Sum ‘n’ Substance:

Thumbs up: 34x zoom lens; good audio quality; 16GB internal memory; compact in design; light on the wallet; easy to use.

Thumbs down: Lag in auto-focus; no image stabilization; video quality is average.

Inside the trunk: Optical sensor type: CCD; Optical zoom: 34 x; NTSC Analog Video Format; Face Detection; 16 GB Flash – Integrated; Schneider-Kreuznach Zoom lens; Built-in lens shield;  video Capture: H.264 – 720 x 480 , H.264 – 640 x 480; LCD display – TFT active matrix – 2.7 inch – Color; Samsung IA-BP85ST Li-ion rechargeable battery – 850 mAh; Widescreen Video Capture.

The whiz-kid speaks:

Razzle dazzle: I do not know what Samsung were aiming for in design but I’m going to call this camcorder, the F-34,‘The Water-bottle’. Its compact design fits properly in the palm of my hand. It is fairly light too, so I can run about with it, without the fear of losing my balance & dropping it down. In spite of it being shaped like a cylinder the Water-bottle has very little body roll when placed on any flat surface. The F-34 is available in black, silver, blue, and red versions, is almost molded out of plastic, but it sure as hell doesn’t feel cheap.

Inside dope: Hmm…Samsung has packed a lot of features in this water-bottle of theirs. With controls on top that include an ultra-sensitive zoom rocker, followed behind by a shutter release for capturing stills (though not while movies are being recorded), a mode button where movies, photos and playback are the options. The camcorder’s battery compartment and SDHC card slot are behind a sliding door on the bottom. To the left of the screen are a Menu button, a four-way directional pad and a select button, and a record button. The zoom can be controlled using the pad too.

The LCD cavity reveals three more buttons: iCheck, LCD Enhancer, and Easy Q. With the power off, the iCheck button gives you an onscreen readout of remaining battery life and storage; with the power on it toggles on and off information on the display. The LCD Enhancer improves contrast and brightness of the display for better visibility. On pressing the Easy Q you enter into a fully automatic mode where you deal with what you get.

The LCD is of low resolution, but is suitable for the capabilities of the water-bottle. It also features Samsung’s swivel-grip feature allowing you to quickly change from underhand to overhand shooting without removing your hand from the strap.

The Video can be recorded at three different quality levels at a resolution of 720×480: TV Normal, TV Fine, and TV Super Fine. The water-bottle is perfect for the point-and-shoot job but I cannot understand why Samsung failed to include the image stabilization mode. Yes it does have Face detection, auto power save, built-in speaker and YouTube capture mode but image stabilization is vital.

Then there are also the eight scene modes that it offers. The video is soft and grainy while performance in dim-light isn’t great either. Photo quality is pretty poor too. This is all because the resolution is that  low. There was lag in the auto-focus too. I guess that’s something that also might need to be worked by Samsung besides the image-stabilization.

Nitty- gritty: Despite all these faults and missteps, what the Water- bottle offers is, loads of features, a 16GB storage, an SDHC card slot for expanding the capacity, a 34x –zoom lens just to name a few,  for a fair price. So go ahead and get yourself a water-bottle and avoid shooting in low-light conditions.

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