Sony MHS-PM1

With the huge success of the Flip Mino HD, Sony has had to get in on the act. The result is the PM1, the first Sony pocket video camera, able to shoot in 1080p HD and take stills at five megapixels.

The design shows typical Sony flair: to switch it on you just spin the lens round from its hidden position. It rotates through 270 degrees so you can shoot with it held almost flat as well as in the usual mobile-phone style position. Or you can swivel the lens all the way round to face you.

This is a camera designed for teens and 20-somethings, and it shows in the PM1’s emphasis on light weight and simplicity over absolute video quality. Behind the plastic lens there’s a basic focus-free, fixed focal-length arrangement; the zoom rocker control on the back is a digital zoom, not optical. There’s no image stabilisation either, not even the electronic variety.

Plug it into a USB port and as well as the main storage, you’ll see a read-only virtual drive pop up in Windows Explorer. From here you can launch the PMB Portable viewer software directly, with no need to install.

The software is basic: you can view videos and upload directly to YouTube and Picasa but there are no editing facilities, not even to trim clips, and none on the camera itself or the driver CD. One trick we do like is the ability to set the camera to mass storage or webcam mode when connected via USB, although the fact that the drivers are supplied on CD, not the device itself, potentially limits its usefulness.

Image quality isn’t what we’d expected, falling short of the Flip Mino HD and the Kodak Zi6. Detail rendition was fine but contrast was remarkably poor, and there was noticeable blooming around bright objects.

It’s good enough for basic video blogging, reportage and silly videos but that’s about it. Sony continues to cling to Memory Stick as its flash memory format too, and unlike its competition it uses a USB cable rather than a neat flip-out connector.

Our final gripe is that the PM1 doesn’t charge over USB – you need to take out the battery and use the charger. It’s not a great first pocket-video outing from Sony.

Author: David Fearon