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Samsung HZ15W 12MP Digital Camera in Grey + 8GB Accessory Kit
The Samsung HZ15W includes a world first 10x optical zoom and 24mm ultra wide angle Schneider lens and cements Samsung's position as an innovator in t ...

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1. 7.2-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 15 x 20-inch prints
2. 3x Advanced Shake Reduction optical zoom; 2.5-inch LCD display
3. Built-in microphone allows 10-second voice memos to be attached to images
4. Captures video in one of two resolutions, up to 640 x 480 at 15 frames per second, in AVI (MJPEG) format
5. Stores images on SD memory cards (includes 20MB internal memory); powered by AA-size batteries

Editorial Review :

The Samsung S730 is a high-resolution digital camera that is equipped with a true-color filtered 7.2 mega-pixel CCD. You can use Samsung S730 to produce even better images and take detailed photos for printing up to poster size. In addition, the Samsung S730 has a 3x optical and 5x digital zoom giving 15x total zoom when combined.The ASR technology prevents the degradation of image clarity and color common to flash photography. With ASR the effects of camera shake are reduced in lower light conditions. You can even take well-exposed, sharper pictures in low light without using a flash at all. It guarantees brighter and more natural pictures.The Samsung S730 has an auto sensitivity feature that automatically adjusts sensitivity according to the ambient exposure conditions up to ISO 1000. The high sensitivity setting of ISO 1000 enables you to take clearer indoor pictures in poor lighting without camera shake or blurred images.

Customer Review :

Luck of the draw

My experience over the last couple of years seems to jibe with what other reviewers have said. The first unit I got stopped functioning properly after a couple of weeks. I forget the exact problem, but I took it back to the retailer (K-Mart) and they provided a new one. This has worked fine.

Battery life is the major issue, and I think it's a defect. Sometimes the most powerful and expensive lithium batteries won't take five pictures, flash or not. When I check the voltage, they're at 1.54, still perfectly good batteries and perfectly usable in other devices. So I tried rechargeables with good success. They work very well. The best and most powerful freshly charged batteries only rate 1.45 volts, but they can last for 50 or more pictures and weeks at a time. In both cases, the battery type setting in the camera was appropriate to the installed batteries. One thing I haven't tried is using the non-rechargeable lithiums while retaining the rechargeable setting. Anyway, I'm fine with the rechargeables, which are cheaper in the long run.

It does a fine job taking pictures in most situations. Transfer to the computer is quick and easy. I haven't used the video capability so no comment on that.

Rating :

Pretty Nice

This is a pretty nice camera. My sister got one a couple years ago, and it worked really nicely. It takes nice pictures, and is pretty quick after taking pictures too as far as refreshing back to screen. The only thing I did NOT like about this camera, is after about a year of use it started to eat batteries up very quickly. We use Re-chargeable batteries in the camera. I thought maybe it was the batteries too as well, but I replaced the batteries with regular Lithium Energizer batteries made for digital cameras, and it did the same thing. It drains in about 1 hour of use. When we first got it, it worked really well. it lasted for a lot of hours. Camera is nice, easy to use though and thats a plus.. it also has Memory card adapter as well so thats nice too. I actually got dirt in her last camera and destroyed it so that's why I bought this camera recently. the other one still works, but when the camera lens comes out and goes in it stops sometimes and beeps 3 times. Other than that its a pretty handy camera!

Rating :

Buy Lots of Batteries! Lots and Lots of Them!

I bought the Samsung S730 camera to replace a Nikon CoolPix L4 camera that I gave to my son.

The Nikon CoolPix 4 Mega Pixel took excellent quality pictures, especially outdoors (I actually printed an shot of a tiger at the Naples (FL) zoo to 23 x 17" on an HP130 printer, and even with only 4MP, the print quality is outstanding! That print is framed and hanging on my wall, and there are no tale-tale signs of pixelation or that it was taken with a digital camera!). Also, a set of alkaline or rechargeable batteries seemed to last almost forever in the CoolPix (weeks and weeks, actually). So I thought this type of battery life would be *normal* for small point-and-shoot cameras. How wrong I was.

