Reviews
Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
- 1920×1080 Full HD Recording w/3MP still image
- 16GB embedded Flash memory
- 1/4″ back-illuminated “Exmor R” CMOS sensor
- 1080/60p playback via HDMI and compatible HDTV
- 30mm CZ Vario Sonnar T* with 25x Optical zoom
Capture stunning 1920 x 1080 Full HD video and 3.0 Megapixel images with the ultra-compact HDR-CX150, which features an “Exmor R” CMOS sensor for superior low-light performance, 16GB of embedded flash memory, and a Carl Zeiss Vario Sonnar T* 25x optical zoom lens to help bring you closer to the action.
List Price: $ 549.00
SALE Price: $ 464.99
Rating: 
(out of 24 reviews)
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about 1 year ago
Review by Stephen T. Crye for Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
Rating:
I bought this camera on Monday, had fun with it for two days, and then returned it. Although I can’t afford it, I then closed my eyes and ordered the HDR-CX550V. I basically went from the bottom of the Sony consumer class to the top in one fell swoop.
Things I liked about the CX150:
* FABULOUS quality in adequate light. The video in 24 Mbps mode is stunning. Search YouTube for examples. Every hair on my cat, dust particles in sunlight, it all shows up with beautiful resolution. It’s amazing. Almost Blu-Ray quality. You won’t find any consumer-class camcorder with better quality.
* 25x zoom , when used with a tripod, lets you get really close
* “macro” works without any special settings. Just put the lens an inch away and it will focus. Resolves fingerprints.
* Amazingly tiny. With no hard drive or tape drive, the unit is frighteningly small. You can put it and all the cables + charger in a camera case designed for a DSLR + telephoto
* PMB software works, has good basic editing. Used it to grab frames from movies – almost don’t need the “still” function if 1990×1080 res is good enough.
* It will take a 32GB memory stick, even though the feature list says they only support 16.
* The touch screen is responsive
* “touch the object” spot focus, spot white balance is cool
* Give it the NP-FV70 battery and it will record for hours and hours
Things I either did not like or features missing (by “missing” I realize that you have to pay more). Don’t mistake the length of my ‘cons’ list as hating the little guy – it’s a good camera for what it is designed to be.
* A bit pricey. I think it is worth about $450.00, not the $549.00 list
* No wide-angle. I wish Sony had made the lens go from slightly wide-angle to about 15x, instead of from normal to 25x.
* No external mic input
* No hot shoe – not even the Sony proprietary one
* Zoom motor noise is very audible in quiet settings – don’t expect to use this camera to record acoustic orchestral music in concert halls
* The “smooth slow-mo 240 fps” is NOT HD 1080i60 quality. Might be OK at 720, but I found it disappointingly blurry. I’d love to see it have the same capability as the Casio EX-FX1 (not holding breath)
* Not enough buttons – too much reliance on the touch screen. I prefer buttons to scrolling through menus. Sony could fix this by providing more than 6 “my menu” choices.
* Auto focus works good most of the time, but when it gets confused it is horrible. Combine that with no quick focus wheel and it is a recipe for loosing shots
* Picture mode is not available in 24 Mbps HD mode.
* The electronic stabilization does not work. I’ve grown used to optical stabilization in my DSC-H50 and there is no going back.
* Short of using something like the Black Rapid Straps Fasten-R2 screwed into the tripod shoe, there is no way to attach a neck strap. I almost dropped it several times.
* The plastic housing is sensitive to noise – any little touch while recording will show up as sound in the video.
* No windscreen for the mics. Combine that with no external mic capability and you won’t be able to hear anything in windy conditions.
* No remote
* No “night shot” infrared
* Low light performance is what you would expect from a small lens size. All the electronics in the world can’t fully compensate for glass area.
Summary: if you want a fairly cheap, tiny camera for shooting GREAT quality vids of vacations, the kids and the pets, this is an excellent choice. Want to do more, and you will need to pay more for a better unit. Just want to help other people avoid my experience of being a bit disappointed and having to trade up.
about 1 year ago
Review by JFLY for Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
Rating:
The video quality is great! The touchscreen is very easy to use, the internal memory is great! This is a better buy than the HDR-CX110 which has no internal memory.
The camera is very small which I love, it fits perfectly in my pocket. It turns on when you open the screen and it turns off when you close the screen, very convenient.
The zoom works great and the steadyshot feature is very good and it really works.
If you set the camera to manual focus you can touch the subject on the screen that you want the camera to focus on, very cool.
