Product Description

Mustek brand has been globally well known for its excellent quality, professional support, and extensive service. Mustek has been recognized by many international magazines and professional organizations for its excellent innovation technology, production capability, and product quality.PRODUCT FEATURES:MPEG 4 technology;4.0 Mega picture resolution;Pocket-sized design;Built-in charger to recharge your battery;Fantastic audio function (MP3, voice recorder, video sound track);Remarkable video recording ability with sound dubbing;Sophisticate Control Panel with friendly user interface.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #39512 in Camera & Photo
• Brand: Mustek
• Model: DV-4000
• Dimensions: .21 pounds
• Display size: 1.5

Features

• Ultra-compact multi-function 2.1-megapixel digital camera/camcorder, card reader, MP3 player, voice recorder, and Webcam
• Fixed lens with 4x digital zoom
• 1.5-inch LCD and easy-to-use controls
• Record in JPEG or MPEG-4 formats to SD or MMC memory cards and edited using one of the included software titles
• Rechargeable Li-ion battery can be charged through USB or outlet

From the Manufacturer
Capabilities are endless with the all-new DV4000 7-in-1 multi-functional camera. The 7 funtions include, a digital camcorder, digital still camera, digital voice recorder, MP3 player, video camera, card reader, and PC cam. It's pocket-sized design allows you to take it on the go and a built in charger recharges your battery with a simple plug.

Video is presented with MPEG 4 technology, which can reduce file size and enhance recording time. Real time video recording frame rate is set at 30fps (352 x 288), and the 640 x 480 VGA video setting provides you with better resolution than VCD (352 x 288/PAL; 352 x 240/NTSC). A seamless 4x digital zoom allows you to capture those far away shots up close and personal. The digital camera function has a remarkable 4.0 Mega picture resolution (4.0 Megapixel hardware enhanced) so you can snap away excellent, crisp, high quality photos. The massive audio functions which range from MP3 player, to voice recorder and video soundtracks, present many options for listening, recording and sound dubbing.

A sophisticated control panel on the inside of the 1.5 inch LCD screen allows you to maneuver the many functions of the DV4000 with ease. Quickly switch from video to still camera, MP3 player to voice recorder by pressing a few buttons. The DV4000 comes with multiple programs including, VideoStudio, Acrobat Reader, Photo Express, Photo Explorer, Cool 360, Camera Driver, and Video Capture Driver. These programs will help you utilize your DV4000 to its fullest potential.

The Digital Tapeless Format
Tapeless camcorders make use of the compression power of the MPEG-4 file format (often called the MP3 of video) to allow you to record directly to memory cards, dispensing with the need for tapes altogether. They may require slightly more computer savvy than other formats, but, as with the DV4000, are more user-friendly than you might expect.

Customer Reviews

Badly Needs a Flash, but otherwise Great Value
If you're looking for a "do it all" digital camera, and you're on a budget, this is outstanding. On the other hand, if you need, or demand superb quality prints this is not for you.
The package includes a still zoomable camera (up to 4 megapixel) Digital Camcorder, Voice recorder, and MP3 player, and is a nice, well made all round package. As others have said, it badly needs a flash system, to help with both the photo, and video functions, but otherwise, it's neat, and a great converation piece, Smaller than a packet of cigarettes, it's a good improvement on the 3000 model that preceded it for a couple of reasons, and worth the extra $40 or so.
It has a rechargable battery, mini tripod, 32MB SD card, carry case, USB lead, S3 lead and mains adapter. I purchased a 256MB SD card for around $50 which gives about an hour of video on highest resolution, and more than enough photo's, even at the highest 4meg setting. On the down side, YOU NEED MORE LIGHT. if you're taking video or photo's indoors, the ambient light makes the resolution suffer, especially on zoom, or even different macro settings. My handy tip on playback for the video is to set your computer media player to 640x480 max resolution, or you'll see a blocky pixel finish. The MP3 repro isn't bad, and probably comparable with cheaper players, but not wonderful, and the voice recorder is more of a toy than anything else. All that said, overall, I thought it was well worth the money, and have been very happy with it, for it's portability and multi functions. Considering that most digital video cameras will cost you at least 2.5 to 5 times as much, this isn't a bad investment. I am a little worried that the integral touch pad and on/off switch may not stand up to too much abuse, but otherwise I recommend this wholeheartedly. Just remember before you buy that there is a lot of truth in the saying "you get what you pay for" so it's good, but not great.

