Sony HDR-CX150

[Matt Hunt]

I just picked up a Sony HDR-CX150 from ebay for a pretty good discount. It was a refurbished model, but still about half off the retail price. I had read through the threads to see what others were using, and found a lot of Panasonic and Canon, but none of these were offered at such a discount on ebay or anywhere else.

I was wondering if anyone has any experience with this camcorder? It seems to have a lot of good features for the price (the price I paid anyway), and looks like it does fairly well in low-light conditions.

 

[David Wolfson]

I just got a CX160 which is pretty much the same and have been getting familiar with it. I particularly like the simplicity of the touch screen menu system. Since I'm not now, never have been, and never will be a videographer the (mis-)setting of features at critical times has always been a challenge for me.

Ran it around town on an in-car mount including a trip going from dusk to night, using the "low lux" mode. Seems to work quite well with deep color until it gets really dark, i.e. night, which isn't something I care about. Nice feature surprises are its macro capabilities and that you can see its component video out while it's recording. Haven't explored this yet, but seems like this should open up all sorts of possibilities for dual recording, streaming, etc. The HD is -- well -- big and beautiful HD to my non-pro eyes. The wide-tele range is very good, too.

The criticism in some reviews I can confirm is some tendency to lens flare. The auto lens cap and front end is a bit fragile, so a protective filter is a good idea. I just have a uv filter, but a fancy polarizer might be worthwhile if you're aiming for Discovery Channel clips in bright sun. Quite happy with it so far!