EEVblog #595 - World's Shittiest Camcorder: Teardown

[NiHaoMike]

Would it be possible to hack the firmware to stream JPEGs out the UART? Hook it up to a cheap transmitter of some sort and it might make a good low cost SSTV setup, in particular for DIY weather balloons and such.

[pickle9000]

Here is a keychain camera that's been around for a while. Price ranges from 8-50 dollars, started out low and grew. Even though they look the same there are many variations. These things are tiny. And yes the low price ones are still sold and still suck.

Cameras

http://www.ebay.ca/sch/i.html?_sacat=0&LH_BIN=1&_nkw=keychain+camera+hd&rt=nc&_pppn=r1&LH_FS=1

All about the evolution from "pretty much sucks" to "hey this is pretty nice"

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1556994

I really like when a product evolves over time.

[rjk5378]

As the guy who sent in this camera, I must say I found reading these comments very interesting. I only sent the camera as an afterthough when I was packing up the HP-41 rubber feet to send to Dave. I knew I would never use it for anything--I got it free for ordering more than a certain dollar value of office supplies--so though, why not. I thought at most he might comment on it a bit when he opened the package and that would be it. I was surprised to see an actual teardown video, but when I watched it I laughed by butt off. I thought it was humorous, and I think that was the intent. But some commenters seem to be extremely serious about defending cheap products against Dave's feigned anger. That, in a way, may be more humorous than the video itself.

[Galenbo]

I maintain that this is an excellent product for the poorest in society to be able to document police brutality, corruption and so on without breaking the bank.

The world is a better place thanks to the availability of this camera.

I think you better first give them electricity in their favella. To charge the thing.
Or water. Or food.

[EEVblog]

As the guy who sent in this camera, I must say I found reading these comments very interesting. I was surprised to see an actual teardown video, but when I watched it I laughed by butt off. I thought it was humorous, and I think that was the intent. But some commenters seem to be extremely serious about defending cheap products against Dave's feigned anger. That, in a way, may be more humorous than the video itself.

I would never have bothered with a teardown if I hadn't just off-handedly remarked if anyone would like to see it. I didn't really think anyone would be interested as it would obviously just be single chip and a lens. But someone remarked they wanted "the worlds shittiest camcorder teardown" and it got a ton of thumbs up, so I did it. With that exact intention of course, a humorous look inside a shitty camcorder, because, well, what other angle was there? And few doubt that it is in fact pretty shit (performance wise), but what they took offense to is that I didn't praise it's value for money. Why didn't I?
1) It wasn't a review, it was a teardown, so I didn't bother commenting on that kind of thing.
and
2) I know that my audience expect me not to praise crap stuff , they expect me to call a crap product what it is, crap. I actually felt a little nervous praising some of the internal design, thinking in the back of mind that I'd have to wear some hate mail for that. But it turned out the opposite, they ignored that praise almost completely and hammered me for not saying anything about it's value for money 
Guess what would happen if I did a video "The worlds shittest multimeter" and actually praised it for it's "value for money" etc. There would be pitchforks on my doorstep.
 

[jucole]

Guess what would happen if I did a video "The worlds shittest multimeter" and actually praised it for it's "value for money" etc. There would be pitchforks on my doorstep.
 

And rightly so! no-one wants a multimeter to blow-up in their face when they connect it to a high energy source or display 0 volts a/c when connected live mains;  but the cam actually worked;  I just think the rant factor was turned up too high, and with 8 pages of forum posts maybe others did too.

[EEVblog]

I just think the rant factor was turned up too high, and with 8 pages of forum posts maybe others did too.

Well, you and they are in the minority. 1182 thumbs up, 188 thumbs down. An order of magnitude more people liked it than didn't.
And of course, as a general engineering rule, you can safely ignore anything that's an order of magnitude away

[komet]

I maintain that this is an excellent product for the poorest in society to be able to document police brutality, corruption and so on without breaking the bank.

The world is a better place thanks to the availability of this camera.

I think you better first give them electricity in their favella. To charge the thing.
Or water. Or food.

Do you have the slightest clue what you are talking about? Electricity is far easier to come by than food in modern slums.

[TimNJ]

I think the only thing that bothered me was that Dave shat all over the camera...which is basically like shitting on the engineers responsible for producing this unit. Cheap product or not, I have a lot of respect for just about all engineers. This was a pretty well designed camera for what it is. I didn't see anything horrific that an engineer goofed up on. I suppose you could lay the hate on the bean-counters, but then again, its such a cheap camera. What's crap to some people might be great to others.

[IanJ]

which is basically like shitting on the engineers responsible for producing this unit.

Engineers weren't responible for this unit......some dumb ass company head was. The engineer who did the leg work will have been given a SOW, i.e. spec and price point to design to and he's done a pretty good job. He'll be more than happy!

Kudos to Dave for honesty on the camera and the pcb layout etc. The world need more honesty like this to help spread the word so that same dumb ass company head as above doesn't produce more of the same crap.

Ian.

[han]

which is basically like shitting on the engineers responsible for producing this unit.

Engineers weren't responible for this unit......some dumb ass company head was. The engineer who did the leg work will have been given a SOW, i.e. spec and price point to design to and he's done a pretty good job. He'll be more than happy!