Overall I love this camera because the video quality and of its size.
about 1 year ago
Review by bob is everywhere for Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
Rating:
I paid, after shipping, $489.99. For that price, this camera is worth it. It lacks certain features you would find on the more costly camcorders. There is no optical image stabilization, only steady-shot. No night shot, no external light, no remote… I can take about 2 hours of video on the highest setting. Battery life is about the same (2 hrs). The sound seems pretty decent, although, nothing to write home about. Video quality is average. Nothing amazing. Images arent quite as sharp as I’ve seen on higher-end Sony’s. I viewed files on my 46″ Sony LCD and the video quality wasn’t what I hoped for. It looks better on smaller screens. The videos were presented in 1080p only when played back through the camcorder. For just average consumers who are looking to play video that fills up their T.V. screens, and do it on a budget, this would probably be a suitable choice. If video quality is a major selling point for you, I don’t recommend camera. I guess what can you expect for $489.99?
!!!!!UPDATE!!!!!! 03/31/2010
After taking this camcorder outside on a beautiful spring day, I must say, in environments with good lighting (outside), the video quality appears to be a lot better. It definetly makes it worth the price. You WILL need a tripod or some form of mounting device to keep the image stable. This thing is lite, as I’ve stated previously. There is no weight to counter any jiddering or wobble your arm/hands makes when operating. I must say that I am overall pleased with this product. I still stand by everything I said before the update.
about 1 year ago
Review by CoolV for Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
Rating:
Where do I begin? I’m not sure. I didn’t know what to expect when I order this camera, but the minute I powered it up, I was amazed at the clarity. I mean right out of the box, this thing is practically set up for you to succeed with your project.
The camera has many adjustable settings, but many of them a buried within the menu system, which is accessible via it’s touchscreen.
Sony was even nice enough to give you a quick menu area where you access the features or settings that you may use more often. I
wish there were more than one screen of these as I often have found myself needing more quick buttons than this.
However, the real reason I am so pleased with this camera is because you don’t need to fool around with anything to take good video.
The intelligent auto feature is activated by default and it pretty much has you covered, as the camera will quickly detect scenes
and select the proper settings based on the environment. What this means is, if you are a point-and-shoot type of person (like me),
this camera will not let you down.
And did I mention the picture quality? It is incredible!!!!
The camera has 4 HD modes and 1 SD mode. They are FX,FH,HQ, LP (all for HD), and STD HQ for SD.
I have only tried the different HD modes and I must say they are great, but I found that I often need to shoot longer videos, so
I am currently using FH mode, which allows me a bit more recording. BTW, this camera has 16Gb internal flash memory, plus a
slot for an SD card or Sony’s memory stick duo.
And did I mention the picture quality?
No matter which of the recording modes you choose, the quality is absolutely stellar!
Battery life is pretty good. You get a battery that you nearly squeeze 2 hours out of. What I like best is that the battery is
external, meaning you can buy a larger capacity battery (Sony has at least 2 additional batteries that will fit).
What I liked about this camera:
1. Quick and easy to use
2. Excellent picture quality regardless of recording mode (1080i)
3. built in flash memory
4. adjustable microphone (recording is dolby digital 2 channel)
5. small and compact
6. zoom is smooth and steady
7. has touch focus
8. has face recognition, including priority of one face in the picture
9. smile detection will take a photo if one of the faces smiles (and smile detection is adjustable)
10. shoots photos while filming
11. reasonably good low light performance (not great, but the colors still looked like themselves)
What I didn’t like:
I waited a while before writing the review to see if I had an issue that I could complain about with this camera.
I don’t have any complaints. It exceeded my expectations in every area. I read some complaints about not having 1080p….
whatever.
Video Formats:
For HD this camera produces MPEG4 H.264 AVC/AVCHD files (files have .m2ts extention when imported by PMB, .mts if you browse
the camera)
For SD I believe the format is MPEG2 (I haven’t shot much SD footage, but what I have was very good)
Make sure your computer is loaded with the proper codecs and you should have no problems.
The camera came with Sony’s PMB software, which I use to download my footage to the computer. It allows you some manipulation
of the files and the ability to burn to DVD in AVCHD format, where it can be played on a Blue-ray player. You can also burn
normal DVDs with PMB as well. However, I only use PMB to import from the camera. I have other software to produce videos.
I would mention the picture quality shot with this camera again, but I think I’ll close the review by saying that, this is an
excellent camcorder and it was worth every penny.
about 1 year ago
Review by chrisghemm for Sony HDR-CX150 16GB High Definition Handycam Camcorder
Rating:
I purchased this camcorder (HDR-CX150 Black) yesterday from Costco for $449 including a bonus camera bag. A month ago, I purchased the Panasonic TM10 and was not happy with the results on indoor shooting so, I decided to look around and found the CX110 at Walmart which have great reviews online including Amazon. Luckily my wife and I went to Costco to look for a DSLR camera. I saw the guy setting this camcorder up. He said that it just arrived. I quickly went to Amazon when we got home and found that the CX150 is the same as the CX110 with the 16GB memory built-in so, I returned to Costco the next day to get this camcorder.
