Features

• 10.1 Megapixel CCD
• 2.7-inch TFT color LCD
• 3X optical zoom
• Stainless steel thin body

The Casio Exilim digital cameras actually come in three flavors (Zoom, Card, and Highspeed), and each has its own benefits. The Exilim Card is thin, lightweight, and very simple to use. The Exilim Zoom (EX-Z29) is slightly bigger than the Exilim Card, but it gives you a higher pixel count and longer zoom. The Exilim Highspeed is completely different than the others, in design. It does not offer as many pixels as the others but it has more professional features. The camera that I am reviewing is the Exilim Zoom EX-Z29.

The Casio Exilim EX-Z29 features things like a 10.1 Megapixel CCD, 2.7-inch LCD, SD Card slot, rechargeable lithium ion battery, and a sturdy stainless steel body.

It also has Unlimited movie recording. It is a pain to have to carry around both a video camera and a digital camera, but with unlimited movie recording you don’t have too. This is a feature that every digital camera should have. It seems like all cameras have some kind of video ability, but many are limited to 30 seconds in length. Even my really expensive Canon Powershot G6 can only take 30 seconds of video at a time. This Casio Exilim will record until the memory is all used up. This is great because it gives you full control over how long your movies are, because you never know when you will need more than 30 seconds of video.

This camera comes with several pieces of software. Photo transport is a program that simply transfers the pictures from your computer to your camera. YouTube Uploader, which as its name implies, uploads your videos to YouTube. The last two pieces of software are Adobe Reader 8 which we all know about and the electronic user guide.

Software

There are two ways to transfer images from the camera to a computer. The first is to take the card out of the camera and put it into a card reader and the second is to use a USB cable. If you use the built-in memory to store images then you must use the USB cable to get the images out of the camera. It is not very common to see a camera include writable internal memory. This camera comes with approx. 17.8MB built-in flash memory. This is enough to store about 4 high quality pictures.

Design

The Casio Exilim EX-Z29 is designed very well. When you first pick it up you will notice that it is put together in a way that makes it feel tough. You are not going to want to drop it, but it feels like it could survive a couple bumps. The camera comes in five different colors: blue, black, red, pink, and silver. The colors are not interchangeable, but you at least get a choice when you buy it.

The front of the camera is dominated by the lens. The lens has a built in lens cover. The lens cover opens and the lens itself extends out when you turn on the camera. When you zoom in or out you will see the lens adjust its length. Because the camera only has a 3X optical zoom the lens does not adjust very much. To the left of the lens is the Self-timer light. This is basically a light that lets you know when the Self-timer is turned on. Above the light is the flash.

Front

The top of the camera is simple and contains the shutter and power buttons.

Top

The back of the Casio Exilim EX-Z29 is basically the LCD screen with a few buttons on the side. The screen easily takes up two thirds of the back. There is no view finder, so you have no choice but to use the LCD screen to frame your pictures. The only problem I had with the screen is the plastic cover. The cover makes the screen very reflective and it is hard to see when you are outside and the sun is shining. I really like my Canon G6 because it has an LCD screen, but it is not glossy.

Back

To the right of the screen are the buttons. Starting at the top are the Zoom, Display mode, Navigation, and at the bottom are the Menu and BS (Best Shot) buttons.

The zoom buttons probably don’t need any explanation, but I think the others need a little. The display mode buttons switch between picture taking and picture viewing. Picture viewing is great on the big 2.7-inch LCD screen. Since each button only had one function I found it interesting that Casio didn’t use just one button that switched between the two functions.

The next button is the circular hat switch with a set button in the middle. These buttons are mainly used for navigating and setting the menus, but they can also be used to alter the display. Pressing up on the circular button changes the overlay on the display. It cycles through three options, no overlay, current settings, and current settings with light meter.

Light Meter

The last two buttons will probably be the most used, they are Menu and Best Shot. The Menu button obviously gets you into the menu system. Under the menu there are sub-menus, REC, Quality, and Set Up. In REC you will find things like Face Detection on/off, Focus settings, Anti Shake on/off, and Digital Zoom on/off. The Quality Menu has things like Size, Quality, White Balance, and ISO. The Set Up menu has things like Eye-Fi, Sounds, Sleep, and Date/Time settings.

REC Menu

Quality Menu

Set Up Menu

The Best Shot button is exclusive to the Casio cameras and when you press it you see a list of different types of pictures that you might take. Some of the options are: Movie, Portrait, Scenery, Children, Sports, eBay, and YouTube. There are 24 different options in this screen. Choosing one of these will automatically set the cameras aperture, ISO level and other settings so that the picture you take is the best for your situation. In the case of the Movie and YouTube options it will set the camera to record a movie when press down on the shutter button.

Best Shot

The bottom of the camera has a tripod hole.

Bottom

The right side of the camera has a small cover that is over a mini USB port. There is also a larger cover that is over an SD card slot and a battery slot.

USB

SD Card

The left of the camera is completely void of anything interesting.

Performance

So how good are the pictures that the EX-Z29 takes? With 10.1 Megapixels you would expect to get a high quality picture, but with only a 3X zoom you will really need to be close to all your subjects. The camera has a digital zoom, but I always turn it off as soon as I get a camera. Digital zoom is one of the most useless features that any camera could have. I turn it off so that I don’t accidentally use it.

To test the quality of the pictures I took a couple with this camera and then took similar pictures with my Canon PowerShot G6. I know that these cameras are not even in the same class (the G6 is a more professional camera, but it is also a lot older), but it is a good reference.

G6 Cars

EX-Z29 Cars

Below you will see a smaller, cropped version of each image that shows the image at 100% size. To me it looks like the G6, despite its age and lower pixel count, was able to take a clearer picture, but for its small size the Exilim does a decent job. You can hardly tell the difference when you shrink the image down to the size of a photograph.

G6 Cars Close

EX-Z29 Cars Close

I also tested out the anti shake capability of the Casio, but I noticed that it seems to make the pictures a little blurry.

Normal

Anti Shake

Warranty and Support

Casio warranties this camera for 1 year. Like I say in all the reviews, this is weak. I wish companies would stand by the products that they make.

Conclusion

For a camera this small I think it does a good job. It does not take the best pictures, but it does fall into the “good enough for an amature” category. This would be great for taking to a convention, amusement park, or anywhere else. This camera is perfect for putting in your pocket and taking out for a quick picture. I was able to find this camera on Amazon for only $119. For that low price, not having perfect pictures is not a problem. I believe that you will be happy with this camera.

