Vivitar DVR 787HD - Action camera - 1080p - 12.1 MP - underwater up to 30ft - red

Don't expect the quality of a "GoPro". Quality is okay, but the video struggles with high contrast subjects. My use was an on-board camera for car racing. Video was "washed out" due to the "darkness" of the interior versus the "bright" light through the windshield. I turned the camera around for a rear view and the quality improved. For ~$50 with a remote, it's a pretty good deal. It is "stupid" you cannot turn ON the camera with the remote. (Remote turns OFF the camera and starts / stops the camera). Came with numerous mounting options, none of which worked for roll bar in my race car:(

My 12 year old son and I were looking in store to purchase Go Pro and was skeptical to spend almost $400 for the set up. Just happened to get redirected when checking out accessories in the store on my phone when this camera popped up. I was surprised when we had read it has the same megapixels as the top of the line Go Pro and decided for $50 what the heck we will give it a try and man is it a good little camera. It has quite a bit of mounting kits (some that we will probably never use) and the waterproof camera. My son could not wait to use so on the way home he talked me into taking him to the community pool so he could try out. Very impressive camera under water. Next he mounted on his bicycle and then the dirt bike. Nothing but new adventures awaiting him and he is super excited to be able to film them now. Thanks Vivitar for making this camera affordable and I hope you are able to make your fortune with this camera and put a dent in the Go Pro market. Did I mention the site to store shipping? Wow 4 days and it was there. Keep up the great work Vivitar!

I had to call to get my camera replaced, the battery expired after 10 or 15 minutes. The tech support people were not happy dealing with me even though I had purchased the warranty upgrade. My replacement camera came in OK but I didn't care for the tech support attitude. The second camera is everything I had expected it to be.

