Logitech Pocket Video 550 review

9 December 2003 12:33 GMT / By Stuart Miles

While the Logitech Pocket Video 750 brings you an LCD display and 32Mb SD card in the box, the company has decided to create the entry level unit - the 550 without any of the above. This is an interesting decision because without an SD Card this unit can only hold 2 minutes of video footage at a time. For the extra £30 - £40 you are then going to have to spend on getting a 128Mb card you might as well simply upgrade to the bigger model and get the use of an LCD display for the equivalent of about a £10 spend abiet a smaller memory card.

Logitech’s Pocket Video 550 as you would expect claims to have the same selling point of the 750 - a handy digital video camera that you can put in your pocket and whip out when you need to capture that magical moment. It’s a nice idea but even more so than the Pocket Video 750 the 550 in practice one that isn’t quite right.

As with the 750 the main problem is the picture quality. To create a device that is aimed at the sub £150 market, Logitech has taken its experience in web cams and put it in a portable recording device.

This is all very well and good, but with a VGA picture resolution of only 320 x240, as soon as you opt to play back your footage on your television you won’t be smiling. Blocky, grainy and not receptive to light very well means this camcorder makes for a poor experience. Couple that with the camera’s ability to only capture 20 out of the ideal 24 frames a second and the image is slightly jumpy as well.

Memory is also a problem for the player. As mentioned the 550 only ships with 16Mb of internal memory and is enough to give you only 2 minutes of the MPEG4 video standard. Expansion - and you will need to, to make this worthwhile is done via a SD Card slot however none is enclosed.

Unlike the 750 the 550 comes with a docking station, and all the cables - such as the ones that allow you to connect it to the TV- are pre-wired into the unit. This helps absolutely no-one and means that you’ve got to drag it round with you. Worse still the USB cable is also pre-wired into the unit so even when it’s on your desk connected to your PC you’ve got to deal with a bunch of phono cables that do nothing.

Verdict

Think webcam without any way of viewing unless you connect a television or PC, that can be taken out on the streets and you wouldn't be far wrong. Therein lies the problem. The idea is here, but not the technology or the design merit.

By the time you have bought the Pocket Video 550 and a decent sized SD card you could have the Pocket Video 750 with an LCD display. However by the time you done that you might as well have gone for the real thing in the first place and saved yourself a lot of disappointment. We just don't see the point.

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Review Recap

Made by: Logitech
Price as reviewed: £150
The good: None
The bad: Poor quality, no viewing screen, expensive
Quick verdict: Save yourself a lot of disappointment and avoid it like the plague
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