Pure Digital Flip Mino review round-up

While it certainly didn't appeal to everybody, Pure Digital's Flip Video Ultra cheapcorder nonetheless found quite the audience, which has not surprisingly led to some raised expectations for the company's just-released follow-up, the Flip Mino. Judging from the first batch of reviews, however, it looks like Pure Digital has mostly managed to hit the mark ($30 premium notwithstanding), even if it still likely won't be getting folks to ditch their more full-featured cameras. Among the first out of the gate with a review was Laptop Magazine, which put the Ultra and Mino head-to-head and found that Mino won out in terms of design, specs, and power options, although the Ultra hung on to an edge in video quality, which it says remained "consistently brighter," particularly in low-light conditions. The Wall Street Journal's Mossberg Solution (not Moss himself) didn't have as much of a problem with the video quality (given the expectations), but it did find that while the Mino's touch-sensitive buttons look great, "they aren't as functional as they needed to be." Wired's Gadget Lab also had some quibbles about the hard to press buttons, but that wasn't enough to stop it from handing out an initial rating of 8 out of 10 (a more in-depth review is promised for later), with the cam's slimmer design and ability to get video up onto the web quickly winning it high marks. If that still hasn't made up your mind, you can find some sample videos taken with the camera and plenty more details by hitting up the links below.

Read - Laptop Magazine ("the Mino won three out of the four rounds," but not the biggest category: video quality)
Read - Mossberg Solution ("looks much cooler than older models")
Read - Gadget Lab (8 out of 10)

[Si @ Jun 5th 2008 3:15PM]

Probably first. Not gonna brag

[waddaya @ Jun 5th 2008 3:24PM]

So what. I'll be the first to Low Rank you.

[Ti @ Jun 5th 2008 5:28PM]

You just did brag, Si.

[Hooterman @ Jun 5th 2008 3:24PM]

I guess I'm one of the people that this doesn't appeal to.


I don't understand why people get all excited about these things?

[Castaa @ Jun 5th 2008 7:00PM]

I use a Flip camera. Basically it's ease of use in every phase of how these cameras are used

1. Very easy to record even in low light
2. Built in USB on the camera and it auto-mounts as a drive when connected (no drivers/software required)
3. The video files are Xvid encoded, so no transcoding as with a mini DV camcorder
4. Easy to upload to YouTube


Most people will give up high quality for easy. And these cameras are almost as good for the low quality world of video on YouTube or send as an email attachment to a friend.

[Nacho @ Jun 5th 2008 3:26PM]

Can anyone explain to me why something like this is worth almost $200? Is it just because it's small? no optical zoom, no expandable memory and a picture resolution comparable to that of a common cell phone camera circa 2003? Pass.

For an extra ~$100 you could pick up a Powershot TX1 (or probably something much better, it's been a while since I looked at stuff like this) which is only slightly larger, has 10x optical zoom, a memory card slot, and the ability to do 720p video.

For $50, I can see getting one of these. For the price they're asking now, I'll stick with my iphone camera.

[ScottJL @ Jun 8th 2008 10:52AM]

Amazon lists the TX1 at $434.60. That's slightly more than $100 difference.

[waddaya @ Jun 5th 2008 3:30PM]

The Flip Mino should have been the Flip Middle. That USB looks to be giving you the FU.

[Si @ Jun 5th 2008 3:38PM]

I like that waddaya, its clever.

[Castaa @ Jun 5th 2008 6:44PM]

I wonder if they fixed their beeping sound distortion issues that existed with the Ultra?

With Flip Ultra, record voices in a quiet room had an inexplicable and noticeable audio buzz/beeping sound. Very annoying if you were recording someone in a quiet environment.

[psilver @ Jun 5th 2008 10:17PM]

I'm one of the first people to buy the Mino as soon as it was announced.. Yet, I'm having second thoughts now and might return it as soon as it arrives here. I could have bought a sub-$200 point and shoot from reputable names like Nikon (I'm a Nikon D300 owner) or Canon and have more features and optical zoom for my money.

The reason I bought one is to have simple videos of myself I can record everyday so I can send it to my son overseas.

Anybody convince me otherwise not to return the Mino!

[Rab @ Jun 5th 2008 11:13PM]

Is the quality good?