I really like this package! More mounting options than I'll ever likely use at a very low price in contrast to its performance. I read a dozen or more reviews on this package before buying it which included remarks regarding it's low light sensitivity being weak and that it had limited battery life, and was really a daylight-only camcorder. And I can see where for some this might be an issue. This camera has a tiny sensor and performs accordingly. If you want perfect full HD recording then you need to find something that has a much larger sensor - but you won't find one for less than a few hundred dollars! I haven't tried it as car camcorder but can easily see why using it in a car at night might have poor performance, ie a very grainy picture. But used at night indoors in normal room lighting it was fine. But I bought it to use a helmet cam on my daylight bicycle rides - and for that purpose it's been perfect! The video quality at FHD (1920x1080x30fps is quite good and shows little motion aritfacting - meaning that objects moving relative to other objects don't get jagged-edged or blurry. But the overall picture is slightly fuzzy compared to my Canon camcorder that cost 20 times as much money. But the overall color balance in daylight is excellent. And the slight fuzziness of the picture is only really apparent when shown on a large screen like my 61" older rear-projection TV. Considering the overall good quality of daylight recording, it's the incredible array of mounting options that come with the camera that push the value proposition way up there. The box contained several plastic bags worth of what were retailed-packaged accessories - as though they were bundling every option you could get for this camera in this one package. Surfboard/skateboard mount, 2 different kinds of Car mounts (windshield and dashboard), the waterproof case, two kinds of bicycle mounts (or rather, a handlebar/pole mount, and a ventilated helmet-type strap mount), and an "outdoor" strap mount that you could use on upper arm mount and possibly in other ways. I used the ventilated helmet strap mount. It's worth noting that it did not come with a barehead strap mount. None of the mounts included had a strap long enough that you use it on your bare head, let alone around a helmet. To secure the hemet mount you have to run the straps through 2 of the ventilation holes. But the way they implemented those strap mounts you are using two straps to independently secure the mount so that the loosening of any one of the straps won't cause the mount to become loose. And once I got the straps tightened, they haven't loosened up at all. Another nice aspect of the various mount options is that they all use standard 1/4" camera mount threading such as is found on the most expensive DSLRs and old 35mm Cameras and down to the simple point and shoot cameras. In other words, all of these mounting options can be used with almost any other camera you are likely to own. Altought mostly plastic and not likely to take the load of an old VHS full-size camcorder or a Hasselblad or an SLR with a long lens, the mounts ought to work with almost any other digital camera you may already own. So what you get is a decent full HD daylight camcorder plus an array of mounts you can use with other cameras as well, unlike the proprietary mounts of some other action camera systems. As far as day to day usage, the camera's menu system is easy to use although the touch screen seems a little insensitive, i.e. often takes more than one press to take your input. But functions well otherwise. Menu system leaves a bit to be desired and takes getting used to, but this is, after all, a set and forget kind of camera - you're going to mount it in some way and then all you're normally going to do is start it and stop it. And the power on and start stop buttons are large and easy to access, even when mounted in the waterproof shell. The camera provides good on and off indications via blinking lights so it's obvious when it is recording and when its not. As to battery life which I read complaints about in other reviews, in my experience it lasts over 50 minutes - how much more I don't know as that's as long as I have so far needed in one go. I suspect it will go more than an hour - assuming you turn off the display on the back. Probably the largest shortener of battery life in most modern devices is the energy put into illuminating the display. On the back of the camera on the upper left side is a button which turns the display on and off. While you're driving and shouldn't be looking at the display, or when you're riding or surfing or running, you shouldn't be watching the display so switch it off. I've read where some people claimed battery life was 40 minutes or less - probably is if you leave the display on. But why do that - the camera has blinking and static LEDs that tell you it's alive and recording - once you've confirmed that why would you want the display on sucking down the battery and presenting a visual distraction - if you can even see it on a helmet or bike mount or while surfing or snowboarding? But because I was concerned about battery life, I investigated using an external battery source via the usb port. And unlike some devices I've run into, plugging something into the USB port does not force you into a mode where the device acts only as a disk drive. I had some external USB battery packs that were designed as portable cellphone chargers that when plugged into the camera worked perfectly, i.e. the camera had all its normally functionality but now had a much higher capacity battery system powering it. I haven't yet been able to determine how much longer but I'm expecting several hours - all from a battery pack that plugs right into the usb port on the camera. and weighs about as much as the camera. Such a device, velcro'ed onto my helmet will hardly be noticeable and will extend the battery life of the camera. I think I paid something like $20 for the external battery some years ago. So if having the camera run longer on it's non-replaceable internal battery is an issue, there's a simple and straightforward fix by using any of the external cellphone portable rechargers. Just make sure you get one that uses the mini USB plug rather than a micro USB plug like most modern cellphones use. Another complaint in other reviews had to do with a shaky picture - that the handlebar mount resulted in a lousy blurry picture. I think people tend to forget the amount of vibration they absorb through their body, certainly on trail riding but even on smooth highways. When you mount something to the handlebars or forks you're going to get a lot of vibration. I have seen some decent video from handlebar-mounted camcorders - but it's always been from pro riders doing tricks or in competition where I think it likely they were using much more expensive equipment with camera shake isolation and image stabilization systems - not what you can expect from what is basically a $50 camera system. I've used helmet mounted systems and even sunglasses-based systems before. And I can safely say that if you want to record your rides you need a good shock absorber between the camera and the road - and there's no absorber better than your own legs and your butt off the seat if you want smooth video. So if you're going to record riding events on a bicycle, don't waste time on mounting to the handlebars. It was barely watchable in SD on my previous systems and will make you sick trying to watch in HD I think. Mount the camera to the helmet. But therein lies my one complaint about this package - the lack of a mount that would work well as a sidemount to my bicycle helmet. Based on the ventilation holes available to me there was no way I could mount the camera to the side of the helmet - without drilling which is not the best thing to do to a lightweight bicycle helmet. So the camera sticks up a good 3+" above my helmet - which means you have to stay alert to the clearance above your helmet when riding on trails with overhanging branches you used to clear with ease. I've whacked the camera a couple of times now but am gradually learning to duck slightly more as I approach those trees. In defense of the camera - not a single glitch as a result - continued working without a hitch. The last thing I'll say is about the recording method. It appears the camera creates videos in half-hour long segments in single files, at least in FHD mode, the only mode I've used so far. That means that that if you ride more than 30 minutes there will be at least two files, i.e.as many files as their are half-hour segments in your recording sessions. If you use a USB car charger to power the camera beyond its presumed hour-long battery life, to record say a long car trip (it said I could record 5.5 hours on the 32GB microSD card I installed, 8 hours in HD 30fps mode) then what you'll find at the end are several files. I used an external video editor to combine the files and they match perfectly indicating that the break between files did not cause the camera to miss recording anything for any significant faction of a second. So - I like it - a great value for the money and gives you accessories you can use for other purposes and devices.

I bought this camera for 2 reasons, to use while riding my motorcycle and also to use for water sport activities. I LOVE this camera for those purposes. I think at $50 you really couldn't ask for any more, all of the mounts are worth that to me. The video is pretty good, and the sound is so sensitive it actually picked up everything I was saying through the helmet. It takes awesome photos and with the vivitar download you have great organizing and editing tools. It's easy to use with a touch screen that is really self explanatory. My only complaint is that the directions for mounts are non existent. The helmet mount is for a bike helmet with big air holes, not a solid motorcycle helmet. I ended up using the car mount (suction cup) which held very well up to speeds of 120 mph. So I'd like to see a better description of the mounts and how they can be used, but a great camera overall for young and old.