HP Photosmart M517 Digital Camera

     As I mentioned earlier, the HP Photosmart M517 we received was not a refurbished product, ours was new and in the original packaging. I can not say that all of the cameras are new as the Computer Geeks website states that the items in the package are new and refurbished. Regardless, I was very pleased to find a new camera worth $199 in a package deal that only costs $175.

     HP ensures you have everything you could possibly need for your new camera, right down the the wrist strap and rechargeable batteries. One thing I really like about this particular camera is it comes with it's own power supply so you can recharge the batteries inside the camera as well as use an external power source when transferring images to your computer or directly to a printer.

     The M517 digital camera is a little bulky compared to most cameras you see today as it measures 4.25" x 1.3" x 2". If size isn't important to you, the M517 is a real nice camera for the price. It comes with 32mb of built in memory and has an SD memory slot. One of the biggest selling points of this camera is it can take photos at 5.2 Megapixels and and has 8x Digital Zoom. The M517 also has a mini USB port for connecting directly to your computer to download photos or you can connect it directly to a photo printer, such as the HP Photosmart 335 which is included in the package deal.

     Here is a side view of the camera where the batteries are located. Also located in this same area is the SD memory slot.

Camera top view. Here you see the still photo button on the left and the video button on the right.

     Above we see the back view of the camera. Here we have all the controls for zoom and for navigating the menu. Here we also have a 2" bright indoor and outdoor color LCD screen. It's pretty difficult to show you what the menu looks like in a photo, but the menus are very east to navigate and are pretty much self explanatory. HP has done a real nice job of making the M517 very easy to use.

     The bottom of the camera features a tripod mount and a Camera Dock that works with M-Series HP camera docks.

     As for software, HP has always been great about giving the consumer a great software package. This particular camera comes with HP's Image Zone v4.5 for Windows XP and 2000. It also comes with Image Zone Express v1.1 for Windows ME, 98, and 98SE.