HP Photosmart M407 4MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom

Rating:
Summary: Good digital camera, but not an upgrade.
Review: Here are the great features of this camera:
* Easy for point and shoot.
* Very light and small! It easily fits in your pocket.
* Great full color LCD viewscreen and easy to understand buttons.
* Wonderful shutter button and "video record" buttons (some cameras require you to twist knobs, pull levers and shift gears to go from picture taking to video recording, this camera makes it a snap!)
* Video Recording will fill up all the space you have. With a 1GB SD card, it will record nearly 90 minutes of video. The video is decent quality (the QVGA 30fps mpeg) and has allowed us to stop taking the bulky 8mm video camera along with us. With Windows Movie Maker software, we can easily mix still photos and live videos for sharing with friends on the web or burn to DVD. It is NOT digital video recorder quality (or even an 8mm) but when you are juggling the kids, keys, diaper bags, towels, and everything else, if you can eliminate a camera and still have the functionality, life is good!

Our first digital camera was an HP Photosmart 735. We purchased the M407 as a replacement. The price and features seemed to make it equal with the 735 but with some enhancements. However, that is not entirely true.

* Strange as it may seem, the 4 MB Best selection doesn't seem to produce the same crystal clear vibrant colors that the 3.2 megapixel 735 did. The flash seems to make this even worse.
* The camera does not have a speaker. It has a mic to record video and audio-over, but you can't play it back and listen to it. You must transfer it to your computer. The 735 came with a built in speaker which made it a great way to check audio quality as well as the picture. I am sad that HP didn't continue that with this camera.
* As with the 735, you still can't operate the zoom when you are recording. This is annoying, but you can work around it. Zoom before you start video recording and it will record at that zoom level (just remember that you can't change it until you stop recording).
* The video recording sound is a little soft. The 735 had an aggressive auto level control that often went overboard, but you never missed audio. The M407 gives "cleaner" audio but at the cost of low levels. I don't know what is best.
* HP eliminated the simple LCD screen that was on the top of the 735 camera that would show the number of pictures left (or minutes left for video recording) which was a nice feature but not critical.
* The view finder is very small and you will probably use the LCD screen instead to frame your shots. The screen is a bit slow (as with other HP cameras).

Overall, it is an excellent camera for the money, but don't expect to see it as an upgrade from the older 3.2M 735 model.

Rating:
Summary: Great camera
Review: I got this camera as an upgrade to a very low resolution digital camera/VHSC video camera combo. We love it, although I did lose a bunch of pictures from my son's first Christmas. After doing some research, I think that was the fault of the SD card we were using (SanDisk).

There is a slight (a second or less) lag time between the time you click and the time the pic is taken, as is true with most digital cameras in this range. Not a problem at all if you plan for it. I have small children and pets, and I missed as many shots with this camera as I did with my very fast film camera.

It's very compact, and contrary to what others have said, I got it with everything that's "in the box." Maybe because I got it from another retailer. I do wish, however, that the camera came with a bag. I had to buy that separately.

All in all, the camera is a VERY good deal for the price!

Rating:
Summary: HP Photosmart M407 with Dock
Review: The camera and dock were fine. However, I ordered this product based on the list of What's In the Box. Do not believe the list. There is no remote control. There are only 2 USB cables, and ther is no HP Memories Disk Creator, or ArcSoft Panorama Maker 3.5 software.

The camera and dock alone were on sale much cheaper at other stores at the time I ordered and even had free shipping and faster service. One other reputable site had the same camera and dock sold separately for a total of $209 compared to the $235 on this site. If all the items listed on this ad had beene included, it would have been a fair price. Without these, it was a ripoff.

Rating:
Summary: Great Price and easy to use
Review: This is my first digital camera and I couldn't be happier. The price is low and it is EXTREMELY user friendly. 5 minutes after taking it out of the box I was taking pictures with ease without even reading the manual. It is also fairly simple to download and send pictures since it is an HP product. I did not even have to install the software onto my PC for it to work. The picture quality is excellent and with the 128MB card I purchased with it, it takes about 100 pictures. I highly recommend this camera to other newbies or people who just want a simple to use product.