Weighing under 6-ozs and priced under $150, the Genius G-Shot HD520 offers 11-megapixel stills and HD video with H.264 compression format for exceptional quality output to today’s high-resolution flat panel TVs

MIAMI (April 27, 2009) – Genius (www.geniusnetusa.com), a brand division of KYE Systems Corp., has announced a new compact, pocket-size high-definition digital video camera that excels at capturing both high-resolution stills (at 11-megapixels) and high-definition video (at 5-megapixel in MPEG-4/H.264 format) and is light enough (under 6-ozs) and portable enough to allow users to capture activities anytime, anywhere. This easy-to-use camcorder is ideal for Summer time outings, dads-n-grads, moms on-the-go or anyone looking to capture life’s moments in brilliant color and detail. Launched today, the G-Shot HD520 is both Windows (Vista/XP/2000) and Mac (OS10 or higher) compatible and designed with a ultra-bright 2.5” LTPS LCD screen that can rotate up to 270-degrees to allow users to shoot videos from any angle or position.

The G-Shot HD520 comes equipped with Face Detection to track and detect faces accurately as well as Electronic Image Stabilizers (EIS) to detect and correct hand-shaking when shooting photos. The handheld camcorder has a built-in memory of 32MB and supports additional HCSD memory up to 8GB. The G-Shot easily outputs to today’s high-resolution flat-panel televisions using the included HDMI cable for theatre-like viewing or video and photos can be easily uploaded to a computer for digital editing, archiving or sharing with friends. Additionally the Z-Lighting technology enhances brightness in low-light environments, perfect for everything from Mother’s Day gatherings in dimly-lit restaurants to Summer sunsets on the beach. The G-Shot HD520 is also capable of shooting still photos (up to 11 megapixels), listening to music, reading e-books, playing voice recordings, and it can also be used as a portable media player..

Priced at $149, the G-Shot HD520 weighs under 6-ozs and comes complete with a 7.1 mm lens, a 5X digital zoom, and a Li-ion rechargeable battery. Interested shoppers can go to New Egg.com, Amazon.com, Tiger Direct, Buy.com or other retailers and distributors listed at http://www.geniusnetusa.com/buy.php. More information on all of Genius’ headphones and products at www.geniusnetusa.com.

G Shot HD520 Camcorder_Front View (by Genius).JPG

G Shot HD520 Camcorder_Full product w box (by Genius).JPG

G Shot HD520 Camcorder_with Viewer Swivel (by Genius).JPG

ABOUT KYE SYSTEMS CORP.

Genius was established in 1985. Genius product portfolio includes computer mice, keyboards, web and security cameras, speakers, gaming peripherals, remote controls, headphones, digital cameras, digital camcorders and digital photo frames. It also holds the U.S. patent for mouse scroll-wheel technology. In 2007 Genius announced a newly invented optical touch-controlled scroll-wheel for fast browsing of web pages and documents in eight directions. Genius expanded from computer peripherals into consumer electronic products that include mobile phone accessories, Bluetooth headsets, digital cameras, digital photo frames, iPod speakers and MP4 players.

Features

• Two analog tuners, each with their own hardware encoders
• Two digital TV receivers for ATSC or clear QAM
• Single slot PCI Express (PCIe) X1 board, half height
• Dual built-in hardware MPEG-2 encoders, for the best system performance when recording analog cable TV.
• Supports clear QAM digital cable TV channels with the new WinTV v6 application

There are several things about a TV card that are very important. The first is that it has as many tuners as possible. This card has two tuners which means it is possible to record two shows at once. The nice thing about these two tuners is that they can receive either an analog or digital signal.

The second important item is that the card has a built-in encoder. If you plan on recording analog TV like you get from cable, then having a built-in encoder is really important. Encoding an analog signal is very resource intensive and letting the card handle everything frees up the rest of the computers resources so they can be used for other things, like keeping the system running smoothly.

The Card also comes with a bunch of extra items. These include an MCE remote, an IR reciever box, IR repeaters, additional inputs (Composite and S-Video), a USB cable, and a Composite to S-Video converter. The one thing it is missing is a Component or HDMI input for capturing signals from higher quality devices.

Contents

Design

It has been a while since I have looked at new TV tuner cards, so when I got this one I was surprised by a few of the changes. The first thing I noticed is that this new card is a lot smaller than my old card. As you can see it is shorter in length and height. This card also sports a PCI-e interface which means it will be able to take advantage of the faster bus speeds. I never had any speed problems with the last card, but then again it was only an analog card, this one supports digital so it may need more speed.

Card

Card Installed 2

One other difference from my last dual tuner card is that on this card both tuners are built-together. As you can see from this image the older, bigger, card has two distinct tuners; however, the bottom card looks like it only has one.

Card Compare

Performance

Installing this TV card is really a snap. It is really easy to plug into a motherboard, and the only other thing that needs to be done is installing drivers and software. The drivers and software come on an included disk which automatically starts when you put it into a computer, You then choose what you want to install. Since I already have Windows Media Center I only need the drivers; however, if you have a version of Windows that does not include the Media Center then you will need the other software also.

Once the drivers are installed you have to go through the lengthy but simple process of getting Windows Media Center to recognize it. If you already have a TV card installed you will need to remove it because Windows currently only supports 2 digital tuners and 2 analog tuners.

Once Media Center has gone through its setup, assuming everything went OK, you can instantly watch TV. I did not notice any problems with the TV signal, it was always clear and smooth.

Even though I said Window Media Center only supports 2 analog and 2 digital tuners. I have read that there is a way to tweak it so it will work with more. So my next task is to get both my old tuner and the new one working together. Lucky for me I ran across this forum thread, which discusses the very topic. I was able to use the instructions and the program provided to accomplish my goal. Now I have 4 analog and 2 digital tuners. I don’t know why Microsoft has to make it so difficult, but it is nice to know there is a workaround.

Tuner Setup

Tuner Setup 2

Warranty

The Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 comes with a 2 year warranty that covers manufacturers defects only. The warranty is not that great, especially since there are no moving parts and nothing should fail. Hopefully my experience with this card will be just like the WinTV-PVR-500, and I won’t have any problems.

