a non-issue. if they were in many short snippets, you'll do a lot of pressing. And I know this firsthand because I sometimes have to make instant presentations of a patient exam to med students and colleagues. I neither have the time nor energy to go back to my desk to edit and join files.
The fact that this Flip has HDMI output means that it's made for instant presentations. having lots of snippets and no remote control makes it tedious.
"Naw - Flip is a great choice. Small, fits in the pocket, goes anywhere, and fantastic video quality. Isn't that criteria #1 - the quality of the video?
The word "choice" implies the ability to CHOOSE. Most of your rant ignored my points and the fact that there are many other QUALITY palmcorders with similar video quality and price, and many more features. For some reason, in your mind, the "choice" was between this Flip and some generic Chinese model from eBay. Sorry dude, go argue with someone else because I never said any such thing.
----
Wow, you really should examine your anti-Chinese obsession. Where did I mention anything about preferring a cheap Chinese palmcorder? It's sad that you need to defend the Flip solely by comparing to generic Chinese stuff. Nowhere did you mention the Kodaks, Vados,. Bloggies, etc even though I did. In other words, you think that the Flip is in the same class that those Chinese junk.
