Review on 📷 Canon VIXIA HF R11 Full HD Camcorder with 32GB Flash Memory - Discontinued by Manufacturer - Reviews and Price Comparison by Gerald Mohammed

Well I haven't had the cameras long but they are already packed and ready to be returned. I've been looking for a replacement for my JVC GR-D72U for a while and have narrowed my list down to three. It wasn't even on the shortlist. Why did I buy it? It was sold at Costco for $355 including a Canon case, 4GB SD card and HDMI cable. They stopped delivering them and that was the last. It was a new, sealed block. Considering the MSRP for this camcorder is $699, I thought it was worth a try at that price. When I unboxed it I was very impressed with the camcorder itself. It was very attractive and had a very nice, premium feel. From what I've read about it before, I knew it didn't have a lot of fancy features, so I figured Canon must have made up for that with quality. It looked like. Unfortunately, this is where the quality ends. I went to install the battery and was surprised to see that it actually fit in the camera. Here is the extended battery. To charge, remove one of the plastic flaps on the back of the camera and plug in the power cord. There are two such doors at the back and they are attached with rubber bands and seem fairly secure. I knew the camera didn't come with a remote control but figured I could get one for it or use the universal remote; wrong, it has no IR receiver. And it's not CEC compliant, so you can't control it with any of your other CEC devices while it's plugged in. I was very disappointed as this is quite common with cheaper camcorders. I went online to see if there were any firmware updates and there were. This allows the camera to recognize SDXC cards. I checked my camera's firmware and it was already up to date. After fully charging the camera, I started capturing video. I started at home with the camera on IA (Intelligent Auto). Everything looked dark and grainy, but I thought it might just be the display. I experimented with different settings that were very easy to find. This camera's menu system is very easy to navigate, and the small, flat, joystick-like grip makes it very easy to switch between menus. After a few indoor shots, I went outside to take some shots of the courtyard and pool. Here I was able to test the zoom and image stabilizer (IS). That's when I started to get really frustrated. IS worked well when the lens wasn't zoomed in, but at full zoom it didn't even seem to be on. IS on my old JVC was much better. So I went back to the menu to see if there were any settings I could tweak and that's when I noticed that it defaulted to regular IS and not Dynamic IS. So I turned on Dynamic with high expectations. I was very disappointed; Dynamic IS didn't seem to make a difference. So I played around with some other settings, including turning the digital zoom on and off, but nothing worked. Really terrible IS. Well, after filming all my test footage, it was time to watch it on TV. I plugged everything in and it appeared beautifully on the TV. It was extremely annoying that I had to crouch next to the TV with the camera because it didn't have a remote control. Well, the interior shots looked awful; even worse than what I saw on the camera display. It was very grainy and the colors were terrible. Unacceptable. So I decided to take a few more shots while trying out some manual settings and AS priority. Same results. This camera cannot take good pictures indoors or in low light. If it had an auxiliary light it might, but it doesn't have an accessory shoe to attach it to. Another problem was that in the recordings I heard the sound of the motor as if there was a cassette inside. It's filmless and has no optical stabilization, so I can only assume the autofocus motor is running all the time. Then I looked at the footage on the street. It got better, but the colors looked a bit washed out. In automatic mode, the settings change depending on the scene. As an an example; I got very close to the bush and it automatically selected macro. Nice feature, but it was so slow to respond that it always lagged behind or didn't change at all. Another problem with this camera is the sound. It sounded pretty bad. The sound seemed very compressed to me. I picked up water running over the spa wall and the sound was inaccurate. There have also been instances where my dog barked during recording and when played back it sounded like someone else's dog. The nice thing is that it has a mic jack, but again there's no accessory shoe to attach a mic to. This is another area where my old JVC was much better. All in all, this is not a very well made Canon product. It's overpriced for the features, especially considering the audio and video quality. Canon just has to drop this product before it tarnishes its reputation. Next I will try the Panasonic HDC-SD60. I know someone who has it and is very happy with it on their Mac. I will also write a review about it. I have not commented on the software and editing apps included as there are so many alternatives if you are not happy with what comes with it. The most important part is the hardware. Pros: o Now supports SDXC cards. o Very easy to use menu system. o No touchscreen (I prefer haptic feedback). o Normal picture quality outdoors. o Poor picture quality indoors/in low light. o Poor sound quality. o No remote control (not even an IR sensor). o No additional light. No accessories. o Digital zoom cannot be used in AUTO mode (manual settings are not retained when switching to Auto mode). o Terrible image stabilization. o Plastic thread for tripod attachment. Quick Guide UPDATE: We've had a lot of snow lately so I thought it would be a good idea to take a drive and get it on tape. I have to say that the resulting videos looked pretty good. Colors appeared vibrant but not oversaturated. Unfortunately, the image stabilization failed as we drove through packed snow and ice. After we recorded it, we played it back on the TV and before we could see the entire video, the battery died. Too bad you can't get an extended battery for this camera. The good news is that batteries are relatively cheap, so you can keep some spares in your pocket. UPDATE: I was a little concerned that maybe my expectations were a bit high. Well I received my Panasonic HDC-SD60 and it met (exceeded) my expectations. It's at least a generation ahead of Canon and vastly superior in almost every way in terms of performance (Canon looks better, has better menus and button layouts). I'll post a full Panasonic review later, but just wanted to say that my expectations for Canon weren't too high.