Conclusion

I am extremely happy with this new TV capture card. I did not have any problems installing it, and it outputs a great signal directly to my computer. If you read my review of the WinTV-PVR-500 you know I had all sorts of trouble getting it to work properly. If you are in the market for a TV capture card I can highly recommend the Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250. If you don’t need Digital in your card, then the WinTV-PVR-500 is a great analog only card. As always compare prices before purchasing. The WinTV-HVR-2250 can also be purchased at Newegg or Amazon.

After the press conferences we got to stand in line for about 3 hours waiting for the Bill Gates Keynote speech. During the speech the talked about the new technology that is coming out of Microsoft. On of the new things Microsoft is working on is the Connected Home. This technology will connect all your Microsoft based gadgets in your home and car so that sharing data between them is seamless. We also got to see a very funny parody of Bill’s last day at work. I hope someone puts it up on the Internet because it was very funny. At the end of his speech they had a Guitar Hero champion come out and play a little for us and then a Guitar Hero God came out to show up the champ.

After the Bill Gates keynote we headed over to the Digital Experience event. This was dubbed The Ultimate Tailgate Party. I expected to find them watching the big college football game that was on, but instead they just had lots of tailgate food for us to eat. Everything else was just like being a CES. There were rows and rows of companies showing off their goods. I guess that this could be the Unveiled event for all the companies that didn’t get invited to the official one that was last night. There were lots of companies that were showing off everything from on-line games to iPod accessories to digital picture frames. Speaking of digital picture frames I saw a 15 inch one that blew me away. Not only did the pictures in the frame look great but the frame was great and very thin. I also saw a great little ipod accessory that would play your iPod videos, but also opened up to play DVDs also. Alienware was demoing a really wide screen monitor, unfortunately I did not get any pictures of it in action. However, check out my videos and you will catch a glimpse of it. Lsst but certainly not least Sanyo was showing off some new camcorders. They were very small and light weight, but did not include any internal storage. All the movies and pictures must be saved on an SD card. One of the camcorders was also waterproof up to 5 feet for 1 hour at a time.

Things are really going really well. The show officially starts tomorrow and I am excited to get out on the show floor and see what else is available.

Digital entertainment is becoming very popular and people don’t want to sit in front of a computer to watch it. Recently several devices have come out that give you the ability to show video, music and pictures from your computer on your TV. The EVA8000 Digital Entertainer HD from Netgear is one of those products.

Features

• Streams HD videos, music, Internet radio and digital photos from your home PCs and storage devices to your HDTV
• Automatically finds all the digital media files on your home network and organizes them into an easily accessible library
• Easy set-up using an on-screen TV wizard for a fun entertainment experience
• High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) for HD video resolution up to 1080p

The Digital Entertainer HD’s main purpose is to play your media files from your computer to your TV without them being in the same room. To do this the Digital Entertainer HD uses several different ways to get to your files. The most used will probably be by networking with computers or storage devices. Another way to get files is to plug a device directly into the Digital Entertainer HD. The Digital Entertainer HD will play files stored in Windows (FAT, FAT32, NTFS), Macintosh, or Linux disk formats. It does not matter if you set up the music player on a PC or a Mac. You can even play files directly off an MP3 player like an iPod.

The Digital Entertainer HD supports high definition playback of Windows Media Video 9 or MPEG-4 file formats at up to 1080p resolution on your HDTV. The Digital Entertainer HD also supports Windows Media DRM (WMDRM10) to playback protected downloaded content from major online services. This requires Windows Media Connect (WMC) server software or Windows Media Player 11.

Using two or more Digital Entertainer HDs in different rooms, you can synchronize music throughout the house (Party Mode) or pause a video in your living room and resume it in another room with the Follow Me feature

With a TV tuner card installed in your PC, the Digital Entertainer HD can schedule recordings and pause and rewind live TV from your living room.

If you plug your USB flash drive, digital camera, iPod, or other USB storage device directly into the Digital Entertainer HD you will instantly have access to all the stored digital media on your HDTV.

Use the remote control and TV to view and access your PC desktop and applications like email or web browser.

Design

The Digital Entertainer HD comes packaged nicely in a box with all the cables and software that you will need to get up and running. In the box are the EVA8000, a remote, PC software, component cables, composite cables and documentation.

Box inside

Remote and Cables

The Digital Entertainer HD is designed to fit in with the rest of your entertainment center devices. It fits the same width and length as most of your other devices so that it can be stacked.

EVA8000 front

The front of the Digital Entertainer HD is fairly bare except for a power button on the left and a USB, headphone, and IR port on the right. The USB connector on the front can be used to connect a hard drive, or MP3 player like an iPod.

Front

The back of the Digital Entertainer HD is where all the output connectors are and you have every available option for connecting to a TV and stereo. As you can see from the image below there are video connectors for composite, S-Video, component, and HDMI. For sound you have composite S/PDIF, Coaxial S/PDIF, Optical, and HDMI. You also have other connectors on the back for Ethernet, USB, two wireless antennas and a SCART port. If you don’t know what a SCART port is used for, then don’t worry about it. It is mainly used in Europe and Australia for connecting to a TV. There is also a reset button on the back so that you can get the device back to factory default settings.

Connectors

Back

The remote is full of all sorts of buttons that you can use to navigate the menus with. The top half of the remote has the buttons that will probably be used the most because they are the navigation buttons for both the menus and the media that you play. Right in the middle are four shortcut keys that can be used to quickly jump to one of the sections, like pics or music. Below those buttons are the number and letter keys. These will be used to type in URLs and search words for YouTube and Flickr searches.

Remote

Performance

There were a few specific things that I was looking for with this device. I already have a media center extender which is mainly used to watch and record TV. The media center extender does a really good job, so for the the Digital Entertainer HD to compete, it will have to be really easy to use and record great video. The extender can also show my pictures and play my MP3′s. It cannot however play protected music or any video that it did not record. The extender is also limited to connecting to one computer at a time and that computer must be a media center computer. So for this review I was looking for a device that could overcome a lot of the limitations that the extender has.

Setting up the Digital Entertainer HD is not difficult, but you have to answer quite a few questions like your language, screen resolution, and zip code. At one point it asks you to install some software on your computer, but that step is not required.

