Camcorder Review: Insignia NS-DV720P

So I bought the Insignia NS-DV720P, and the short story is I'm happy with it. All I wanted was something which I could easily use and do the basics, and I got even more than that for a really good bargain.

Insignia is basically a no-name brand by BestBuy. You can buy this camera at BestBuy for $129 CAD, but I bought it at Future Shop (owned by BestBuy) for $99 CAD.

Here are some specs and features:

• It can record in HD (720p), SD wide, SD, and QVGA.
• Saves in both AVI and MOV
  
• Takes 5 megapixel pictures
• 3" screen
• Has sockets for composite, HDMI, USB and and SD card.
• Uses a Lithium battery
• Has about 100MB of internal memory.
  
• Came with USB cable, HDMI cable, composite cable, and battery (but no external memory), strap and felt bag/case. I bought a separate bag and 16GB of memory.
  
• Has a light
• user interface defaults to simple mode, which can be turned off to show more advanced features. Very intuitive

Overall it's a lightweight, and easy to use camera with very high quality. Here are the only downers I've experienced:

• When trying to delete videos, If you start playing the video, then the delete button turns into the button to turn the sound down. If you play the video and decide you want to delete it, you have to stop the video, exit the view videos mode, go back into the view videos mode, and then delete it. Well I haven't pored over the whole manual but I've tried everything =P
• When saving in AVI, windows and mac can't open it. I tried Ubuntu and it works just fine. Apparently it uses a code called ITU H.264. Quick research made that codec seem pretty standard but hrm... An easy out for now for me is to record in MOV if I intend to watch it on windows or mac. Of course if I upload it straight to YouTube or Facebook, AVI works just fine.
• I tried using the camera with iMovie 08, but it didn't get recognized as a camera. I guess the operating system only recognizes it as external memory, and not as a camera. Well it's cheap, so I'm not really complaining I guess, just observing.
  

Anyways I've never done a product review before, but I had a lot of thoughts so I thought I'd jot them down. If you're thinking of getting a basic camcorder, I'd highly recommend this one. Remember, get it from Future Shop, it's cheaper =)