Vivitar any good?

dpreview doesn't have any reviews on this brand. I am wondering how the quality on these cameras is, particularly the 8600s and maybe the X60. There was a fairly good price locally on the 8600s, but I know nothing about it. I'm wondering if their quality is like that of the Kodak cameras where the lenses are of such a poor quality that a lower megapixel camera with a better lense produces a better picture (like the Panasonic or Konica models). I also heard bad things about the quality of the camera in general.

Lets face it....Vivitar market these cameras...I doubt they even have a design dept for them. They appear to be made by Premier of Taiwan....or atleast some of them are. I had the 8MP version and it took lovely images. Slightly noisy at higher ISO's.

As to Kodak cameras....I think you should go to the Kodak forum and see some of the images they 'snap'. Check out what this guy says...

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1011&message=21287407

Kodak appears to produce cameras at all price points, if you want to buy cheap, they will give you cheap and cheerful, and if you want to pay more..you can. I rate the P880 extremely highly, I have a Sony R1 also, and it doesn't perform as well - however it is potentially more capable with its larger sensor...but more often than not I use the Kodak, its much more reliable...so much so I bought a second one just in cas I dropped the first. The Sony is too big to carry all the time too...so...when you generalise about Kodaks you should be aware that they have some fine products in the range.

I think also there is a confusion about image quality too....different compression and noise reduction methods will give an image of different quality. As can be seen from the reviews some prefer noisier images with more definition, others with less noise...

Kevin Ar18 said:

dpreview doesn't have any reviews on this brand. I am wondering
how the quality on these cameras is, particularly the 8600s and
maybe the X60. There was a fairly good price locally on the 8600s,
but I know nothing about it. I'm wondering if their quality is
like that of the Kodak cameras where the lenses are of such a poor
quality that a lower megapixel camera with a better lense produces
a better picture (like the Panasonic or Konica models). I also
heard bad things about the quality of the camera in general.

Click to expand...

I have a Vivitar 8300. It's not a bad camera, but it wouldn't be my first choice in digicams. If you are considering a low-priced camera, I would recommend the Fujifilm F30. I've got three Fuji cameras, and the only one that's any good is the F30. It takes good pictures in most situations, is responsive, and simply can not be beat in low-light performance. The only real drawback is that it uses those funky xD cards. You can pick one up for about $200 after rebate on the web. It's a steal at the price.
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'The primary purpose of any business is to make a profit.'
Canon CEO Fujio Mitarai

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home ;jsessionid=GX90G0k1Qp!1508707039?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=186095&is=REG&addedTroughType=search

Phil Loughran said:

too big to carry all the time too...so...when you generalise about
Kodaks you should be aware that they have some fine products in the
range.

Click to expand...

Well, ONE at least - the P880 - I find the images from it VERY un-Kodaklike, in otherwords, not smeared out with Noise reduction and with good colours and detail , the rest are pretty awful compared to the competition - the P880 could do with "modernizing" as in a fast sensitive AF system, fast card writes and a better LCD (as well as De-Uglifying) but it's quite a camera at the prices they can be had for now and that lens is the only one on a Kodak worthy of the "Schneider Kreuznach" label..

The R1 is very consistent, sharp and detailed when shot in RAW, I'd never use the JPG engine, it suffers the things I hate Kodak images for (too much NR, blown highlights, poor de-bayering)

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Please ignore the Typos, I'm the world's worst Typist