Select Language

Welcome

Select Setup

Set TV Mode

Set TV Mode 2

Enter Your Zip Code

Searching for News

Basic Setup

Basic Setup 2

Installing the software on your computer adds a little extra functionality. Features like watching TV and YouTube videos require the software. Watching and recording TV also requires that you have a TV tuner card in your computer. Part of the setup also creates thumbnails for pictures and shares directories that have content you want to show on the EVA8000. I did not mind sharing my directories, but one benifit of the media center extender is that you don’t have to share directories.

Once it is setup you are shown the main menu. From here you can get to all the options like watching live TV, YouTube videos, looking at pictures and listening to music.

Main Menu

Main Menu / Weather

The first option on the menu and the first thing I tried was watching various types of video. When you click on the TV / Video menu you may see two or three options. If you have a TV tuner card installed in your computer and you installed the EVA8000 software you will see the TV Tuner option. I installed a Hauppauge WinTV-PVR-500 about a year ago so I see the TV tuner option. At first when I tried this I was not having any success. After reading the instructions better I found that I had to enable the TV viewing in the settings before it would work. After enabling the option I was able to see the TV, but it was very choppy and unviewable. So I put off testing this feature until after an upgrade or something. After the latest upgrade the video does look better, but there is a lot of pixilization when there is fast motion and scene changes. Despite the pixilization I was able to watch the TV without any problem. My Media Center Extender did not suffer from any of the above problems.

Video Player Menu

Video Player

Tuner Unavailable

settings

TV viewing

After the TV Tuner test I moved on to the recorded video menu. Recorded Video will play all your AVI, WMV, MPEG- 1, 2 and 4 files, including XviD, DivX, and even H.264. I only had a couple of XviD files on my computer so I copied them to a network share and played them on the EVA8000. The videos played really well. I was even able to fast forward and rewind without many problems. I did have several problems with playing back videos. One of the problems that I had was if I stopped a video I had to start it all over. The other problem was that the menu for the videos does not show directories. This means there is no way to organize your videos except by giving each one a different name. My Madia Center Extender cannot play any external video.

Recorded Video

In addition to playing the other types of video, the EVA8000 has the ability to play unencrypted DVD files, but because of the organization problem I mentioned above it is difficult to tell each movie apart. All you really see is a huge list of VOB files that all have the same name. The DVD playing features also does not support DVD menus, so finding the right VOB file becomes even more difficult because some of them may be previews and not the actual movie. If you are going to use this to watch backed-up DVD’s I recommend encoding them with XviD and giving them a name you can understand. My Media Center Extender also cannot play DVDs.

The next option down the list is YouTube videos. To play YouTube videos you first have to find one and this can be harder than it seems. From the menu the first three options are for recent searches, favorite videos, and favorite users, but you cannot use those until you have searched and added users and videos to your favorites list. It would be nice if you could log into your YouTube account from here and see the favorites you marked from the web. The next two options, search tags and search user’s videos seem like they would be straight forward, but they are not. Searching the tags is like searching through categories, which is not useful to me. You would think that searching the user’s videos would be like searching on the website, but it is not. When I type in justechn on the website I get a list of all the videos I have submitted for my reviews. When I type in justechn on the EVA8000 I don’t get anything. Mostly,I just use the Top option to see the most popular. Even after I find a video and I try to watch it, it only plays sometimes. Often it will say buffering, but after a bit it quits like it was finished and asks if I want to add the video or the user to my favorites. When the video does play it looks ok, but not something you would want to keep. Playing YouTube videos is also something my Media Center Extender cannot do.

YouTube Videos

Music is the next thing to test. As long as you have music in your share this should not be a problem. The music playing menu is very straight-forward. I did not have any trouble playing music. It was even able to pull up the album art and track information. Once a song has started playing it will continue to do so even while you navigate to other things. This is great for setting up slide shows with music. Internet Radio is also listed under this menu. This option will go out to the Internet and pull down a huge list of Internet radio stations. The quality of the broadcast is displayed when you select a radio station and this is great because the quality of each station can vary greatly. My Media Center Extender can play MP3s, and it cannot play internet radio, but to make up for that it can play FM radio if you have a tuner installed in your computer. Luckly, my TV tuner came with an FM tuner.

Music Player

Music Playing

Internet Radio Player

Internet Radio Stations

Picture viewing is also another one of those things that is easy to do, you only need to make sure that you are sharing some pictures. The EVA8000 only supports JPEG, BMP, PNG and TIFF images. You can choose how long to keep a picture on screen, and choose from several transition effects, like fade, slide, zoom etc. You have several options when viewing pictures, like by year, folder and much more. The one annoyance that I found was that when the slide show is going you cannot change the music without having to go back to the music menu and change it there. That seems like a lot of work if you just wanted to do something simple like move ahead to the next song. In addition, I found that the music would often get distorted while playing. There are several reasons that this could happen, but I am guessing it was network congestion or something like that. The Media Center Extender can show pictures and it does it really well.

Browse Photos

Photo order

Photo Thumbnails

One thing you will want to keep in mind is the amount of time it takes for the EVA8000 to check for new music and pictures. I have about 1800 MP3′s and about 7500 pictures that I was sharing with the Digital Entertainer HD and it took about 30 minutes to index them all. One other thing about scanning for pictures and MP3s. If you start a scan you must let it finish otherwise you loose all your previously scanned media. So make sure you are ready to devote the full amount of time to a scan before you start one.

Looking for media files

Looking for media files 2

Looking for media files 3

I next wanted to test the schedule recordings, but I was unable because of one major glitch. The Electronic Program Guide requires a key and I could not find anywhere to get one. I checked the user guide and it talked about needing the key, but it referred me to another section in the guide that did not exist. I also checked the website, but there was no mention of a key. I currently have a case open with Netgear support, but it has been about a week without a response. I think this is just a feature that they have not finished yet. With the Media Center Extender the guide works really well and it is free.

Schedule Recording

Guide Key

Internet media is where you will find Internet music and YouTube. It is a little bit redundant because YouTube is also under the TV / Video menu and Internet Radio is under the Music menu. The other two options are Flickr photos and RSS news and podcasts. RSS feeds work great, but it is a real pain to get them added. Fortunately, the Digital Entertainer HD comes with a list of preconfigured RSS feeds. To add an RSS feed you have to manually type in the URL and a name for each one. Entering in a long URL with only the remote is not a fun task. Fortunately, you can enter the URL’s by using the EVA8000 web interface. All you need to do is point your browser at the IP address that is assigned to the Digital Entertainer HD. I will talk about that more later.

