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

I bought this kit from my local Costco for $379. I currently use a very good Panasonic 3CCD miniDV SD camcorder and an iPhone4 for 720p video. It should be better than both. I only use iMovie ('10) on the Mac and haven't even bothered to use the software that came with it. So the following are my observations when using this camera: *poor low light performance, lots of noise *poor optical image stabilization *poor image quality for motion, lots of jagged edges *default bitrate set to fairly medium (change to high) *default video quality set to medium set (change to high) * Default video size set to 1600x1200, (change to 1280x1080) * Default frame rate set to 60i, not 24p or 30p * Camera set to frequency mode 24p or 30p frames Disable photo feature* Default JPG compression level set to medium (change to low)* iMovie needs to convert AVCHD to QuickTime, very slow process, even on a quad-core Mac* AVCHD .MTS files are 1/5 the size of QuickTime .MOV * Larger .MOV files are a challenge before using external drives their much faster speed to play Data Source * VLC can be used to play .MTS-Date Play ien directly * Estimated battery life is only 45m * Saving footage presents a dilemma, save AVCHD, QuickTime or both? lots of disk space required, no tape backup* iPhone4 video quality is better, albeit only 720p. So this camera delivers worse video quality than my iPhone4. Optical image stabilization, the only thing that can be a significant benefit, is so weak it's barely usable. I sent the camera back and will wait another year or two to get the best technology in this price range.