Review - Flip Mino Camcorder

I just bought a Flip Mino for me and my wife. Since we're having twins soon, we wanted a camcorder to replace the miniDV one I've had for about ten years (which, by the way, still does a good job). We weighed our options, looked at rather expensive Sony HD cameras and tried to decide what might be the best. Then, on Black Friday, I saw a Flip on sale at a local store. I immediately thought this might be the best solution.

I've always been a big fan of still photography, and avoided shooting video because it has always been a royal pain--especially if I wanted to post to the Web. I'd have to use some kind of editing software, go through hours of crap, cut the file down in size/quality, etc. It just wasn't worth the effort for me. Photos have always been much easier to manage, upload, and share (hence my obsession with Flickr).

The Flip camera is a great option for people like me. Think of it as a portable, recordable web cam. The video you shoot with it isn't the best quality (640x480 I think), but it's not meant to be. It's meant to be easy to use, quick, easy to upload and portable, which it is. Turn it on and it's almost immediately ready to shoot. Press the red button and there you go! So simple anyone can use it. It's so small and light it can literally be held at any angle and easily turned around. The mic is good in my opinion. It picked up my wife from two rooms away at the house and she is very clear and succinct in the video.

I only have a few cons for the Flip. First--the zoom. It sucks. It has a 2X zoom and it's extremely slow. You might as well not bother using it. Second, there are no real settings of any kind in the camera itself--no control over recording settings, no video controls, nothing. You can set the date and time and that's about it. I know it's supposed to be that way for simplicity, but what about when you actually DO want to have some control over what you're filming? Maybe a real camcorder is necessary at that point...

In all, the Flip is well worth the price and I highly recommend it. If anyone has the Flip MinoHD please leave your thoughts in a comment. I'd like to know how it performs and if it is worth the investment as well.