URL(http://www.sfree24.com)

[babbitblob @ Jun 6th 2008 2:51AM]

I recently finished filming a video project with the help of a friend, who just happened to have an early mino thorugh family connections. Low light conditions did tend to vary, but once we hit night filming, with only some car headlights acting as our lighting, the mino outdid the ultra. The colors may have been slightly less than optimal, but the mino's focus was superior compared to the ultra, which tended to suddenly forget what was going on and become blurred.

And of course, these cameras are probably going to be like gold to the youtube crowd.

Probably my biggest gripe (having to edit the videos) is the extra codec you had to install, and that they didnt automatically attach timestamps to the video filenames. Instead you had to go thorugh their rather clunky software.

[Gunter @ Aug 4th 2008 11:13AM]

Looks very nice and i think the quality is very good.

URL( http://www.sms96.de )

[David Seitz Jr @ Aug 16th 2008 3:01PM]

Judging from the Flip Ultra, I'd say that I would rather not buy anymore Flips at all. Though it is very popular, being seen on Oprah with the Johnas Brothers, used by Kev Jumba, and many more pop stars, the popularity of the camera is the only thing that I was satisfied with having. If the Flip Mino is anything like the Flip Ultra (which I suspect it is) then it is just another cheaply produced and overpriced camera. Not even half a year into owning the Flip Ultra, the sound on the camera stopped working. Not because it's broken, because it occasionally makes the power on sound that it's supposed to, but for some unknown reason. Also, when recording, if your first video file has a very loud sound at any time in the video, lets say 0:36 (because of screaming, or loud thumb from bumping it), the second, third and so on will skip at the 0:36 seconds causing the video file to become corrupt. I doubt that anything has changed in the Flip Mino besides its new sleek design. $179 is way too much for a crappy video camera. Use the money to buy a nice $150 Sony digital camera which takes great quality pictures and the same video quality.

This comment is mostly out of anger because of my complications with the product, my apologies.

[Emil @ Sep 11th 2008 4:56AM]

Cool, but expensive.
----------------------------------------
www.sms4free.eu

[Emil @ Sep 11th 2008 4:58AM]

They look very nice.
-------------------------------
http://www.sms4free.eu
http://www.world-sms.de
http://www.europasms.de

[Flip Fashionista @ Nov 26th 2008 11:52AM]

Of course this is no Sony pro camera, but for creating videos to upload its great. Many of my friends are giving them out as gifts this holiday. We were so inspired, we create a whole lot of designs for them and put them online at http://www.cafepress.com/FLIPfashionista

[ruthyo @ Nov 30th 2008 11:55AM]

can u burn a dvd using a flip

[kawano @ Dec 9th 2008 2:37PM]

Just got mine from Amazon for $159 and love it. Then I saw that Wigix is selling it for $99 (although only one per hour), but I would have waited..oh well..

https://www.wigix.com/index.php/secure/flipsell/index/0/2

[Marie @ Mar 26th 2009 7:29PM]

It's just like a new relationship. Great for the first 6 months then is useless afterwards. It freezes on me all the time and even started to make buzz sounds when I pressed the delete(trash can)button. I never dropped it and doesn't have water damage. I would love to get a new one or my money back but it is out of warranty. Just 90 days for warranty...maybe they knew something consumers didn't!

[Lorne Leahan @ May 11th 2009 12:03PM]

I lashed out and bought both the Mino and MinoHD. After using both of them, I prefer the Flip Mino. The Mino HD had a problem with codex using under Camtasia whereas the Mino works without any problems. Both are great video cameras, but I haven't had time to fix the Codex problem.
The light metering indoors is particulary good on the Mino. I do all my marketing on my website using only the Flip. Easy, take video, and up load to the YouTube. If you are interested in the quality, check out my BodySuppsVideos on YouTube.
I live in Australia so I, by chance, had my flips (Mino and MinoHD) while a couple of kangeroos jumped by. I will be putting that up on http://www.videocamerareviewonline.com/ shortly.

Regards,
Lorne
Canberra, Australia

[rschmiege @ Oct 22nd 2009 12:47PM]

Their Tech Support sucks. Either they have a robot answering their emailed support questions, or a 3rd grader. They definitely can't read. I wanted to know what component of their software would not work if the computer was just below the minimum requirements for processor speed (2.49Ghz instead of the required 3.0Ghz for an Ultra Hd camera) they kept sending me back the minimum requirements (which I could read right off the packaging). I kept telling them it was working on a computer with that speed processor (at least all the features I had tried) but I wanted to know what would not work. I finally gave up after 4 or 5 tries of trying to get an answer from them.