This Samsung is a newer model than the CoolPix L4 and higher resolution (7.2MP vs. 4MP). I was hoping for maybe even better battery life, hoping that a newer camera had newer power-saving features? Alas, no.

I would like to comment on the picture quality, but it is difficult because I have been able to take so few, due to my AA battery budget being under $50 a month! This Samsung eats alkaline batteries like a elephant eats peanuts; NO exaggeration. Let me repeat this important & *expensive* point:

----- THIS THING EATS ALKALINE BATTERIES LIKE CANDY!! ----

My rechargeable batteries (2100mAh) worked quiet well, and long, in my Nikon CoolPix, but the Samsung won't even turn on with them! A new set of name-brand alkaline AA batteries are only good for perhaps 10 or 15 pictures before the low battery warning and prompt shut-down. This is unacceptable for a camera. Any small camera, in my opinion.

To use this camera at all, I have had to switch to (VERY) expensive lithium batteries. These last as long as batteries should in a small digital camera, maybe 100 shots or more, but at $10+ for a set, the cost of $-per-shot is still unacceptable. But the camera is useless without them, so it has been either buy expensive lithium batteries or just not use the camera at all. I will be much more careful when I select my next camera (and it probably won't be a battery-eating Samsung).

As another reviewer had mentined, the battery power indicator is basically useless, as it shows a good, full charge, then suddenly the camera warns you that you are running on low battery power and promptly shuts itself down. However, don't throw those batteries away, as you will find that if you put them into any other device that uses AA batteries, they are still quite good with lots of power left, maybe most or almost ALL of the power of a new AA battery! This makes this Samsung useless & unacceptable, even *if* it has good picture quality.

I tried to return the camera to Circuit City (RIP) because of the battery issue (well before they went under), but I was told this was normal and they wouldn't take the return.

Rating :

Can't afford to operate the camera

I purchased the Samsung camera about 3 months ago thinking it would be a great camera to take along on my vacation to Alaska in August. Sure am glad I bought it early! I couldn't afford to buy batteries for this camera. On several occasions, I only got 6 pictures out of one set of batteries.
I have an older digital, took the batteries out of the Samsung (It indicated they were dead) and used them in the other camera for 20 more pictures.
I recently bought another camera to use on my trip, anyone want to buy a Samsung S730? Cheap!!!

Rating :

Great pictures but terrible battery life

I bought this camera to use while hiking and otherwise away from a constant supply of batteries. If you buy this camera, you better bring huge supply of batteries with you. For instants, once in a while I would get maybe 20 or so photos before it shut down, sometimes only 3 or 4 and a couple times it would not start up with store fresh Duracells. It always seemed to shut down when I needed it the most.

On the positive side the pictures look great, the camera has easy to use controls and the supplied Windows software works well. All in all I suggest you look elsewhere for a digital camera.

Rating :

More reviews...

1. 8-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 16 x 22-inch prints
2. 5x optical zoom with Advanced Shake Reduction (ASR); 2.5-inch LCD display
3. Face Detection detects up to nine faces and automatically adjusts for optimal focus and exposure
4. 14 scene modes and special effects "E" button; high-resolution movie mode at up to 30 fps
5. Stores images on SD memory cards (20MB internal memory included); powered by 2 AA batteries

Editorial Review :

The Samsung S85 is a high-resolution digital camera that is equipped with a true-color filtered 8.2 mega-pixel CCD that allows the Samsung S85 to produce even better images and take detailed photos for printing up to poster size. In addition, the Samsung S85 has a 5x optical and 5x digital zoom giving 25x total zoom when combined, as well a bright and color-sensitive 2.5" LCD screen. With the Face Recognition AF & AE function, the Samsung S85 detects faces and automatically focuses on them and also adjusts brightness. Fast ASR technology prevents the degradation of image clarity and color through camera shake, and the S85 also supports ISO 1600 high sensitivity to give you super clear pictures even when taking moving subjects under less-than-perfect lighting conditions. Supports ISO 1600 high sensitivity AVI recording capability 14 scene modes for optimal settings no matter the shot 20MB internal memory - accepts SD/SDHC/MMC memory cards USB 2.0 support - can share data with both Windows and Mac

