Samsung Galaxy Camera - Black (16MP, 21x Optical Zoom, Android 4.1 Jelly Bean OS) 4.8 inch HD Touch LCD

I bought this as a Christmas present for my wife. Delivery was well packed and fast. I had seen and tried this camera at a Samsung demo in Milton Keynes and so I knew what to expect of the camera. I purchased this camera primarily because of the great screen, connectivity and smart features, and zoom function. Wifey set it up, loaded it with her favourite games, facebook app(!) and tried a few practice shots. Unfortunately at this stage we discovered the lens cover will not close correctly when the camera is powered down and it is possible the lens to be damaged. An exchange has been arranged with Amazon and I await the new item. We are both huge Samsung fans over a range of products and at this stage I am happy to put this down to an unfortunate fault rather than a poor product. The quality of the pictures, ease of processing and uploading to facebook and other websites are all outstanding. The camera is also incredibly easy to use, especially if you are already familiar with the android operating system. So a little disappointed with the product fault, but delighted with the overall quality of all other aspects of the product.

First impression is a quite fantastic device having 3G, WiFi and GPS. I go to loads of gigs and have 3 million hits on YouTube so there is much potential here, particularly with the 21x optical zoom lens. Live tweeting close up quality photos is very satisfying for both me and my followers. If ever EE have the decency to deliver my 4G mobile wifi unit ordered 22 days ago then I may even upload videos immediately after recording.The still picture quality is exceptional in broad daylight, in darkened environments where a flash is not appropriate no better than my Canon G12. The video quality so far has been promising. It's a little soft for a 1080p device but the two gigs I have made videos at were in a dark church in Hackney. Somewhere with a full-on lightshow may prove sharper. Like every other camera I have had it runs into problems standing down the front right by the speakers, things get a bit muffled and distorted. The auto-focus is rather slow to respond when zooming in and out leaving 3-4 seconds out of focus at times, again this should improve outdoors in daylight.The Android functionality is only hampered by the Samsung customisation. I expect it for the camera hardware and the menus are very easy to use other than an apparent lack of recording volume options leading to sound distortion as above. It's just a shame they can't leave well alone in other areas.Anything I can do on my other devices I can do on this. I ignore DropBox and use Google+ Instant Upload instead. It's just a shame I can't remove DropBox completely. Facebook still bombs out when trying to share directly from the gallery as it does on my Nexus 4.1 phone.However...Battery life is very short. 3 hours at a gig taking 2-3 videos and 20-30 photos sees the battery down by 50% despite being on power saving. This may be down to Instant Upload struggling to get a 3G signal but I shouldn't have to switch off that functionality to see if there's a difference. 5 days at Glastonbury next year might require 5 batteries unless I switch off 3G completely.The fatal flaw leading to this particular item's return and replacement with another is the video zoom. When initially zooming forward there is no problem. But zooming backwards and subsequent zooming in either direction leads to an extremely loud crackle in the video recording. Hopefully this is just a one off with my unit and wouldn't stop me from recommending it.##UPDATE##Having had the replacement which came in blue rather than the advertised black a couple of points.Our office Christmas Party was in a very dark night club in London. In these settings taking shots with the flash is pretty random as you don't get the green squares around faces very often leading to lack of focus and red-eye reduction simply doesn't work.I went to the XFM Winter Wonderland and had my first occasion to test out the video on the new one with high volumes blasting out of the speakers. Unfortunately the previous issue with crackling/distortion when using zoom is still very much present. It also takes quite a while to regain the auto-focus when zooming quickly. I may just have to live with the crackling or simply use the zoom a lot less. In so many other ways it is a brilliant camera with no apparent rival on the market, very reluctant to return again.##UPDATE##Very impressed with Samsung via their Contact CEO facility. I had a very helpful reply from their head of customer services when I said it seemed a bit pointless to return the camera a second time only to discover the very same issue a 3rd time. He contacted their technical guys and came back with a request to try the latest software update, Android 4.1.2. I had already applied this but hadn't had a chance to test it out. I did note, however, this also contained a firmware update. Not having any gigs for a few weeks I put my Led Zeppelin DVD on and progressively turned up the volume to the point my receiver safety cut-out kicked in, zooming in and out all the while. Result, zero crackle. A minor amount of motor noise when no volume but this will not affect me. There wasn't even any high volume distortion and the levels were similar to front row Brixton Academy. Hoping this holds true at a real gig but looking great so far.

I have spent only 4 days of intense shooting with the camera but i can tell that i am delighted with the camera. It has a great functionality as camera and as a smart device ( full functioning smart phone w/o the phone part ). Camera focus is relatively fast for the class of the camera, "smart" presets are really nice ( HDR function on such a small camera is a killer ), video shooting is great. I can keep the list of nice features going but no need.On the down side - battery is getting drained faster than i would like ( there are charging kits - charger + battery sold in Amazon for a good price of about 25-30 pounds thought... so if you plan a full day walk w/o power plug, buy one ). The other thing that bugged me is that from stand by mode it takes a long press of the power button to wake it up ( about 2secs ) instead of shutter press...And a warning - if you have Galaxy Nexus phone - Wifi Direct connection wont work ( from what i got searching the net its about the different type of NFS that GN is using compared to Samsung S3/4 phones )In general - if you are "casual" photographer/traveler and you are not crazy all about the "professional quality" and you are tired of carrying heavy bags with big cameras and lenses, or you are crazy about sharing pics "on the moment" - this is a good choice of a camera.