Good Value for money
The first impressison was very favourable,- the camera was well packed and gave the impression and feel of good quality.

Having used this camera for appprox. 3 months I have had little occasion to use it for any other tasks than as a video camera.
I like to carry it with me at all times due to it's small size.
Overall, as an occasional user, I consider the Mustek DV4000 good value for money. Although some of the printed data may look very promising, please, do not expect the video resolution associated with some of the more expensive cameras. I found that the image quality does not just depend on the number of pixels, but on many other things (quality of the lens etc).

Posititive Qualities:
The Camera provides fairly good results on high resolution,- providing you are happy to put up with the high res. setting at 10fps as this tends to accelerates the speed of people walking or driving by.
The low light setting is helpful for indoor takes, even though the resolution is impaired.
The AEL Setting can be very userful for situations with exteme contrast, to select the area that should be correctly exposed.
The quality of the sound is remarkably true to reality.
I found the digital zoom to be very useful,- on the high res. setting,- however not beyond zoom ratio 1:2 (or there about)
The Sound Setting has shown itselve to be remarkable sensitive,-rather better than some of the analogue systems tried on other models.

Negative Qualities:
I did not consider the lower and medium resulution settings very useful,--the image quality was sadly lacking, (not what you might expect from a moder digital camera),- even though there may be benefits for imaging on computer screens. The 30fps for the low reolution settings are certainly a bonus when it comes to showing up movements.
When it comes to the performance of a still camera I am not convinced even though the results are acceptable;- my Olympus C300 Zoom gives better results.
The absence of optical zoom is a disadvantage,- a digital zoom can never make up fot this.

Recommendation: Select a flash card of adequate capacity, as the one supplies will not be adequate. Using a 128mb card, the high resolution video capacity of my camera provides approx 25 min.videotime.
For taking videos indoors during nightime, please ensure adequate lighting so that you don't have to go into to low light level mode.

Not bad for a tiny camcorder with this price
So far I'm pleased with the purchase, and I plan to keep it for a while. Pros and cons listed below:

Pros:
-Low price. Its only around $150 while the other top brand will cost you more $$$.
-Small size. It fits in your palm and easily in any pocket
-Looks good. The appearance of this little unit looks high tech.
-Mp3 player is nice. While don't expect top quality speakers, the sound output from the external speaker is acceptable, and you can also use head phones. 512MB sd card can hold quite a few songs.
-Video quality is decent. With resolution of 352 x 288, it runs at 30 frames per second. This is the highest for the current tapeless camcorders around this price range today.
-Battery life is good. One charge seems to last a whole day.
-Easy to view. Simply plug into tv and you can watch your videos or pictures

Cons:
-Poor still shots. Under the camera mode, the still shots at 2 or 4 mega pixels are not very sharp. When comparing shots taken from my canon s300, there's huge difference.
-No flash and needs light. Video and pictures will need external light or else it'll be dark.
-Digital zoom is not very useful. Because every time I try to zzom, the picture quality seems to suffer.
-Video at 640x480 is not very good, because its only 10 frames per second. So it's better to stick with the lower resolution at 30 frames per second.

I haven't mess around with the software that it came with, but I can just plug it into the pc and it shows up as an external drive, so I can just drag and drop the files. I'm a fan of pocket size gadgets, and I plan to keep the DV 4000 for a few months until maybe the Samsung ITCAM7 with 1.5 GB HD comes out. The gap between camcorder and digital camera is narrowing, and it's just matter of time a true all-in-one unit will appear on the market.

The bottom line is if you need to get high quality pictures or videos, you probably will need to fork out a bit more money to get something else. But if you are like me, just want the convenience of carrying a light weight camcorder in your pocket, this unit will do the job.