Sony Bloggie MHS-CM5

The Sony Bloggie MHS-CM5 ($200 as of April 30, 2010) distinguishes itself from competing pocket camcorders with a pistol-grip design, a 5X optical zoom lens, and a dual memory-card slot that supports both SD/SDHC cards and the MemoryStick format. It shoots reasonably good video and has some nice features, but ultimately it doesn't set itself apart from the crowd in the area of performance.

Unlike most pocket camcorders in stores today, the Bloggie MHS-CM5 looks like a miniature version of a full-size camcorder. And along with its candy-bar-style cousin, the Bloggie MHS-PM5, it's among the first Sony pocket camcorders to shoot 1080p-resolution high-definition video. Both Bloggie models are follow-ups to last year's Webbie camcorders; Sony has simply renamed its pocket-camcorder line.

Aside from having a unique design, the Bloggie MHS-CM5 is noticeably bulkier than most pocket camcorders. It has a built-in USB connector that swings out from a compartment on the side of the camera--a welcome improvement on last year's Webbie models, which used a separate USB cable to offload footage and charge the camera. Because of the camcorder's generous size, its USB connector may have a bit of trouble fitting in some port configurations. Fortunately, Sony includes a female-to-male USB extension cable to alleviate such woes.

The Bloggie shoots 1080p MPEG-4 video captured at 30 frames per second--as well as 720p video captured at 60 fps and 30 fps, 640-by-480 VGA video taken at 30 fps, and 5-megapixel still photos. There's about a second of shutter lag between when I pressed the shutter button and when the Bloggie captured an image, but the image quality is decent and the camcorder's SteadyShot digital stabilization does a good job of reducing any associated shakiness.

Video performance is decent, as long as you're in a well-lit setting. In bright indoor lighting, the Bloggie's 1080p video is a bit darker and somewhat less sharp than output from two competing 1080p pocket camcorders, the Kodak Zi8 and the Toshiba Camileo S20. The 5x optical zoom lens is a great spec for a pocket camcorder, but the Bloggie didn't offer nearly as much coverage on the wide-angle end as our wide-angle winner, the Creative Vado HD. Autofocus has a little trouble at the telephoto end of the zoom, but it ultimately locks in on a sharp image after a second or so of searching. Also, the zoom is the smoothest we've seen on a pocket camcorder, by far.

Shown below are the results of our standard pocket-camcorder tests. Wide-angle coverage is on a par with that of the Kodak Zi8, but footage shot with the Bloggie showed shadowy bands scrolling upward over our test footage.