Internet Media

RSS news and Podcasts

Edit RSS URL

Edit RSS Description

The News / Weather also lists RSS news and podcasts along with weather and weather maps. The weather feature would not work for me, but I was able to see the weather maps. The maps are small and low resolution. I was hoping that you could zoom in on areas or limit it just to your local area, but I could not find a way. You are only able to see the few maps that are listed in the menu.

News / Weather

Weather

Temperature Map

The More menu lists a lot of system settings. Things like scanning for new media, PC Access, and follow me. Any time you add new media to a share and you want to be able to get it on your EVA8000 you will have to start a new scan. The PC access feature is for getting a remote desktop connection to a computer on your network. This option is only available if you have the Digital Entertainer HD software installed on a computer and the remote desktop option turned on. It is suppose to be used for checking your email and sending quick messages. Anything more and you would need a keyboard and mouse to quickly navigate and type long messages. As you can see from the picture below this feature is useless for me because the resolution on my computer makes it so the text is unreadable when displayed on my TV. The Follow Me feature is when you have more than one EVA8000 and you want the music or movie to transfer from one room to another when you move around. There is also the ability to update the system. As updates come out I highly recommend that you download them so that you can get the latest bug fixes and functionality.

Main Menu 2

Supervisor Functions

PC Access

PC Screen

Garbled text

Update

Checking for update

System Information

In case you are away from your home or you just don’t want to enter long URLs with a remote you can access most of the features of the EVA8000 from the web. The web interface is very basic and is really only useful for adding new items to the RSS feeds and other minor tasks. Scheduling recording could also be done from the web, but because I was unable to get a key, I could not test this. You can view pictures and listen to music through this interface, but I do not recommend it because it is extremely slow.

Web Main Menu

Web RSS Menu

Web RSS Add Item

After all is said and done, there was one glaring problem that I found happening a lot. If I left the EVA8000 on for a long time without using it then it would lock up and I would have to unplug it before it would work again. I did not want to use the reset button because that removes all my settings and puts everything back to factory settings.

Warranty and Support

The Netgear Digital Entertainer HD EVA8000 comes with a 1 year limited liability warranty. This warranty only covers defects in workmanship and not damage that may have been caused in shipping or from misuse. You can find out more about the warranty here. Support for the warranty can be received either online or over the phone. Phone support is only free for 90 days after the purchase of the product. You can find out more about support here.

Conclusion

Netgear Digital Entertainer HD EVA8000 has a lot of potential and when the bugs are worked out I think it will be a very useful product. At this point it is about 80% functional and 20% annoying. I think Netgear has a long way to go, but most of it is with user interface and incomplete features. One of the things that Netgear could do is get rid of the Internet media menu. All the options in that menu appear in other menus so it is completely redundant. I am also disappointed that Netgear would require a separate purchase of a key for the Electronic Programming Guide. After spending $350 you would think that Netgear could at least give its customers a 1 year trial. The Digital Entertainer HD is a bit expensive, you could buy a cheap computer for the $399 that this retails for. I have found it for cheaper and as time goes on I am sure there will be discounts and rebates to help the cost not be so high. As always compare prices before purchasing.

Features

• 6 Megapixel CCD
• 2.2-inch LCD
• 3X optical zoom
• Stainless steel thin body

The Casio Exilim digital camera actually comes in three flavors, and each has its own benefits. The Exilim Card is thin, lightweight and very simple to use. The Exilim Zoom is slightly bigger than the Exilim Card, but it gives you a higher pixel count and longer zoom. The Exilim is completely different than the others, in design. It does not offer as many pixels as the others but it has more professional features. The camera that I am reviewing is the Exilim Card.

The Casio Exilim Card features things like a 5.5 to 6.0 Megapixel CCD, 2.2-inch LCD, SD Card slot, Rechargeable lithium ion battery and a sturdy stainless steel body.

It also has Unlimited movie recording. It is a pain to have to carry around both a video camera and a digital camera, but with unlimited movie recording you don’t have too. This is a feature that every digital camera should have. It seems like all cameras have some kind of video ability, but most are limited to 30 seconds in length. Even my really expensive Canon Powershot G6 can only take 30 seconds of video at a time. This Casio Exilim will record until the memory is all used up. This is great because it gives you full control and you never know when you will need more than 30 seconds of video.

This camera comes with several pieces of software. Photo Loader is a program that simply transfers the pictures from your camera to your computer. Photohands includes retouching tools for adjusting image color, contrast, and brightness, for resizing images, and for changing image orientation. Ulead Movie Wizard is for editing the movies taken with this camera.

The camera comes with a docking cradle. The cradle doubles as a way to connect the camera to a printer or computer with USB, and a battery charger. The only other way to transfer pictures to your computer is to take the card out of the camera and put it into a card reader. If you use the built-in memory to store images then you must use the cradle to get the images out of the camera. It is not very common to see a camera include writable internal memory. This camera comes with approx. 8.3 MB of me

mory. This is enough to store about 2 high quality pictures.

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Design

The Casio Exilim card is designed very well. When you first pick it up you will notice that it is put together in a way that makes it feel tough. You are not going to want to drop it, but it feels like it could survive a couple bumps. The camera comes in three different colors: orange, blue and silver. The colors are not interchangeable, but you at least get a choice when you buy it.

The front of the camera is dominated by the lens. The lens has a built in lens cover. The lens cover opens and the lens itself extends out when you turn on the camera. When you zoom in or out you will see the lens adjust its length. Because the camera only has a 3X zoom the lens does not adjust very much. To the left of the lens is the AF (auto focus) assist lamp/Self-timer lamp. This is basically a bright orange light that either helps the camera focus or lets you know when the Self-timer is turned on. To the left of the lamp is the flash.

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The top of the camera is simple and contains the shutter and power buttons.

