GoPro 3 black edition Amazon ratings.

[UgashikBob]

I have a DJI F550 and planned on eventually equipping it with GoPro Hero 3 black edition because it seemed so widely used and accepted. When I went to Amazon to order it there were 418 customer reviews. Of those there were 146 that rated it a 1 or most negative. The complaints were most reliability issues but included a little bit of everything from video quality to battery life etc. I can understand writers singing praises but see no motivation to write a negative review. Any comments on this or other options I might pursue for video on a F550?

 

[PeteDee]

Loving both my black and silver h3. A couple of updates on both have them pretty well sorted now.

Pete

 

[UgashikBob]

PeteDee:
I live in a very remote area and our internet is satellite based with very limited bandwidth so I can only watch the you tube and other videos on the lowest of resolutions and you really can't evaluate anything at that rate. Seems like nothing else in the GoPro's price range to compete. What features of the Black make it worth $100 more than the silver?

 

[ChrisViperM]

Hi Bob.....With the GoPro it's like with a lot of other products....it became a live-style product. Because of that, a lot of people are buying it just because of that...it's very present in the internet and got the "I have to have it" factor. I am not saying it is a useless product which just get's sold because ther is a hype, but it also get's sold to people who know a little bit about image quality, and then the GoPro doesn't meet their expetations, also the firmware seems to have a few issues (64GB memory cards for example). I guess the bad customer reviews on Amazon (althought Amazon would be the least place to look for good product reviews) might be due to hyped expectations which heven't been met by reality. I use a GoPro HD3 Black as well, but more for practical reasons: It fit's perfectly on my TBS Disco and all up-coming brushless gimbals are geared towards the GoPro....I also use a Drift HD Ghost for my motorbike, and the overall image quality from the Drift is for me personally far more superior....also no issues with Firmware at all. If I could, I would sell the GoPro and only use the Drift HD Ghost....but it's always in the eye of the beholder.


Here is a good comparison of the different cameras:

http://www.hurtlegear.com.au/news/38/8-Reasons-Why-Drift-Is-Better-Than-GoPro.html
http://www.hurtlegear.com.au/comparechart.pdf
http://www.hurtlegear.com.au/news/27/
http://www.definitionmagazine.com/j...-drift-innovation-hd-ghost-action-camera.html

If you have a slow Internet and find it hard to watch movies online, why not download them over night (if you use Firefox).....https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video-downloadhelper/?src=search


PS: At the end of the day it's always a risk to buy something what you have not seen in person....



Chris

 

[SMP]

Chris, does the Ghost HD do away with the "gopro" fisheye look??

We have a love and very often hate relationship with our Gopros. We're up to 3 original HDs 6 HD2's and 7 Blacks (we use them for Bcam timelapse). WHEN they work we love them. Blacks are much better in low light than previous editions, the smaller size and the 1920x1080 @60FPS rocks. Downside is they seem to hate 32gb sandisk cards and have all kinds of lockups and battery issues. We're now trying the cheap 32gb transcend cards as supposedly that helps. We'll see.

I too would LOVE to get away from gopro as they are no longer dependable; but the fact remains, they are the leader at this point. And search all you want, as Chris points out 90% of small cam stuff (builds, gimbals, accessories) are justifiably built for the Gopro.

Edit - Sry I missed the whole point. Key Features of Black over Silver. Silver is the older HD2 Sensor repackaged. New sensor is MUCh better. White Balance is much better. Available Resolutions are much better.

 

[ChrisViperM]

Chris, does the Ghost HD do away with the "gopro" fisheye look??

Not really, like in the GoPro, you set the field-of-view in the camera menue....three choices there: wide, medium, narrow....the wider you go, the more fish-eye. I prefer the medium FOV on both cameras, , good compromise for me. If you need some specific lenses for the GoPro, have a look here:

http://ragecams.com/shop/gopro-hero2-hero3-lenses-c-72.html

Not cheap, but depending what you are looking for, you might find something.



If I compare the vids from both cameras, with the GoPro I always have the feeling there is some invisible sort of "greyish magenta" color filter involved (didn't find any better words)....but it's easier if you watch some comparison vid's:

GoPro HD3 right side, Drift HD Ghost on left side:

Here is the manual of the DRIFT HD ghost: http://driftinnovation.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Manual-4th-Jan1.pdf



But we could team up and try the different cam's with some of these activities: :tennis:
http://www.gaskrank.tv/tv/motorrad-fun/die-bestengeilsten-jumps-gross-11947.htm


Chris

 

[kloner]

my black has the latest firmware, 32g memory chips they sell on the gp site and mine won't do anything but 1080 60p, 30p and all the 720 modes. it will not record 2. or 4k anything for more than a minute. the camera just stops recording like you pushed the start/stop button. POS. untill i upgraded it the first time all the modes worked. at least with the last upgrade you can download the data through the cameras usb port without it kicking the port down to usb1 mode. I pretty much gave up on it for work.

 

[ghaynes]

If you get one that works count your blessings. I went through two of them. Sent them back to GoPro for refund. Same opinion as Kloner. Was given another at NAB and so far it is working fine. But I am not using any of the bells and whistles. Just the camera, no wireless WiFi, no wireless controller. Just the battery. Keeping fingers crossed. Probably one of the most negative comments, and overall comments I have ever seen on Amazon.

 

[Debian Dog]

I think my only real complaint is the battery life. It is not horrid but you can not do a time lapse for much more than 2 hours.

I played with the 2k and 4k stuff but never could really think of a reason I would need it... today. It never locked up but I have not played with it for more than 30 mins either.

I do no have any SD card issues. (I have a Polaroid 32 GB class 10) I use an external SD card reader as it seems slow off the camera. The one time I did have an issue I read that you can't have other stuff on that card and since I formated it and let only the GoPro write to it, NO issues.

Once in a while I will get a weird anomaly where it locks up while charging off USB. I think an easy fix for that would be to spend the $20 on Amazon and just get the external charger and extra battery.

I had some issues with the color and recording in full sun (at a certain angle) that seemed to be corrected with this ND filter attachment.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12psgQFBNbU

I really like that I can check my picture framing and recording mode with the WiFi via my Android phone before taking off. Then cut the WiFi off and go.

It is a $400 camera I do not know what people expect. My last 2 cameras were $3500 and $5000. I say for $400 this thing does a pretty fair job.

 

[ghaynes]

Debian I think that they expected it to be trouble free like the Hero 2. None of the types of issues encountered with the H3 seemed to happen with the H2. The problems were so bad and service so poor that the CEO posted an apology letter.

 

[Debian Dog]

Debian I think that they expected it to be trouble free like the Hero 2. None of the types of issues encountered with the H3 seemed to happen with the H2. The problems were so bad and service so poor that the CEO posted an apology letter.

Well working in IT myself I am sure the technical folks told management "it is not ready to go" and the CEO and his minions were like "This f'er is shipping before Christmas! Period!" The V2 did not have built in WiFi or all the features either. But I get your point.

 

[UgashikBob]

After watching all the comparison video's is doesn't leave much doubt who wins the video quality award. Anyone have any idea what kind of range you get with the iPad app for the Ghost?

SMD: For what it is worth I have had nothing but good luck with the 32GB Transcend cards and they win the value award.