5/5 stars – you’ll want one!
Well, I’ve had the MinoHD for about 2 weeks now. Unfortunately the first week I had it I was terribly sick with strep throat. However I have had quite a few days to play with this nifty little device and I must say I’m pretty impressed.
The footage isn’t *amazing*, however it is incredibly impressive given the size and weight of the device. I must say I’ve become quite attached to it. I bring it everywhere.
I went to our local Circuit City and got a carrying case, a tripod, the extension cables, and an action mount. All four accessories were $15 each but thanks to Circuit City’s store-wide going out of business sale, I picked them all up for a cool $25. Three days later I went back and all of the Mino accessories were gone. Perfect timing!
I’m going to break this review down into three sections.
1. The Footage
The footage is really pretty great. The colors are a tad washed out at times and in low light there is some grain, but that’s to be expected. In well-lit environments (such as outside on a sunny day) the video quality is really amazing though.
Keep in mind that HD footage takes up a lot of space! In the 2 weeks I’ve had the device I’ve recorded almost 40GB of video. I would recommend picking up a 750GB external Western Digital drive ($109 from NewEgg) or, you can go my route and buy 200 blank DVD+Rs and a DVD storage system (I got a locking CD File Vault). This way I can archive all of my footage onto DVDs and have them safely stored away from my computer.
The downside to using DVDs as a backup solution is when you want to find your footage or do some editing, you will have to copy the video files you wish to work with back to your computer and work with the footage off of a hard drive. Looking back on it, I wish now I’d just bought another external drive instead of spending almost the same amount of money on blank DVDs and the CD Vault storage locker. Oh well, no use crying over spilt milk, right?
2. Editing
I have been testing my MinoHD on a 2GHz Intel Core Duo iMac with 1.5GB of RAM. Unfortunately, when trying to edit my raw HD footage in Final Cut Pro, I get constant frame drops and errors and the edited video does not play through. I can export the footage to a .mov file and it plays just fine. I went online and did some research and it turns out Apple recommends 2-4GB of RAM when working with HD footage in Final Cut. So, I ordered another 1GB RAM chip to replace my 512MB chip bringing my total RAM to 2GB. The new RAM hasn’t arrived yet, but it should be here by Friday. I will update everyone then and let you know if this solved the problem. This is not a fault of the MinoHD.
Currently, my editing abilities are pretty limited, but I will be posting footage in an amended review as soon as the new RAM gets here and I can actually work in Final Cut Pro.
3. Overall Impressions
So far I have not been irritated by the 2 hour battery life and 1 hour recording time limitations. I’ve been able to plug into an iMac or a MacBook Pro and download the footage (which simultaneously charges the MinoHD as well) when I need to, even on the go thanks to my MacBook Pro.
The camera is super light weight and the screen, while admittedly very small, is bright and viewable even outside on a bright sunny Oregon spring day. The interface is very simple, and surprisingly enough, when the MinoHD is held steady or placed on a tripod the image is very stable and useable. You won’t be able to get much pro footage, but really the MinoHD is designed to be a pocket cam that works good enough. I’ve taken it everywhere and it fits quite nicely in my pocket alongside my iPhone. The thin and lightweight casing makes it very easy to bring along just in case, allowing you to capture impressive HD footage of just about anything on the fly.
The camera goes from completely powered off in your pocket to on and recording in about 4 seconds, so you won’t miss much of the action. Just make sure it’s fully charged and the internal drive is cleared before you take off somewhere with it. HD footage eats up space quickly so be sure the device is completely empty each time you want to use it.
I ordered a black standard case design MinoHD. My friend Kelly ordered a customized MinoHD with her personal photo, and that should arrive this week sometime. She saw how cool mine was and had to get her own. I will let you all know how the custom designed case looks when hers arrives in my amended review. Stay tuned for the answer to these questions and more:
- Will Final Cut Pro work with the extra RAM?
- Do the custom case designs actually look good?
- How easy is it to take a Final Cut edited video and burn it to a useable DVD disc to view on your TV?
- How will the MinoHD handle being action-mounted to my Specialized Rockhopper mountain bike and taken off the beaten path?