Go Underwater with Sanyo's Waterproof Camcorder

Sanyo camcorders are not something extraordinary in terms of image quality or performances, but they sometimes manage to make quite an impact on the general public.

Take for instance the Sanyo Xacti E1, which might be the first waterproof camcorder. It won't make you an underwater explorer, but it will allow you to record video and images five feet deep for up to 30 minutes. This means it's more suitable for swimming pool activities and amateur underwater footage.

Undoubtedly, it can be lots of fun, not to mention it will save you the trouble of buying an underwater case, provided that you know its limitations.

But enough talk. Let's see some specs. The Sanyo Xacti E1 is able to record both full 640x480 resolution video at 30 frames-per-second and high-resolution 6-megapixel digital still images, all of which are stored on SD or SDHC flash memory cards.

Regarding compression, the E1 uses the AVC/H.264 video compression, which makes the resulting files up to 25% smaller than those of typical MPEG-4 cameras. The problem with this format is the hardware requirements for playback, but given the 640x480 resolution, this won't be such a problem.

The result is high-quality video recording up to a total of 10 hours of full motion video with an 8 GB SDHC memory card (TV-HQ mode). The Xacti E1 can also record up to a total of 5 hours of video with a 4 GB SDHC memory card, up to 2.5 hours with a standard 2GB SD card, and up to 1.25 hours with a standard SD card.

The Xacti E1 digital media camera features a 5x optical zoom with a bright maximum aperture of f/3.5. Consisting of 9 groups and 12 total lenses, the E1's lens provides a field-of-view equivalent to that of a 38-190 mm lens in 35mm terms.

If the Sanyo Xacti E1 tickles your fancy, it can be purchased for approximately $500.

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