Rating: Summary: My change of heart (since Jan) -- I'd avoid HP215 Review: I was very happy with the 215 when I bought it & I wrote a positive review here on Amazon in January. I must, however, update the information and recommend that consumers avoid the HP 215. My camera died after only six months of operation, and from innate design/production flaws. That was when I found out that HP does everything it can to discourage customers from reaching a customer service representative or getting HP to honor their warranty -- it was one of the more horrific experiences I've had with a vendor. I won't bore you with the long details but it took many hours of my time sitting on a 900 number (my dime -- they have no toll free numers) just to get HP to admit the camera was broken. After a long battle, they allowed me to send in my broken camera for replacement. They sent me someone else's used and broken camera. This cycle repeated four times, with HP continuously sending me broken cameras in the mail and waiting for me to give up. It took an email to the CEO to finally get a working product. That's just not right. For several years, I was employed to purchase, maintain, and repair all computer equipment for my department. HP used to make wonderful, durable products and used to have great technical support (especially the documentation). Things have changed, however, so caveat emptor! Since I purchased this camera, many more great, cheap digital cameras have come out on the market. There are lots of alternatives to this camera -- shop around and read reviews.
Rating: Summary: a great camera for a great price Review: I had my heart set on a Kodak DC-3200. I thought it was the coolest camera on earth. But then, our local Wal-mart stopped selling just the camera, they bundled it with a printer. Since we had just gotten a printer, and we had had a bad experience with the brand that made it, I began looking at other models. The HP 215 stood out, mainly because of the price. I had seen the model before in another store, but never really thought much about it. Now that I did some research on it, including reading these other reviews, I realized that this was a WAY better camera than the Kodak. So, on Christmas, I opened up the box, and I saw a camera, a CD, a USB cable, a wrist strap, batteries, and some instructions. On top, there was a pamphlet titled "quick sucess guide". It took me through the setup process, and in about 2 minutes, I took my first picture. I was impressed with the results--it came out great. Now I've had the camera for a couple of days, and I'm still very much impressed with it. The quality & resolution are great, and at the highest resolution, it makes even good 8x10s. Tip: for all but your most important shots, use fine resolution, you can hardly notice the difference from the higher one. It's also very simple, just flick it on, and press the button! After you're done taking pictures, plug it into your computer, and it automatically downloads your pictures. The one thing is I recommend getting a bigger memory card; I got a 16 MB one... This will hold 43 picturs in fine quality mode. Also, if you are going to be taking a lot of pictures, get a digital camera battery charger, because the battery life isn't bad, but it's not the greatest either. Well, I hope this review was helpful, and good luck camera shopping!
Rating: Summary: Very good camera for low $$$ Review: I got this camera for Christmas, and I'll be the first to say it works like a dream. The flash is a little slow and the batteries drain pretty fast, but other than that it's great. It's simple-to-use, the scrolling menu is simple and easy. The switches are sort of easy to slide into the wrong position, but anyway, menus and picture-viewer are great, the quality is incredible, should be a lot more expensive, but it's not. I love the camera. I am 13 and I have made some really great photos with this camera, just make sure you have USB port on your computer, and that you have the right kind of photo-editing software, I prefer Arcsoft PhotoStudio 2000, or Adobe will work too.
Rating: Summary: CHEAP camera and you get what you paid for Review: The camera is pretty cheap if you are okay with putting up with constant frustration. The software has a bug in which the camera will not save pictures to the memory card. The only information you can get to solve this is to call into tech support which is NOT a toll free number. The camera is unreliable in picture quality and the on/off button sometimes does not function well. It's a good CHEAP camera.
Rating: Summary: Highly Unreliable Performance Review: The on/off button is so poorly designed that you can't help switching it on by accident. By the time you decide to take a picture, of course the power will have been drained. Even if you take care of this (camera) like precious jewelry, you still need to avoid using any flash light and/or LCD display, for otherwise you will have to wait like 20 seconds for the battery to recharge before you can shoot another one. This would still not have been a problem if the camera could indicate the remaining recharge time. However, since the camera keeps the user in the dark, the user has no choice but to keep pressing the button until the camera takes the picture. More often than not, the timing is awkward; and the results, disastrous. Don't let this happen you.
Rating: Summary: hp Photosmart 215 Review: Super good quality digital camera !!!! Takes very good pictures, espically in the #5 picture mode !!!! The #10 picture mode is also very impressive. Would highly recommend this digital camera, for the price is hard to beat for a digital camera of this quality. Has lots of special features that i really like and use, usually seen on really expensive digital cameras. Anyone who purchases one of these hp Photosmart C215 digital cameras will be very pleased indead !!!!!!!!!! One of these are all you need from a digital camera----take the extra money you would spent on a really expensive one and buy some other grown-up toys !!!!!!!!
Rating: Summary: OK, could be better Review: Like all digitals, these eat up batteries by the dozen. For this camera, I suggest getting NIMH rechargeables. These work the best for me. Also, get a better MC. Sandisk or Viking are good bets.
Rating: Summary: Nice! Review: Great picures, easy use and internal memory to save a few pictures.
Rating: Summary: After weeks of toiling, I bought it - and LOVE it!! Review: Ok, I'm a toiler. What's that you ask? Its someone who toils for days, even weeks over decisions. I quite literally can think of nothing else while I'm toiling over a quandry. So, I toiled for 2 weeks over what digital camera to get and firmly decided to get the Kodak 3500 with the dock. I read every review on every camera on this site and cnet.com. So the next day, black friday, I (...)bought the HP215 becuase it was so cheap I couldn't resist. It was not what I wanted and held on to it for 2 days without opening it, convinced I should take it back and get the Kodac. WELL, I am a fool becuase I LOVE this camera. It is so amazingly easy to use. A chimp could figure it out. Takes great pictures, they look amazing on the PC screen and in e-mails, even a moron like me takes really fantastic shots. I'm suprised - usually my pictures really and truly stink. If you want to TAKE PICTURES and see them on the screen and e-mail them, this is the camera for you. Save your money and get this one instead. And it really doesn't eat batteries, I don't know what those people were talking about. Even printed shots came out great (buy photo paper for your inkjet printer). One down side, it takes several seconds between shots to re-load. That is a real drag. But that is the one and only down side. The price, the pictures, the fun, it's a fabulous value.
Rating: Summary: Great Camera For The Price Review: I bought the HP 215 camera last month. It is a good value for the money. The pictures are very good, although the memory card could have been bigger. It's also a battery hog, draining most AA batteries very fast. My advice is to get an AC adapter for uploading images, and rechargable NiCad batteries for shooting. Overall, a great camera for people new to digital photography.
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