Kodak EasyShare V570 Dual Lens Digital Camera (5.36MP, 2569x1929, 5x Opt, 32MB Internal Memory, SD/MMC)

Reviewed by: yeohkt

Duration of ownership:

Strengths: love the 23mm lens. panoramic mode - stiching 3 pics, good control (takes a bit of time to get use to,excellent movie mode with zoom, compact

Weaknesses: Very bad battery, slow charging (3 hours), link cable is 26pin( diff from old 24 pin). Slow startup, noisy zoon lens, kodak do not support SD > 1G, Slow SD record, need to connect AC for base station

Overall Evaluation: Size-----as many ppl have review. its not as small as the new sony T series but small enough. very light dc indeedKodak Support-------------Kodak support is very good in Australia. Call their support number a few times (not much waiting time) but i think the support is overseas from the ppl i spoke to and also good email response (always getting reply the next business days).Price-------Got the camera on sale at Harvey norman during fathers day - Aud 297. Battery---------Very slow battery charging ( only 780mAh ) compare to 2.8 on my sony V1. Very bad indeed. Batteries are also Aud30 each.Kodak U8 Cable--------------Called support on connections. They said it need the new 26 pin kodak u8 cable which is different from the old 24 pin)ERRRR. hate more cables. and it cost Aud30 for the cable.ERRRR. Further more no compatible cable ( generic ones on ebay ... YET).Zoom Noise-----------Hate the Zoom noise. very sharp and noisy. Movie Recording-----------------The Best feature is the Movie. Zoom and auto focus . very good on a Bright and evening shots. but very bad on Low light indoor. Will fill up the 1G SD ... if the battery last...the outdoor pics are a bit good compare to other ppl review. took a few picstures of melb in the evening and it looks amazing.Storage - SD-------------Called Kodak about SD support. as usual they recommend Kodak SD which is VERY expensive and futher more recommend using not more than 512Mb which is a laugh. they said the camera would perform VERY slow if a bigger SD card is used and would have a significant performanace hit when accessing over 650~700mb on the SD.they would not say how quick the kodak camera writes on the card...testing shows less then 60x (9mb/sec ).. ppl please get a good fast card ( more then 60x) as it saves time transfering the pics using a card reader (most ppl now days buys a 512/1G/2G/4G SD)...old sony sticks MS are 1.5mb/s .. very slow..Kodak Software-------------Not like other ppl, hate the kodak software. 2 very different versions. that comes with the CD and if u download only.. initial file 1.5mb + 45+Mb download to install.Hates to restart windows when Kodak finish installing and load more junk when windows startup.I never got the Kodak connection software running. ;(Firmware upgrade-----------------The camera I got was ver 1.01 ..the latest online was 1.02. called support. not much changes. did not know how to upgrade anyway.Picture Quality---------------Not as good as a REAL 5 MPixel. The picture quality is more like 4Mpixel. and not as sharp as pics take by a sony V1 or my old nikon dcSaved Options-------------Hate it when it does not remember the options set and always set to auto mode ( with flash on, normal shapness etc) and need to set it back to Customs .EERRRRThings that come with it--------------------------come on kodak. No hard case for this delicate camera ?also the string is so clumsy. no tight up knot .. just too long. Very bad.but Very good and thick manual + nice camera box.also please include some more promotional stuff and discount vouchers etc. Kodak improvements------------------We want user forums !direct download of 45~60mb Kodak s/w online as 1 file.Finally---------Australia famous Croc Hunter Steve Irwin died yesterday. he was a great hero that we all at australia loves and will miss dearly.ppl could email me and ask questions yeohkt(AT)msn(DOT)com