Traveler Digital Camera

With all of Peter‘s talk about his digital cameras, I figured I’d throw my own hat into the ring.

A few weeks ago, I purchased a Traveler 6.31 Megapixel Digital Camera, from, of all places, Aldi. As mentioned in the comments, the camera appears to be a rebranded Vivitar Vivicam 4000.

Thus far, the camera has worked wonderfully. To start with, it came loaded with accessories – 2 Lithium Ion batteries and charger, a car adapter for charging on the go, a small carrying case with belt loop and plenty of cables for connecting your camera. The 128MB SD card was a bit small, but I have others (more on those another time).

The quality of the pictures has been solid, but I must admit that I haven’t used it nearly as much as I should have. I’ll try and put it through some paces one of these days.

As I understand it, this camera went for $269 over the Christmas holidays, and even at that price it would seem to be a pretty good deal. When I bought mine, they were apparently clearing them out, because it cost only $169, making it seem like a complete steal. I’m very happy with it thus far, but I’ll keep you posted on that if it changes.

Update May 26, 2006: I encountered the “take a couple pictures and the battery dies” problem myself. Thus far, no resolution. It seems that I can take somewhere between two and five pictures and then the camera shuts down, despite the battery having a seemingly full charge.

Luckily the batteries used by the camera are fairly common, though somewhat less so in the US than in the UK. I have found them here (charger here if you need one).

Free shipping on orders over $50, though I’m not sure how long that offer lasts. I’ve used this site before, and their products seem to work just fine – or they have in the past, at any rate. Let me know your experience if you use them and I can update the information here. I haven’t yet decided if I’ll invest more money in this camera or get a new one.

Update August 8, 2006: I ended up purchasing two of the batteries and a new charger from Atbatt.com (as linked above). I used them somewhat extensively on a trip last week, and they worked wonderfully. I have tried charging the old batteries, and they still aren’t working too well, but at least the camera is working again.

Update: Alas, the camera itself finally died, due to my own problems (I dropped it). For some reason, the camera works to some degree – it will go through menus and whatnot, but it won’t actually go through with the taking of any pictures or anything. So I’ve moved on. I have another Traveler camera, and I’ll post a review of it soon. It does not take these batteries, however, so if anyone needs any, contact me using the link below if you need some and make me a fair offer if you’re interested.

Update: The camera and all accessories have been sold. Thanks!