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Average rating:
3.80
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Toshiba PDR-53004.9 megapixels | 1.5" screen | 35 – 105 mm (3×)
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Average rating:
3.80
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Opinion: I bought the Gateway version of this after reading a glowing review in Wall Street Journal. They should stick to the financial world! Noisy, terrible colors, awful battery life. I will say that it led me to buying a Nikon D70 quickly! In most respects this camera was inferior to my older Sony Mavica.
Opinion: I have the Gateway DC-T50 version of this camera. I purchased it for $200 at Best Buy. One week later I saw the camera for $150. The reason for the price dropping on this camera is that Gateway has decited to stop selling this product. I have contacted Gateway, and they are not offering ANY direct support for this product. They will NOT provide any firmware updates. For all issues you are requested to take the camera back to the retail location from which you purchased the camera.
That being said, it has been a great camera. Pictures are crisp and the colors are rich. For most circumstances the auto function works great. Manual functions are good with shutter speeds as long at 8 seconds. ISO settings are limited: 100/200/400. Automatic white balance and spot metering work well.
Video mode has a variety of settings, and with my new baby I have taken advantage of this feature a lot. You are not able to use the zoom feature when in video mode. You MUST zoom first then use the video function.
You will need to upgrade the 32MB SD card that comes with the camera.
In all, this camera is the best bang for the buck...if you can still find it on the market. I would definitely recommend this camera for the budget minded photographer, or if someone is looking for a second camera for situations where you do not want to take your expensive camera.
Problems: The main issue is that Gateway will NOT be providing any meaningful support for this product. They will replace the camera if it is broken, but don't look for any firmware updates. I have not tried using the Toshiba firmware on this camera as I am not able to get the original firmware to put back on it if the update fails.
I have had an issue where the camera detects the media card as protected even though the switch is set to writeable. I must power off the camera and then back on to fix the problem.
ISO 400 setting is rather noisey. I've had to use lower ISO settings and a longer shutter speed.
Occationally, I've had a picture "bleed" onto the previous picture.
http://mrknisely.is-a-geek.org/graderror.jpg
I've found battery life to be quite good; however, there is no external charger for this camera. I have purchased an extra battery that I keep chagred. Other manufacturers use the same battery, so you can buy their external charger if you would like.
Opinion: Gateway's DC-T50 is the same camera exactly, sold only through BestBuy.Com and its stores at $199, compared to Toshiba's MSRP of $349 for the PDR-5300. Except for short battery life (see below), it is a great buy, 5 MPs very sharp and clear, with versatile recording modes like monochrome, sepia, vivid color, etc., and numerous automatic and manual options for WB control, focusing and exposure. The output is straight JPEG, beautiful pictures in high detail, which were uploaded effortlessly right into XP through a cheap USB SD card reader, ready for computer review and/or printing. No driver necessary.
Problems: Brand new the battery needed five hours to fully charge. The camera ran quite warm from all the work the chip did during normal data processing of these large picture files. After photographing (with optional automatic exposure bracketing, which is three times the usual work for the camera and processor), having previously formatted two SD cards and programmed the unit's many settings, then finishing with photo review on the LCD, deletions of rejects, etc. (about 20 pictures completed), the battery was completely dead. Total time powered up and working was about 45 minutes!
I took this machine back as "defective" after judging that the lithium battery is far too small for continuous operation of an otherwise very sophisticated, beautifully designed, high-resolution imager. I never used the flash, since I shoot available-light only. There would appear to be a general, almost insoluble problem with miniature digital cameras--the higher the pixel load and LCD size, the worse the battery life. This could helpfully be investigated by DPR. Also, the milliamp-hour capacity of each camera's standard battery should be listed in the specs tables, helping to get a grip on the problem.
Opinion: Dead before 3 months! On/off button hard to use, and flash red-eye can't be turned off during portrait mode.
Problems: One day my camera just decided to die, for no reason! It was never dropped, kicked hit or anything. I'm having it fixed (under warranty) and I'm hoping that it was just a fluke. Other than the dying problem, my only other pet peeve is that for portrait shots the flash can not be turned off. Let alone the red-eye reduction. For pictures of my son (he was 3 months old at the time) all it did was give him red eye and most of the pictures his eyes were closed due to the delay with the red-eye timer. I was able to take close up shots without the flash when I used the auto feature. Those pictures turned out just fine. The camera it's self is amazing just make sure that the store you buy it in will accept it back if it turns out to be a lemon. The on/off button is also a problem. It's a button that is already inset in the casing of the camera itself and so it's quite hard to turn on unless you have fingernails. The camera takes a little bit of time to "warm up" when first turned on, but not too too bad. The battery seems to last for a very long time, I took about 1000 pictures and only recharged the battery once.
Opinion: I bought this through gateway- it has their private label but when I saw the Toshiba in a digital camera magazine and read the specs- no question it's the same camera- and gateway sells it for less with rebate incentives!
Nice camera, I have a Canon G2 and it's as easy to understand, instructions are clear. Great to have manual options on such a small camera.
Problems: wish it had a better optical zoom- plan to take this on vacation this year and leave the canon home(too big to schlep through orlando parks)
oh yes! invest in an extra battery and bigger memory card.
Opinion: This is my first digital camera, even as a beginner I found it easy to use and picture quality is very good. The price is quite reasonable given it is 5MP. I would recommend this camera over the Canon's. I think the brand Toshiba is under-rated.
Problems: No problem so far!
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 | 22.3 megapixels 3.2" screen Full frame sensor |