Kudos to Dave for honesty on the camera and the pcb layout etc. The world need more honesty like this to help spread the word so that same dumb ass company head as above doesn't produce more of the same crap.

Ian.

The west country didn't need very much effort to marketing a product,
But china cannot make a expensive and quality product without large Investment, because nobody will buy them.

Few year ago i fix a testing equipment with rant more then Dave rant..
The casing is quite nice( build by CNC milling machine)
but inside is very shitty..

they use $.05 sensor, in prototype board for 7805 and biasing for sensor, with very bad soldering.
off the self MCS-51 + 8 bit ADC , Chaepo 3 digit LCD.

One thing that make me mad.. it have $15K price tag
they buy it because it made in USA and have ASTM standard...

So, when there is a shitty overpriced product from rich country, it's normal.
But, cheapo product with poor spec with good production step from china.It have to go to trash bin...

[jeroent]

My only question is: Will it blend???

[EEVblog]

I think the only thing that bothered me was that Dave shat all over the camera...which is basically like shitting on the engineers responsible for producing this unit.

No I did not, and no it is not. I praised the work on the internals, it was engineering quite well for it's cost.
Please don't extend my calling the product crap to mean I am attacking the engineers responsible, I am not. 

[rjk5378]

I think the only thing that bothered me was that Dave shat all over the camera...which is basically like shitting on the engineers responsible for producing this unit.

I think Dave actually praised the engineers who designed the unit based on the internal cirucuit boards, etc. The criticism was directed at the bean-counters, marketers, or whoever gave the engineers such pitiful specifications to work with, namely, no matter how well the electronics may have been designed, they are never going to produce a decent result with that sensor and the non-lens.

[DrGeoff]

Yet more pollution as these get pumped into landfill with all the other cheap junk products out there.
What a waste of time, resources and energy.

[Pisami]

Hi all! I had to register to just say that this video was hilarious. No one seemed to mention that the board with most components was actually "MIAN BOARD 1.3". I laughed so much when I saw that! See you!

[ashplant]

Good video.  I liked watching you figure a way to get the the dam thing gently apart.  I'd be inclined to use a hammer., myself.

This is gererally true of consumer producrt teardowns.

But is it this camcorder the world's shittiest? It looks like the makers decided to spend most their limited budget on the electronics, not the case. That isn't shitty to me.

[station240]

2) I know that my audience expect me not to praise crap stuff , they expect me to call a crap product what it is, crap. I actually felt a little nervous praising some of the internal design, thinking in the back of mind that I'd have to wear some hate mail for that. But it turned out the opposite, they ignored that praise almost completely and hammered me for not saying anything about it's value for money 

cheap != value for money, unless you're in the Liberal Party.

Waste of 8 dollars, as others have pointed out it's in the trash at some point, due to:
a) You give it to your kids, and they smash it on a rock, then it goes in the bin.
b) You get bored with it and put it in the cupboard, then it goes in the bin.
c) It breaks, then it goes in the bin.
For the same $8 you could buy two bars of chocolate, and enjoy eating it.

[BillyD]

2) I know that my audience expect me not to praise crap stuff , they expect me to call a crap product what it is, crap. I actually felt a little nervous praising some of the internal design, thinking in the back of mind that I'd have to wear some hate mail for that. But it turned out the opposite, they ignored that praise almost completely and hammered me for not saying anything about it's value for money 

cheap != value for money, unless you're in the Liberal Party.

Waste of 8 dollars, as others have pointed out it's in the trash at some point, due to:
a) You give it to your kids, and they smash it on a rock, then it goes in the bin.
b) You get bored with it and put it in the cupboard, then it goes in the bin.
c) It breaks, then it goes in the bin.
For the same $8 you could buy two bars of chocolate, and enjoy eating it.

The same arguments could equally apply to an $80 dollar camera.

And where the hell do you buy your chocolate?!

[DrGeoff]

Willie's chocolate (that's REAL chocolate, not the mass produced fatty substitute chocolate that seems to adorn the supermarket shelves) is about $6 a bar here, so not quite 2 bars for $8 then

[hikariuk]

Willie's chocolate (that's REAL chocolate, not the mass produced fatty substitute chocolate that seems to adorn the supermarket shelves) is about  a bar here, so not quite 2 bars for  then

I prefer Hotel Chocolat.

[acourtois]

If you look at the specs of the main chip and the single shot resolution it can do, I'd say that it has been wrongfuly integrated. Give this chip a decent CCD, lens and preview screen, in a decently designed, good form factor case, for 45$ and you'd have a winning product here. Not just for developing countries.

[Fungus]

If you look at the specs of the main chip and the single shot resolution it can do, I'd say that it has been wrongfuly integrated.

You think there was a plan? More likely the boss said "make me 10,000 cameras for $5 each" and the engineer just used whatever chip he could score 10,000 of at the auction that day.

[acourtois]

If you look at the specs of the main chip and the single shot resolution it can do, I'd say that it has been wrongfuly integrated.

You think there was a plan? More likely the boss said "make me 10,000 cameras for $5 each" and the engineer just used whatever chip he could score 10,000 of at the auction that day.

Yep. I know. I was questioning the manufacturer' vision. No pun intended.