Excellent quality, Very Good night tolerance, 5x Zoom

I bought this camera for megarides, a trip we cyclists do in Brazil, in order to ride during all day long (and nights). The ZX1 camera trembles a lot (no stabilizer) and its 2x zoom (1x?) was so limited (adding the fact that its default zoom (0x) appears to be 2x already). So we bought ZX3. We can say its was a 200% upgrade!

Advantages:

- Its smaller size
- Klic 7004 battery - although harder to find, its only 0.4oz (11g), comparing to 2-AA batteries (50g), which support up to 1h30m of HD video.
- the camera IS a recharger itself: you can recharge using USB or your OUTLET.
- Digital image stabilizer: Sincerelly, the camera still trembles when we film around walking, jumping, cycling... but less than ZX1. The Sony Wxxx cameras with BIONZ and OPTICAL stabilizers are still the best! For grade 0 to 10, we give 8 to Sony W120/W350, 5 to ZX3, and 2 to ZX1.
- MUCH better zoom! It appears to be 5x or even more (KODAK doest show the magnification in the screen). The digital zoom acts like an optical one, regarding to quality, when you film at VGA or HD-60 because it takes the 1980x1024 CCD and 'uses its pixels' to draw back in 1280x720. So the effect is amazing, it appears like an optical zoom! We can say (for VGA) 4x, 5x will be interpolated. For HD-60, 3x, 4x and 5x. In a FULL HD setting, whichever zoom used will be interpolated.
- Its has three movie color config: normal color, vivid (high saturared) color, and black & white.
- Filming at night! The camera is amazing at night! We can even film candles and some fluorescent lights and see the surroundings! Of course, it tears up a bit (noise). The camera also adjust its inner light for distant parks and poles (using zoom). Very amazing! And the most important: the FPS does not shrink! It still remains 60fps for HD video! In ZX1, the FPS drops to 10fps or even less, in dark areas.
- HDMI output (so nice to see on TV)
- can film underwater (according to manufacturer, 3 meters)
- tripod support (nice to put in a bicycle handle bar!)
- Good price (mine was $139). Few bucks more than ZX1.

Drawbacks:

- Its small size is harder to get a grip. The camera can fall easier! Use a strap always!
- Using class 1 to 4 SD cards let the preview slow to be viewed on a LCD TV or similar via HDMI (HD or FULL HD output). Testing a Class-4 4gb SD in the camera and HDMI cable let the FPS follow this pattern: 60-60-20-20-60-60-60-20-20-60-​60-60-60-20-20...
- The batteries are hard to find, although you can recharge up to 90% in less than 2 hours in the outlet. However, bring a spare if you ride for the entire day
- No flash (why have one? Its for sport activity!)
- No way to set white balance, focus (like macro), shutter speed and settings like that.

An Excellent Play

I've owned a number of digital camera and video recorders. Most had many more features than the Playsport but I never have been able to record as easily as I can with this recorder. For the Amazon price, this is an excellent bargain. Videos are in very good resolution, still shots are quite adequate and the recorder can be carried in your pocket. As long as you do not expect all the bells and whistles that are on some camcorders, you should be quite pleased with this item. The underwater feature works and I will be really testing it later when I go snorkeling.

The one feature I wish this had was an optical zoom. I realize this may not be possible with such a small lens in a relatively small case. The digital zoom works well but the resolution of the resulting videos is not great. In all fairness, this is OK for display on YouTube or on a small screen.

I'd rate it 4.5 with the only significant negative being the lack of an optical zoom.

Another Kodak winner. Thoroughly recommeded as a point and shoot camera.

This camera is a great little addition to my kit. As a quick point and shoot it works well, but is grainy in low light - not a big surprise. The underwater images are also very good I used it as a test camera for some underwater sequences and it was very useful.

The angle of the lens is quite narrow for an action camera and the shape of the body makes it shakes if used in a car mount which is not supported at the top. The 4X zoom is a definite improvement on previous models.

I've used this camera for 'quickie' interviews and found it to be OK, but wider shots reduce the quality of the audio so I record dialogue with a small field recorder.

All in all, a fantastic pocket camera for the price. If you have realistic expectations of a single chip point and shoot camera you will be very happy.

Buy the Zx3 for great fun in water and on land. Don't pick the Zx5.

This is my third Playsport Zx3 purchase.
The Zx3 is superior to the Zx5 because of the removable battery. Extra batteries and a battery charger and a remote are all available for this camera. The supplied charger works with the battery while in the camera.

The other model, the Zx5, has a macro setting as it's only advantage, which most people would seldom use anyway. The Zx3 does close up pretty well as it is. But the Zx5 has no removable battery, which was a bad move by Kodak since having an extra battery or two is great when you're out filming on a trip or event. Get the Zx3.

Battery is good for an hour or two of total record time depending on how much you use the view screen whle not recording, and the power rating on the battery("mAh&quot​; number relates to how long it lasts). Some aftermarket batteries last a little shorter, some longer - read the mAh number rating when choosing what's better for you. The battery model is a KLIC-7004, but comes in different mAh.

The sound sometimes takes awhile to clear up when coming out of water, and the camera is designed as for light use and shallow submersion underwater. It's great around the pool or in bad weather like that snow sled excusion but if your actually diving you may want to choose something more heavy duty.

There is several settings. Video and Camera. The 5MP Still pictures are mediocre. There is no light or flash - so it does decent pictures for a video camera, but bring the regular camera along if you want nice pictures.

There is something to be said about the video options - other cameras may have the 1080 HD @ 30FPS (frames per second) like this one, but only 30FPS @ 720 as well. The Zx3 has a 60FPS @ 720HD setting, and sometimes the 720 HD @ 60 FPS actually makes better movies. There is no simple formula (like using the 60 FPS for action) - some of my action videos actually came out better at 1080 @ 30FPS - typically, the lower resolution seems more vivid and smooth, but it is a lower resolution, and you may find yourself using the 1080 setting most of the time.

I also recommend purchasing the Square Trade warranty if available.

Great product for the price!

I needed a water proof/resistant camera for taking videos and pictures on my boat, I didn't want to take my Cannon DSLR out in the salt or spend a lot on a camera, and this camera fit exactly what I was looking for, simple and easy to use with good video quality.

The Zx3 had better reviews than the newer Zx5, so I went with the Zx3, and so far it has proven to be a good decision.

The battery life is a little around 2 hours, and was to be expected, but this is not that big of an issue, extra batteries for this camera are cheap so I purchased 3 extra batteries to keep on stand by, and a floating wrist strap in case it mistakenly found its way overboard.

If anyone is looking for a low price camera that is easy to use with features and video quality of higher end cameras you can't go wrong with the Zx3