Vivitar 5188

...camera in question is the Vivitar 5188 - a 5 mega pixel camera.
It was in Argos for sale for the fab price of £50 which I thought to be rather reasonable - even more reasonable when I realised that I had £25 in Nectar points on my Nectar card - bargain camera for £25! Only when I went in to buy it, the camera had been reduced to £40 - even better - I was now about to buy a 5 mega pixel for £15 - total bargain!!!

So to the camera ...
...much info as possible.

Packaging:
The box is rather nice with a lovely picture of a surfer on the front and shows the picture of the camera on the side in the two colours it comes in - black and pink - now I bought the black but that is only because there were no pink!! Either way both are exactly the same specification!
Inside the box was the next surprise - I hadn't realised the camera was capable of underwater pictures ... more

I recently went on a work trip to Orlando and decided I needed a new digital camera to enable me to take lots of photo rather than struggling with my old digital camera that was the worst camera I have ever owned and now just used for taking pictures for ebay items!

The camera I really wanted was out of my price range and so just needed something cheap and cheerful to do the job - I found a camera that was just that but it has ended up being more cheerful than I'd expected it to be!!

The camera in question is the Vivitar 5188 - a 5 mega pixel camera.
It was in Argos for sale for the fab price of £50 which I thought to be rather reasonable - even more reasonable when I realised that I had £25 in Nectar points on my Nectar card - bargain camera for £25! Only when I went in to buy it, the camera had been reduced to £40 - even better - I was now about to buy a 5 mega pixel for £15 - total bargain!!!

So to the camera - I'll start with the finer details and give as much info as possible.

Packaging:
The box is rather nice with a lovely picture of a surfer on the front and shows the picture of the camera on the side in the two colours it comes in - black and pink - now I bought the black but that is only because there were no pink!! Either way both are exactly the same specification!
Inside the box was the next surprise - I hadn't realised the camera was capable of underwater pictures - could this get any better?? Well yes a little bit as a case was also included. Now for me it's these little extras that make all the difference - after looking at some more expensive cameras that didn't even have a case provided which probably costs next to nothing to make anyway and then to even have an underwater case included the bargain price is looking to be even more of a good deal!
The camera is neatly laid out in the box along with the casing for underwater photos and the case and instruction booklet. The cable to connect to a usb port is also provided and a lead to connect to a a TV.

The camera itself:
The camera is really lightweight and has a silver panel across the front as in the picture. On the back there is a 2.0'' LCD screen with really easy to use buttons on the back next to the screen. There is a hole on the bottom to enable you to screw in a tripod if you have one and the slot for the SD card is next to this. The battery slot is then next to this of which it takes 2 AAA batteries you are looking at the back of the camera the USB port to connect to your computer is on the left hand side of the camera and the macro button is just above this also on the side. The on /off button is on the top of the camera on the left hand side and the shoot button is nest to this. To the top right corner is a strap bar. The camera doesn't really look expensive but it doesn't look that cheap either - the only thing I will say is that looking at bot the black one does look like it costs more as the pink can look a bit cheap.

Features:
The camera has quite a lot of features for such a good priced camera and these are:

Photos
Video
Audio recording
Built in flash
Built in microphone and video recording
Internal 16mb flash memory and SD card support
No driver required for MAC OS 9.0 or Windows 2000/ME/XP or later(you are provided with a disc in case you need it though)
TV output
5.0 Mega pixel sensor

The camera settings to your own personal standards such as setting to auto flash or increase picture quality based on size. You can also set the date and time and choose to show on the pictures you take or not.
On the display, you can choose what you can see on screen whilst you are taking pictures such as the photo counter, the battery display, the flash symbol, picture quality and the macro/normal mode. You can also view all your pictures by selecting on the menu so that you can delete any unwanted ones before uploading onto a PC. The case that it comes with is a small leather one with a Velcro fastener flap.

Pictures:
The picture quality is really clear and the camera even has a setting to show if you need to hold steady as if you are shaking it too much it will show you a little hand symbol to warn you that the picture may blur! Now I constantly keep my camera on fine quality and fine this gets the best picture. The best thing I found with this camera is that because of the counter i can see exactly how pictures I have left to take - however I needn't have worried about running out! The 2GB card I have in it allows me to take just over 3000 pictures - quite surprising since my old one couldn't take that many and yet was a lower pixel!!

The underwater case:
The casing for this camera is really cool - pretty bulky but worth it! It is just a clear case all around and the camera just sits inside and then the case clips shut. All the buttons that you can use on the camera can still be used whilst it is on so you could even view your pictures underwater if you wanted too!!!

Downsides:
As with most things there is always a downside - the only thing I have found with this camera that no matter what setting I try, even sensor flash where it will automatically determine if the flash is needed, it can sometimes take fuzzy looking pictures if it's inside or not in natural light. There are viewable but just don't seem 100% perfect. However in natural light the pictures are of ace quality and even using the zoom they are still really clear to look at - one thing to note though is when you actually zoom in to take the picture it will look really blurred and you do think 'how the hell will that turn out?' However as soon as you take it it clears right up and comes out brilliantly so don't be alarmed by that when zooming in! The only other downside is that whilst viewing the pictures, they only show in order of when they were taken so if you've taken quite a lot and wanted to look at them it can take a while to scroll through them all. This is not a big deal to me though as more often than not, I check if a picture has turned out as soon as I've taken it so if it hasn't it will be deleted straight away anyway.

Overall this is a great little camera at an excellent price - it is lightweight and small enough to carry around without getting in the way. It can take loads of pictures and has enough settings to keep the more gadget type person happy! This is also a good choice if you were buying for a bloke or girl as with the two colour options it can be for either. Not too ad at all if you just need a camera quickly without the expensive price tag. 

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