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The back of the Casio Exilim is basically the LCD screen with a couple of buttons on the side. The screen easily takes up two thirds of the back. There is no view finder, so you have no choice but to use the LCD screen to frame your picture. Directly above the screen is a light and three buttons. These buttons are the Play, Rec, and movie buttons. If you press the play button the screen displays the pictures and movies that are stored in the camera. If the camera was off when you pressed the button then the lens does not extend. The REC button functions just like the power button, when you press it the camera turns on and is ready for use. The Movie button only works when the camera is on, and it starts the movie recording. To the right of those buttons are two more buttons. These are the zoom buttons. The one on the right zooms in and the one on the left zooms out. To the right of these buttons is a hole for a wrist strap. To the right of the screen is a speaker, and several buttons. The first two buttons are the menu (top) and BEST SHOT (bottom) buttons. The menu button takes you into the vast menu that is available in this camera. You can adjust everything from the quality of the picture, sounds, language, date format and everything else you could think of. The BEST SHOT button is exclusive to the Casio cameras and when you press it you see a list of different types of pictures that you might take. Some of the options are: Portrait, Scenery, Children and Sports. There are 34 different options in this screen. Choosing one of these will automatically set the cameras apature, ISO level and other settings so that the picture you take is the best for your situation. To the right of these buttons are more buttons. These buttons, big square, are mostly used for navigating the menus, and selecting options. Pressing up on the buttons when in picture taking mode the screen will show the color chart. Pressing the down button when in play mode will give you the delete options.

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The bottom of the camera has a tripod hole, SD card and battery slot.

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Performance

This camera does not take the best pictures I have ever seen. At 6 Megapixels you are sure to get a high quality picture, but with only a 3X zoom you will really need to be close to all your subjects. The camera has a digital zoom, but I always turn it off as soon as I get a camera. This is one of the most useless features that any camera could have. I turn it off so that I don’t accidentally use it. I took a couple pictures with this camera and then took similar pictures with my Canon PowerShot G6. I know that these cameras are not even in the same class, but it is a good reference. Below you will see a small cropped version of each image that shows the image at its full size. You can clearly see that the G6 takes a much better picture, but for its size the Exilim does a really good job. You can hardly tell the difference when you shrink the image down to the size of a photograph.

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Warranty and Support

Casio warranties this camera for 1 year. Like I say in all the reviews, this is weak. I wish companies would stand by the products that they make. The software is warrantied for 90 days.

Conclusion

For a camera this small I am really impressed. This would be perfect for taking to a convention, amusement park or anywhere else. This camera is perfect for putting in your pocket and taking out for a quick picture. The retail price of this camera is $399, but even on the Casio website you can get one for $349.99. Looking around a bit you can probably find it cheaper. I believe that you will be very happy with this camera.

Features

• 7.1 Megapixel CCD and Enhanced Optical Shooting System for Stunning Image Quality
• Powerful 35-140mm (35mm equivalent) 4x Optical Zoom
• NEW Ergonomic SLR-style Grip and 2-inch LCD Monitor
• Exclusive Canon DiG!C Image Processor and iSAPS Technology for Superior Image Quality and Faster Processing Speed
• 9-point AiAF for Precise, Accurate Focus
• 12 EOS-based Shooting Modes plus Photo Effects, Super Macro Mode, Wide-area FlexiZone AF/AE and Spot Metering
• VGA-quality Movies; ID Photo Print and Movie Print
• Print Direct from Canon Direct and PictBridge Photo Printers

Owning a Digital Camera is not like any other electronic device that you have owned. A digital camera will be used to capture moments in your life that are precious and special. Most of these moments will never occur again, so, you want to make sure the camera that you have can capture the moment with detail and clarity. With a 7.1 Megapixel CCD you can be sure you are going to get a lot of details. In fact the higher the number of pixels the more detail the camera will capture.

In addition to having a great amount of detail the Canon PowerShot G6 has a decent zoom. This is about average with 7 Megapixel cameras. It would be nice if the zoom were a little better, so that you could get a closer shot without having to get closer to the subject. To help alleviate the short falls of the zoom, Canon offers a wide angle and telephoto lens that can be attached to the camera, so that you can get wider or closer shots. These are nice additions, but they are also expensive. Each one is between $150 and $200.

Being able to record videos seems to be a feature that most high end digital cameras have. The only thing I don’t like about the video on the PowerShot G6 is that it is limited to 30 seconds at a time. It would be much more useful if you could just record until your Compact Flash card was full. I suppose this is because the videos are first written to internal memory — because it is faster, then it is written to the slower Compact Flash card when the internal memory is all filled up. This would also be the case with taking many shots at the same time. There are two continuous shooting modes. High speed mode is able to take shots faster, but it also fills up the internal memory faster. When the internal memory is filled up the speed of the shots will drop dramatically. This is done so that the camera has enough time in between shots to write the images to the Compact Flash Card. You will also notice that on high speed mode the LCD screen is turned off. This is probably done to reduce some of the processing requirements of taking pictures really fast.

Having a wireless remote is essential. The PowerShot G6 comes with a very nice, fully functional, yet small remote. With this remote you are able to access many of the cameras settings and functions. The only problem is that if you are far away you are not able to see the screen and you don’t know if the settings are what you want.

Design

The PowerShot G6 is designed very well and it is comfortable to hold — due to the large grip on the front and the rubber coating on the grip.

On top of the PowerShot G6 grip you will find the shutter button, zoom lever and main dial. The shutter and zoom are self explanatory, and the main dial is used for selecting certain menus and for displaying images. In shooting mode, turning the main dial can set the aperture value, exposure compensation, white balance and other menu items. In playback mode it displays the next and previous image. You can also click the main dial, in shooting mode it will select the menu item that you are currently on, and in playback mode it does not do anything. This dial only works for menus that are accessed with the FUNC button.

On top of the PowerShot G6 is an LCD display screen. This will display the camera settings, the remaining number of images, movie shooting time, battery charge and other information. To the right of the screen is a small button with a light bulb above it. This button will turn on the back light for the display. The back light will stay on for 6 seconds unless you press the button again. Pressing will manually turn off the back light. Also on the top of the camera is Hot Shoe. This is used for attaching an external flash. To the left of the hot shoe is a set of buttons. The top button cycles through the different flash settings. The next one sets the continuous mode and the self timer. Finally, the bottom one switches the light metering settings and also jumps images when in playback mode.

The back of the PowerShot G6 is dominated by the LCD viewing screen. This screen can flip out and face many directions so that you can see it from the front or back. Above the LCD are the macro and manual focus buttons, and the settings knob. The settings knob can be rotated a full 360 degrees so you can select any of the settings. These settings range from Auto to Movie to Manual mode. With these settings you are able to make sure this camera fits just the situation you need. Be very careful with this knob because it is easy to bump it and change the setting. I had this happen to me several times and I didn’t notice it until it was too late to retake the pictures.