Customer Review :

Samsung Digimax S85 8MP digital camera with 5X optical zoom

great camera & easy to use. takes nice, clear pictures. It does run tru batteries, even the rechargeable ones so have back ups...great camera at a good price

Rating :

What a bettery PIG

First let me say that I love Samsung products. However, this camera is a battery PIG. I can only take up to 15 pictures before the camera starts beeping at me that the batteries are low. The video recording feature is very useful until you get 30 seconds into your video and the batteries are dead. I have tried 6 different kinds of batteries and the best have been the Duracell for electronic devices, which got me 23 pictures before being dead!! Great camera poorly executed. Come on Samsung, get it together.

Rating :

Decent photos in daylight, but...

This camera takes excellent, high-resolution pictures outside. I found that it even worked quite well for action shots when there is plenty of sunlight. However, taking pictures indoors was another story. If there is any motion, indoor pictures come out blurry and grainy. I had tried taking pictures of hockey, in a very well-lit ice rink, and the pictures always come out brown and grainy. I have adjusted the settings as well as I could, but the amount you can change the aperture and speed of the exposure is very limited, even in the "Manual" mode. I even used a tripod, and the improvement was only marginal.
Now, after 1 year of working normally (and the warranty expiring), it has developed a severe problem. It shuts down unexpectedly, regardless of the charge in the batteries. It does with with new, alkaline batteries as well as fully charged NiMH batteries. It takes pictures for a minute or two, then just shuts down. It does not even retract the lens. It just goes black. Obviously, there is some kind of short or poor connection in it, but it does not appear to be related to the battery door (a common problem area on many digital cameras).
Thankfully, the credit card I used to purchase this extends the warranty, so I should be able to get my money back.


Rating :

Wonderful 5X camera (vid included)

i bought this camera 5 months ago and it's all i need plus more ,astonishing photos. the camera has so many features to list (need some time to learn it all), even the video is good (not great) . i think it's one of the best camera under $100 . i bought another for my brother. check out the video i took with this camera in a concert.
[...]

Rating :

So, so disappointed.

I was thrilled to find a reasonably priced camera from a company I used to trust - what a disappointment. After only a couple months of light duty taking pictures of my kids and dogs, it now randomly shuts down regardless of how fresh the batteries are or what I do to try to solve the problems. When it shuts down, sometimes the lens stays open. Right now, I have this camera on my desk, stuck open, dead as a doornail. We tried cleaning the battery contacts but no dice. Google "s85 shuts down" and see that other people have had this problem.

Rating :

More reviews...

1. 8.2-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 16 x 22-inch prints
2. 5x optical zoom; 3.0-inch LCD display
3. Face Recognition autofocus and autoexposure, MP3 player, SRS WOW HD sound effects, and PMP
4. Built-in World Tour Guide function covering 2,600 regions in 30 countries
5. Powered by lithium-ion battery (battery and charger included); stores images on SD memory card

Editorial Review :

Imagine a camera born to be the multi-player. The Samsung i85 is equipped with 8.2 mega pixel 1/2.5" CCD, 5x optical zoom, MP3 player, SRS wow HD sound effects, and PMP. These functions allow the Samsung i85 to operate as more than just a digital camera but as a movie player, text viewer, voice recorder, portable hard drive and camcorder. Envy or be envied - it's up to you.

Customer Review :

battery life unacceptable

We bought this camera for my daughter for Christmas after doing much research. I have been terribly disappointed in the battery life. She has to charge it before every use. I have a Fuji Finepix that I can keep in my purse for months and use it periodically and it holds a charge for months at a time. I called Samsung and asked why the camera would not hold a charge for more than a day at a time and they told me that is normal for this camera and there is no fix for it. Very disappointing. If you buy this camera, plan to charge it daily. What a pain!!

Rating :

No more Samsung anything!