Our purpose for this camcorder is to record precious moments from our 2 kids (3 year old and 1 year old). We have our camcorder ready all time to shoot video when they start dancing or having fun and this usually happens inside our home. This camcorder performs excellent indoor with just a flourecent or a lamp as a source of light. I set the panasonic TM10 and this Sony CX150 side by side and record my 3 year old walking, running and jumping around and going to the different part of the house. The difference is night and day on scenes with only the lamp as source of light. The CX150 is sharp and clear while the TM10 are already grainy. When I have my daughter turned off the light, the CX150 looks a lot darker but is more viewable than the TM10. This is because the TM10 though clearer, shows a lot grain. The CX150 also exhibit some grain at this point but is more acceptable. Anyway, who will be shooting videos with no light? The test I did is set to HD|HQ which is the third quality down. Maybe the highest resolution will give better result.
The only thing I noticed with the CX150 is that it tends to get out of focus when you zoom too fast to an object. Something I did not see on TM10. Also, the TM10 have a simpler menu option. I was able to figure it out within 5 minutes after opening the box. For the CX150, I’m still trying to figure out how to change video quality. I can change HD to Std but I could not select the other HD options like HD|FX to try the highest resolution.
Other features that I like:
1. Slow motion is great, I will be using this a lot with my kids.
2. “My Menu” option. This will let you set up to 6 favorite menu item.
3. Battery life shows 125 minutes when fully charged.
4. Image are stable even when you walk around while taking video.
5. 25X Optical Zoom
6. Clear LCD
7. Built in lens cover
8. Direct copy. Let’s you copy to a portable harddrive without the need for computer.
Features I don’t like:
1. No viewfinder. Newer HD camcorder at this price range does not offer viewfinder but I just hope that there is one available as my kids likes to watch at themselves while doing their stunts. I have to hold it to my side so I can also see if they are at the center of the camera.
2. Cover design for ports (Memory, cable, power) looks easy to break. It looks great with the body but I like the rubber type better as I feel that I protects the ports more from dust.
3. Battery charger is sold separately. Need to plan ahead to make sure you have enough battery on big events. Current package will only let you charge battery with the camcorder so camcorder will be out of commission for a couple of hours.
4. You need to dig deep into the menu if you need to change some settings. Maybe this is why they setup the “My Menu” option but I don’t have time to play with it yet.
Those are the things I noticed so far after 1 day of ownership. I will update when I find more things here.
———————-
UPDATE – JULY 8, 2010
———————-
Still happy with the product after over 2 months of having it. I was able to figure out all the menus and setup the camera to my preferred setting after looking at the manual. The videos are great and I like the fact that it creates a new file on each new clips that you take. I learned to control the when to cut and create a new video file for easier editing.
We went to Alaska cruise at the end of may and this camcorder continues to work even on extreme changes in temperature. From inside the boat with room temperature to going outside at the Glacier Bay, I was expecting the lens to fog up but it did not.
Battery life is adequate. I never run out of battery as long as I charge it at night during our vacation. Also, the battery seem to hold its charge really well. I have it fully charged and just keep it inside its case and pull it out when I need to take videos. So far, I have only recharge it once in a months time.
Memory: 16GB memory can hold up to 4 hours of HD|HQ and around 2 hours for the highest quality. LP mode will give you close to 7 hours of recording time. I currently have it set at HD|HQ since I only do small edit and convert it to DVD. Will use the highest quality when BlueRay disk becomes cheaper. Also, it is fast and easy to tranfer the files compare to the old MiniDV tapes so I just transfer the files to the computer often and delete the memory.
Lens: I added a wide angle lens VCL-0630X as I found out that the widest angle is sometimes not enough when taking video of kids inside the house. Kids moves a lot and it forces you to move back or they will get off the frame. With the wide angle lens, I can just stay in one place and adjust the zoom using my fingers. The wide angle lens also help me take videos inside the ships cabin without any problem.
about 1 year ago
Sony HDR Video Converter for Mac is the best video converter for mac software for sony users, it can help you convert all sony HDR Camcorders HD video files to avi, wmv, mov on Mac OS X for editing.
http://www.ilifesoft.com/how-to/convert-sony-hdr-video-on-mac.htm