GE X5 Power Pro Series 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 15X Optical Zoom

GE X5 Power Pro Series 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 15X Optical Zoom

• Make sure this fits by entering your model number.
• 14MP Digital Camera with 15x optical zoom and 5.7x digital zoom
• 2.7 Inch vibrant LCD with auto brightness
• 18MB internal memory with SD/SDHC card support up to 16GB
• Face detection, in camera red eye removal, image stabilization, smile detection, blink detection, and face auto-exposure
• Uses 4 AA batteries so you'll never be stranded waiting for your camera battery to charge

Buy Now : GE X5 Power Pro Series 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 15X Optical Zoom

Brand : GE
Category : Electronics,Camera & Photo,Digital Cameras,Point & Shoot Digital Cameras
Rating : 3.7
Review Count : 262

GE X5 Power Pro Series 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 15X Optical Zoom

• After using the camera for six weeks I am ready to write a little review. This is very comfortable to hold and is loaded with features. The quality is very good. As others have noted, this appears to be a relabeled Fuji camera.I compared the GE (15x) to a Nikon Coolpix S6000 (7x). The skinny Coolpix fits in a pocket easier but is much harder to hold. The programmed features are comprehensive and very similar - panorama picture stitching, multipoint autofocus, face recognition, etc. The GE adds some additional manually selected programs, plus aperture priority, shutter priority and manual exposure. The GE offers more choices in metering the light exposure.The GE has a pop-up flash which makes turning the flash on/off quick. The elevated flash reduces red-eye. The flash can be set to give a pre-flash which further reduces red-eye. The night flash is good, balancing environmental light with fill-flash on the subject. The flash range is very good, at least 25 feet. The Nikon flash tends to get covered by a finger when holding the camera. Nikon\'s flash range is not as far as GE\'s.The GE has a very sharp lens with very good multi-coating on the lens elements to reduce lens flare. In the 14mp setting you can actually see all those pixels. GE and Nikon are equals here. But as expected for a 15x zoom, there is a slight barrel distortion at the shortest wide-angle focal length (FL). The distortion is nearly invisible when extended to the same FL as the Nikon\'s widest angle. The distortion remains invisible until extended to the longest FL where a very slight pincushion effect occurs. This is quite acceptable for all general photography.Some sensor flare (a purple colored ray) occurs when the camera is pointed directly at a bright light. However, it is less than the flare in the Nikon. Both are acceptable in this regard.Both cameras have image stabilization to reduce blurring if the camera shakes. The GE is good, but the Nikon is slightly better.Movie mode is very sharp, but limited to a maximum 640x480 resolution. You will usually want to turn on continuous autofocus in movie mode. I experienced no dropped frames or image blocking. The Nikon has an HD option. The sound quality was only fair, but at least the mike was directional, which is reduces stray noises. The Nikon sound was slightly better but seemed less directional. Sound would improve with an externally mounted mike, but many movie cameras don\'t offer that either.The GE LCD display panel is sharp but could use more anti-reflective coatings. The Nikon has superior coatings on its display panel. Both have the same number of pixels. The GE has a good automatic LCD brightness adjustment which is lacking on the Nikon.GE has a very fine viewfinder with complete display functions and same resolution as the 3\" panel. The Nikon has no viewfinder. The viewfinder saves some power and has no problems from ambient light. Most importantly, you can hold the camera against your face for a steady image and still see what you are filming. The viewfinder is very important to me. I wear glasses and use the viewfinder without any problem.The time required to take a picture is slightly longer with the GE than the Nikon. At first, I thought the GE was slow, but once I learned its features, the time shortened noticeably.GE and Nikon both use two position shutter buttons. The first position initiates the autofocus and exposure. Pushing down all the way trips the shutter. Shutter speeds are similar, about 4 seconds - 1/2000. The GE offers very long exposures in the manual modes and also offers a selection of time-lapse exposures.Battery life is fair. Alkaline batteries lasted about 250 pictures, mostly using the focus assist light, continuous autofocus, flash, and the display panel. Turning off one or more of those features could extend the battery life. Rechargeable batteries might not work as well as expected. To be fair, my rechargeable NiMH batteries are four years old and probably over-the-hill. I noticed that the camera is conservative about turning on. If any battery is under 1.30 volts, the camera doesn\'t want to start. However, if you slide the ON switch a couple times, the camera may start and continue to work for quite some time.My model shipped with firmware version 2.03. Their website offers 1.05 so I have not tried different firmware. The box contained an abbreviated 29 page manual. The CD-Rom had an 89 page manual in B&W. The GE website has the longer manual in color. You really need the long manual if you want to learn all about the camera. The CD includes a basic photo program, but I prefer the open-source IRFANview. The camera comes with mini-USB and RCA video cables.In summary, this is a fine camera for anyone who wants the features it offers and a best-buy in its category.
• Purchased this camera looking ahead to a photography course I wanted to take 3 months later. I didn\'t get into that class, but after becoming aptly familiar with the camera and its various settings. This is my first \"pro\" camera, and it\'s been quite a ride.The lens is excellent (4.9mm is roughly 28mm at a 35mm equivalence and 15x that is like 400mm or something). Macro mode works like a dream. The good pictures taken with this yielded crisp and clear pictures. You can zoom in with some of the larger pictures, and it will be far from perfect, but you can\'t expect that level of detail with only a 1/2.3\" CCD sensor.Now let me talk about the \"bad\" pictures.Low-light performance is horrible. This camera is plagued by both horrible noise performance at ISO\'s above 800 and blurry pictures from the \"good, but not good enough\" electronic image stabilizer reduced a handful of my images to being worthy of only a VGA resize on the web (to be fair, I keep my image stabilization at regular not \"+\" most of the time). Turning off the Auto-focus beam increases the chances of the picture being out of focus. Sometimes I turn it off as a courtesy to my subjects, or animals I happen to be taking pictures of.Even in the best of conditions, though, I expect this camera to pump out good prints at up to A4 sizes. It\'s not the smartest sensor, either, since it had managed to underexpose one of my perfectly well lit pictures (out of ~80 pictures taken whilst on Program AE with EV=0.0). Luckily it has a OSD histogram picture (a feature I didn\'t know how to use at the time)Though I have an inkling that the \"screw a tennis ball to the camera mount\", or the \"set to 2-second self-timer and focus on holding steady\" tricks will work wonders, I would invest some money on a cheap mono-pod just to have it handy in the case of lowlight pictures if you\'re like me and refuse to use un-diffused/un-softened flash.This camera is definitely capable of taking good pictures (it\'s excellent with enough lighting), though it\'s not as \"smart\" as your run-of-the-mill Point & Shoot, it gives you those pro features to compensate for that. So if you\'re willing to take the time to really get to know this camera, this is a very capable low-budget camera, and a very good one if you can work past the limitations. On the other hand, you can bomb some potentially good (well composed) pictures if you didn\'t check your exposure, focus, and blur (though these can be post-processed or resized to be less noticeable).Oh. and yes. there is a whirring-ish noise when you record videos. so if you want videos check out that next model: the GE X500, they might\'ve fixed all of the problems I\'ve had with this one, who knows?

Location:

Share :