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To the right of the LCD is another set of buttons and an omni selector. The display button turns on and off the LCD, The FUNC button gives you access to the picture settings. With this you can set things like resolution, detail, shutter speed, ISO and more. The menu button gets you into the system settings. Here you can set things like Red-eye, self-timer length, digital zoom, volume, Date/Time, and themes. Themes are a way to customize the sounds and screens that the PowerShot G6 uses when it is operating. Be aware that using extra sounds and stuff can cause some battery drain, for the most part I keep all my sounds off except for the timer and shutter sound, I like to know when the camera is about to take a picture.

The LCD is also very unique. Instead of being fixed in one position you can rotate it and expand it out from the back of the camera. For shooting pictures you open and rotate the LCD so that it faces backwards. When you are done you rotate it back and close it. This keeps the LCD safe when you are not using it.

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The right side of the PowerShot G6 is where the Compact Flash card goes and the left side has all the connectors and a speaker. On the Left you have a A/V out for sending an image and audio to a TV or other screen. There is also a mini USB port for connecting to a computer. Last there is a DC plug for powering the camera with an outlet. The cable for this is not included with the camera. I actually find it easier to take the card out of the camera and download the images directly using a card reader. If you use the USB then you must use the Canon software to get to the images.

Performance

Testing a camera is not an easy task. If you don’t have the right knowledge and equipment then it can be difficult to get a comprehensive set of tests. I am by no means a professional photographer so I will leave the sophisticated tests to the professionals and I will test simple things like usability and some pictures that I have taken.

Depending on the type of photographer that you are, you may or may not appreciate all the functionality that Canon has built into the PowerShot G6. This camera is as close to an SLR as you can get. It even has interchangeable lenses. With this camera you have the ability to let the camera do all the work, by setting it to Auto, or if you are really picky you can set the camera to full manual mode and adjust all the settings that are available. For my tests I usually left it on Auto unless I needed to fine tune the shutter speed, or something else simple like that.

Taking a picture with the PowerShot G6 is a piece of cake. If you want a quick shot you set it for Auto and push the button. The camera will calculate all the right settings to take the picture. You can see the level of detail that you are able to capture with this camera. I have it set to the largest size, 3072 x 2304 , and its highest resolution, Super Fine. At this resolution I found that each picture takes up about 1-4 MB depending on the amount of detail in the picture. I know this seems like a wide span of space, but it is nice that the camera adjusts the size of the images so that low detail pictures save you space on your memory card.

Even though the PowerShot G6 has a fairly weak zoom, the shear number of pixels in each picture makes up for it. This means that you can take a wide shot and still get in close, because the detail is so good, you can crop out pieces and still have them look good. Below, I have 6 images each one is a different zoom and the cropped version of the picture. The regular image has been reduced in size so that it will fit on the screen. The cropped version is the same picture but with a small area cropped out and zoomed to 100%. This just shows how big the picture is that the camera takes. you will notice that there is a little bit of distortion with the digital zoom, so unless you really need it I recommend that you don’t use it.

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The camera does a really good job of storing the images as well. The resolution and compression settings determine the size of each image, but the amount of detail can also effect the size of the image. On my camera I have it set to the highest resolution and the lowest compression, not raw, and with my 512 MB flash card I can store about 163 images.

One of the shooting modes that I found useful is Continuous shooting. Continuous shooting mode is really good for action shots. Canon reports that with Large/Fine setting you can get about 1.2 frames per second with normal and 2.0 frames per second with high speed. My personal tests were done with Large/Super Fine settings. With high speed mode I got about 5 shots in before I noticed a slight drop in the speed. After another 5 shots there was a dramatic drop. I don’t know what caused the first drop, but the second drop was because the camera had filled up the internal memory. With the normal mode I could get about 16 shots in before it filled up the internal memory. This is because the shots were slower and it gave the camera time to transfer some information to the Compact Flash card, in between shots.

The battery life on the PowerShot G6 is amazing. In my old camera I was using cheap rechargeable batteries and it seemed like I was always changing them. This camera uses rechargeable Lithium-ion batteries, and according to Canon it can take about 300 pictures with the LCD on and 900 pictures with the LCD off. That means I can fill up my 512 MB flash card twice before I have to worry about charging the batteries.

Warranty and Support

Canon, like most companies, offers only a 1 year warranty on this camera. It would be nice to see longer warranties, especially with equipment that is this expensive.

Conclusion

This is really a great camera. For an amateur like me it is really easy to use. For a professional it still has all the settings of an SLR so you can have full control of the picture. At the time of this review most online retail stores were selling the PowerShot G6 for about $599. If you shop around you can find it for a lot less.

Features

• Powerful, distortion-free bass
• Innovative driver technology
• Digital equalization
• DTS 96/24 support
• Amazingly powerful controls
• Innovative satellite design
• Connect to multiple sources

Computer system speakers have been around for a long time and just like everything else they continue to be improved upon. Logitechs Z-5500 digital speaker system is an improvement on their previous model, the Z-680. In fact, the exact speaker system that I received has improvements that were not available when this model was first released.

The Z-5500 speaker system is THX certified, which is targeted at computer users and home audio enthusiasts who don’t want to spend a fortune, but still want all the quality of a higher end system. This is currently Logitechs high end speaker system and it has all the features of a more expensive system. In addition to being THX certified, the speakers can play back several formats including Dolby Digital, PCM (uncompressed stereo), DTS and DTS 96/24.

The Logitech Z-5500 Digital is one of the few speaker systems that supports DTS 96/24. DTS 96/24 is a format that you don’t normally use and is not widely available to the general public. It is mainly used in recording studios where they need the absolute best quality. Even now 96/24 is currently used on a limited number of enhanced DVD and audio discs as well as some high-end PC sound cards. Normal DVDs audio is formatted at 48/20 and CDs are at 44/16 (higher numbers are better). So even with the ability to play audio at 96/24 you won’t find many opportunities to use it until more media is released using that format.

The Z-5500 has connections for just about anything that outputs audio. On the back of the Digital SoundTouch control center you will find the connectors that you need to get your computer, DVD player or stereo hooked up. There is one digital optical and one digital coaxial input for DVD or CD players, PS2, Xbox or PC sound card with digital outputs. There is also a 6 channel direct (3 stereo-mini connectors) input for uses with 2, 4 or 6 channel sound cards or for 3 stereo analog mini audio sources. Lastly there is an analog stereo mini jack at the side of the box for portable CD or MP3 players. Also, on the side just above the mini jack is a headphone jack.

