Product review

Creative Vado HD simply good

Several manufacturers have brought out pocket-size video cameras aimed at the YouTube crowd, but Creative's Vado HD is the best I've seen.

It offers genuine high-definition resolution to give your video clips a touch of class. And it's an appealing object to handle and use, a little bigger than a mobile phone and finished in matt black. To protect the finish, Creative thoughtfully includes a silicone rubber case in the box.

The controls can all be operated easily with the case on. There's a power switch, record/stop and playback/pause buttons, trash, rewind and fast forward buttons that also let you flick back and forth between clips, plus volume controls that additionally operate the zoom. It's all very simple to use and the bright two-inch LCD screen produces a sharp, clear picture. If you want to video yourself there's a tripod mount.

The Vado comes with 8GB of built-in memory – enough to record two hours of best quality HD footage or a truly epic eight hours at the VGA setting. This is remarkably generous as some rivals provide hardly any memory at all and make you fork out extra for an SD or SDHC card. On the other hand you can't add extra storage to the Vado.

The camera can be hooked up to your TV using either the supplied HDMI cable or an optional AV line, while there's a retractable USB connector so you can link it to your computer. The battery recharges via USB and a single charge lasts up to two hours, though if that's not enough you can buy a spare battery.

Most important of all, the results are impressive. Bearing in mind it's a small, light device with a tiny lens, the picture looks remarkably good – even when blown up on a 40-inch high-definition TV. The audio is not particularly good when you preview your clips on the Vado, but is OK when you run them through a TV set or on a computer.

The Vado comes with built-in (PC-only) software to help you upload your video gems to YouTube, Photobucket and Box.net. The software lets you do other useful things, too, such as taking still pictures from a video or adding music to your clips. If you have a Mac you can, of course, upload videos in the normal way.

It even works well in tricky light conditions. I shot the Dubai Fountain going through its paces at night and posted the clip on YouTube – check it out by searching for 'Dubai Fountain EB24/7'.

All in all the Vado has a lot going for it – it's easy to carry around, simple to use and produces good quality video.

Price: Dh849

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