Genius G-Shot DV1210 review

Performance
Lacking an optical zoom and only shooting low-resolution video, this camera wouldn't seem to do much that a camera phone couldn't do. But the resulting video is of decent quality, given the basic resolution. Colour isn't especially vibrant, and fine detail tends to smear, but when shrunk to Internet video player size, as much of this footage probably will be, the results are acceptable.

It may be fine for outdoor movies, when biking, sailing, skiing, skateboarding, or falling on to concrete, but image quality is poor in low light. Although the camera has a flash, there's no light assistance for video. This leads to darker videos often being reduced to noisy mush.

The digital zoom rocker is deceptive, as it's easy to zoom in happily and only later discover that the results are atrocious. All detail is smudged horribly. We would almost have preferred to have no zoom option at all, and for the DV1210 to make a virtue of its crude simplicity rather than sabotaging us with a subpar zoom.

Still images can be captured with a 5-megapixel sensor. Autofocus is responsive, although the shutter is rather slow. It's tricky to get pin-sharp images without any control over the shutter, especially as the shutter button's position on top of the camcorder and the way you grip it make it difficult to keep the body still. A tripod helps, but lugging a tripod around seems to go against the principles of such a light, disposable-feeling camcorder.

Battery life is pleasingly good, and the fact that the DV1210 takes AA batteries means that running out of juice doesn't have to be a big problem.

Conclusion
The DV1210 can't do much, but what it does, it does well. The various functions are so simple as to be rudimentary, and it sorely lacks an optical zoom and some kind of light for shooting in darker conditions. Our score reflects this poor feature set. But it's light and quick and produces respectable image quality within those resolution limitations.

If you have any ambitions to getting creative with your video, then the DV1210 is far too basic, but if simple point-and-shoot video primarily destined for the Internet is your intention, this camcorder is cheap enough to take into any environment without fear.

Edited by Jason Jenkins
Additional editing by Nick Hide