My husband bought the camera from Sear's on 12/1/08 as a Christmas gift to me. I was pleased with it until 12/4/09 when it would not come on. (It has a 1 year warranty) I took it to Sear's on 12/5/09 and the guys in electronics tried to figure out the problem but couldn't. Just got off the phone with Samsung Customer Service and was informed my warranty expired in April 09 even though I had a receipt for 12/1/08. Also it was going to cost a minimum of $50.00 to fix the camera. We will never purchase another Samsung product again.

Rating :

DO NOT BUY THIS CAMERA YOU WILL REGRET IT FOR YEARS!!!!!!!

This is the WORST PRODUCT with the WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE!!!!!! I only gave it one star because I had to, but it does not deserve ANY!!!!! I bought this camera last November and have yet to have a camera that works. I have sent it in FOUR times to be fixed and the last time I sent it in (a month ago) I have STILL HAVE NOT RECEIVED IT BACK!!!!! When I asked for a refund, I was refused and they said that they could only send me a black camera (which after a month of waiting they have not sent me). Each time I sent it in to be fixed it was because it stopped taking pictures after recharging the battery. I cannot believe that Samsung has not refunded my money after they convinced me to buy their piece of GARBAGE!!!!!!! How is it that a company can sell a product that doesn't work and not refund your money after a year of CRAPY SERVICE and HEADACHE? I will NEVER buy a Samsung product again!!!!!

Rating :

GREAT BUY! UPDATE!! GO TO SEARS.COM TO GET FOR $129 DEAL!!!

I got this camera (red) as a black friday/cyber monday deal [...] and I am completely impressed about the quality of pictures. I have a [...] kodak and I have been looking for a good point and shoot to replace/supplement it. The screen is big, the lcd screen shows a crisp view of the pic with very clear and deep colors. The extra features are really nice too. I'm still exploring them, but, I heard a song on the mp3 mode, the world map/tour thing is really interesting; gives you attraction sites in multiple places around the world, and the video/movie mode looks really really good too. My requirements for a new camera were, at least a 3" lcd, compact size, and good pics. I also tested a Nikon (s52)which was more expensive, had less features and more importantly the pictures were so grainy compared to this one; it was a huge difference. So huge that I realized what a good deal I had gotten and quickly got back online and ordered another one of these for a gift. I'll update after more experience but, just wanted to let people know this is a very good option.

Rating :

Samsung has hit it Big with this one!

I've been a Samsung Camera lover for a long time. I began with the Digimax S500, then upgraded to Samsung NV3, and now I recently purchased the Samsung i85. I've tried other cameras like the Sony Cybershot DSC S730, but returned it instantly at poor picture quality and lack of image stabilization (Don't be fooled by the SONY brand name, this camera is not good!). Then I bought an Olympus FE-230, and although the picture quality was great and the camera was slim and lightweight, it was too slow at taking pictures for my taste.

After my failed attempts, I bought the Samsung NV3, which is a perfect camera. It takes great pictures, amazing videos with great sound, and you can even hear MP3s on it. After having a successful buy with the Samsun NV3, I decided to upgrade and immediately fell in love with the Samsung i85. This camera has it all. It takes beautiful pictures both inside and outside. It has many features in which you can tweek your camera into taking great pictures despite the horrid conditions outside.

The face recognition function, image stabilization, and ASR function make this camera perfect for portraits and up close and personal pictures. The pictures are so crisp and clear that it makes the worst looking image look beautiful. Videos turn out nice, with great sound quality; however, it is better to take videos in well lit areas. The World Tour guide function seems to be really cool and educational, but I haven't really messed around with that yet.

Moving on, Samsung's i85 is a great camera for those who want great pictures, and don't want to spend too much on a digital camera. Samsung cameras are also very durable and with the internal zoom, you won't have to worry about messing up the lense. Battery life is very good, but I feel that the NV3 has a longer battery life span. The LCD display screen is huge and great for previewing pictures. I do recommend for those who are purchasing this camera to buy it either in silver or black, as they look nicer with time.

Overall, this is a great camera and you'll definitely be content with your purchase!

Rating :

More reviews...