Samsung WB150F 14.2 Megapixel Digital Camera - White

2013-02-16 Many updates and changes made below. I will come back and update this review with more details as I have more time with the camera, but first impressions are good for the price paid (~130). It is plastic in construction, but solid and the build quality seems good.White body is quite nice.No printed manual, but the manual (PDF) is on the CD and is quite detailed.You can read on your PC.Tablet, or other device or print it if you wish it. The big question for many seems to be WiFi. I have a fairly standard wifi setup and had no problems. I selected my network, chose the shared setting, entered the password (easy), and logged in. got connected right away. No need to read the manual, just turn the knob to WiFi and you'll probably be able to figure it out if you've already set up a lot of devices. Once done, I was able to easily upload images to my SkyDrive after entering my login details, again easy to do. I was also able to email photos to my email account. Transfers were fast (normal wifi transfer speeds) for the 4 to 6 images I tested with. If you're trying to transfer 500 images, it will take a while, it's probably best to just remove the SD card and use your SD card reader (or plug in the camera through US B). But for occasional image transfers it works well. So Wifi was easy to set up and use in my opinion and works well. USB->PC transfers were also easy and fast. And, of course, you can take out the SD card and also use your PC card reader or external USB reader. Update: Also tested PC Autobackup via wifi which transfers all images from your camera to your PC. This is the most efficient wifi mode and it also preserves image size and quality. Many other modes (like SkyDrive, social media choices, compress file size). You need to install the software on your PC from the CD (which also contains the manual and Intelli-Studio software) and pair once via USB. After this, you can use the PC Autobackup option in the camera WiFi menu and everything works automatically and efficiently. You can also selectively transfer images while browsing the playback menu. In general, all wifi options that I tried worked fine. There was a case where a transfer "stuck", but when it was restarted, it completed fine and there were no other issues. Update: In subsequent use, AutoBackup worked quickly and without any problems. This is definitely the best mode for saving your images off the camera over Wifi. You still have the option of using the USB connection or to remove the card, but AutoBackup works well enough that I don't need it unless some circumstance prevents it. This mode tracks what you've transferred and will only transfer new images/videos - nice! Transfers are placed in a dated folder, which is also nice. The camera handles well. Menus and controls are decent and easy to use. Full manual settings are available which is good at this price. SMART mode seems to work fine. Everything works pretty much as you expect it to. doubt. The zoom rocker is a bit small, but it worked. PQ update: Images look soft and contrast is a bit low. Image quality seems average for a P&S travel zoom camera. Colors are good, saturation on the extremity lower compared to many. Biggest issue seems to be aggressive noise reduction (due to small sensor size) which smudges detail and causes loss of sharpness. images don't have the "zing" that most off-camera jpegs have these days, so many will be disappointed with the image quality I think. It is possible to add color saturation, sharpness and contrast, but the loss of detail due to the small budget sensor cannot be "fixed". That said, the apparent image quality when viewing at normal screen and print sizes is decent and that may not be a big deal for some people. This is not not a DSLR. At this price the quality is acceptable and images can be edited in any decent editor (although lost detail cannot be recovered). For casual use I think it's OK. I've seen other cameras in this price range with very similar issues. Small detail noise reduction smearing is the biggest negative so if you like crisp detail this won't a good choice for you. So image quality is acceptable, but not stellar. With a little care, good images are possible and wifi and other features are unique at this price point. Decide if you can live with that by in exchange for the other fun features on offer. In casual use, most people won't notice much of this. Hobbyists will. The many varied modes, scenes and effects are all a fun bonus. The "live panning" mode has worked very well in my few tests so far. I've been quite impressed, actually. I found the fun camera to use. There's built-in help that explains most of the on-screen choices and the controls are well thought out (for the most part) and easy to understand and use. So far, looks like a bargain at the current price. Comes with battery, charger, USB cable, CD and wrist strap, but no SD card. 2013-02-16 Update: Video - Surprise! The relative quality videos is pretty good. The 30fps 720p HD (1260x720) video tests I did looked pretty good. Good colors, saturation, contrast and detail (for video) and overall very acceptable. transferred fine via AutoBackup over wifi, thought they were taking longer due to the much larger file sizes. Having an 18x optical zoom that works in video mode is also a nice bonus, and it works pretty well. is as good or better than most small portable video cameras I've used and they're in mp4 format so almost any device should be able to handle them fine. Sound is mono (as usual for video cam at low price) but okay. So we have a bit of a “sleeper” here if you like shooting video as well as stills.