Control center back

All your bass with come out of a 10″ subwoofer. You don’t see 10″ subwoofers in many computer speaker systems, but you sure do notice the difference. The subwoofer is also graced with a large 4″ tuned port. Including a port on a subwoofer serves to increase the amount of bass that you hear, but also complicates the design. This is because the port has to be tuned. Which is often reserved for a much more expensive system. The back of the subwoofer is where the system all comes together. Here you will find all the speaker connectors, which are the same spring clips that you find on most stereos, a 15 pin serial plug for connecting the Digital SoundTouch control center and a master power switch. Once it is all connected you control everything from the control center.

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Subwoofer front

The Z-5500 also includes its own decoder. This is a big feature because it means you don’t have to have a separate receiver to do the decoding for you. All you need to have is the control center and that will take care of everything for you.

Design

The Z-5500 is a 5.1 speaker system so that means there are 4 satellite speakers, 1 center speaker and 1 subwoofer. Each of the five, including the center speaker, are 3-inch digitally equalized aluminum phase plug satellites which combine two drivers into one, providing the clarity of a tweeter with the richness and fullness of a mid-range driver. The satellite speakers have a very stylish look to them. They are mostly black with a silver front that is covered by a black grill. If you like the look better you can remove the grill and display the bare speaker. If you have kids around I recommend you leave the grill on for added protection.

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Speaker front

Each of the 4 satellite speakers has a stand that can be rotated. When fully rotated the stand can be used as a wall mount. Unfortunately, once the speaker is mounted there is no ability to swivel the speaker so that is faces you, so you need to pick a mounting spot that faces your general direction. On the back of the speaker is the port and spring clip wire connectors — now this is where the speaker design differs from the first release of the Z-5500. The first release had the cables integrated into the back of the speaker so you could not remove them. On the other end of the 25 foot cable was a single RCA plug. This made connecting them easier but complicated the process of installing the speakers. Since the wire was only 25 feet long you had to find a place in your room that was only 25 feet away. If your house is already wired for speakers then you could not plug these in because they did not use standard plugs. The new and improved speakers do not have the wires attached to the speaker and they use a spring clip so you can easily attached them to a pre-wired house. This also allows you to easily purchase and attach longer and better quality wires. The system comes with 15′ of wire for the front two satellites and the center channel speakers. The two rear satellite speakers each have 25′ of wire.

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Speaker side

The center channel speaker has the same design as the satellite except the speaker is laying on its side and it does not have a rotating base. Instead, the base is set up to allow you to tilt the speaker up and down. This design is made so you can place it above or below your monitor. If you have a CRT you should place it above and if you have an LCD you should place it below.

The subwoofer is the hub of connectivity for the system. It is a big beast — it houses a 10″ subwoofer on the front and a 4″ port on the side. The subwoofer also holds the 500 watt amplifier, as evident by the huge heatsink on the back. Also on the back are 5 sets of spring clip speaker connectors. One for each of the satellites and the center speaker. Below the clips is a 15 pin serial plug for connecting the Digital SoundTouch control center and below that is the main power switch. There is also a fuse located below the power switch.

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Connectors

Even though the subwoofer is where everything connects, you will not interact with it very much. Your main center of attention will be with the Digital SoundTouch control center. The control center contains all the controls and settings that you could want. The control center is made up of a power button, large volume dial, 5 setting buttons and an LCD display. The 5 buttons that it has are input, effect, settings, level and mute. The input button controls which input will be using the speakers. Pressing the input button will cycle through the available audio sources. The effect button moves through the different effects that are available. Each type of input has different effects that it can use. The effects include DTS, Dolby Digital, Pro Logic II Movie, Pro Logic II Music, 6 channel Direct, Stereo x2 and stereo. Adjusting the settings is much like adjusting the Effects. Only certain settings are available for each input type. The settings include Panorama, Dimension, Center Width, Surround Delay and Night Mode.

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Control center buttons

There is also a remote control that you can use with the control center. At the top of the control center is the IR port so make sure that is not blocked by anything. The remote can perform all the same functions as the Control center itself. The only problem is that the LCD display is so small that you may not know exactly what you are doing unless you get really close to read the LCD display, and if you are going to be that close you might as well not use the remote.

Remote

There is one bit of warning that I want to give you. The Control center is really fragile. There are lots of warnings in the documentation and on the back of the subwoofer that tell you not to plug in or unplug the control center unless the main power has been turned off or the system has been unplugged. These warnings should be followed. If you do not follow these warnings you could end up with a dead control center. I have to say that I am severely disappointed that the control center would be this fragile. I would think that for a setup this expensive Logitech would have put in a circuit breaker or fuse that would prevent the circuits from getting fried. None the less, you really need to be careful so you do not also end up killing your system.

Another complaint I have is the length of the cable on the control center, it is only about 7′. This means that you cannot put the subwoofer in the corner, where it produces the best sound, unless the rest of your entertainment system is within 7′ of the corner. If you are more then 7′ away from a corner you must decide if you want the best bass or if you want the control center on your desk or with the rest of your entertainment center. You are not allowed to extend the cable for the control center, doing so may damage your system.

Performance

It is really hard to quantify the performance of a speaker system without going into a lot of numbers that for the most part do not matter to most of us. Most of us just want to know how it sounds. Let me tell you, it sounds awesome.

When you turn on this speaker system with your favorite game or DVD just make sure you don’t have anyone sleeping anywhere in the house. This system easily raises the hair on the back of your neck and the subwoofer can really shake things up.

Logitech says that the system outputs a very impressive 505 watts (RMS), with 62 watts going to each of satellites, 69 watts dedicated to the center, and 188 watts allocated to the huge subwoofer’s 10″ driver. This is really a lot of power for a speaker system that is for computers. These kind of numbers are normally only seen in much larger systems.

Warranty & Service

This speaker system comes with a rather good 2 year limited warranty. I have not had a reason to contact Logitech for any support so I don’t know how that is, but I have not heard very many bad things either.

Conclusion

Overall, the quality of the sound that this speaker system produces is out of this world. You won’t find a better speaker system for the same price. There are several things that I consider flaws, but if you are willing to put up with them then I don’t think you will be disappointed.