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camcorder harddrive or dvd
tjoh84 - 21/7/08 at 04:06 PM

as title looking at a camcorder have any of you got a harddrive cam or a dvd i want what ever will give best quality. this is for every day use and not in car

if happy with yours what one you got thanks tery
iv been looking at sony dcr-sr290e
http://www.which.co.uk/reviews/camcorders/sony-dcr-sr290e/review

BenB - 21/7/08 at 04:11 PM

Don't bother with the DVD ones, they're shite. The recording time on the little DVDs is rubbish. Hard discs are much bigger capacity. Personally, though I'd make a decision based upon the quality of the optics. I used a semi-pro camcorder and even on bog standard miniDV tapes it knocked the socks off even quite expensive home cameras.... The quality was awesome.
If I was buying anything now it'd be a semi-pro HD camera like the Sony HVR-A1E.

tjoh84 - 21/7/08 at 04:19 PM

ow sorry and want to be around 550 to spent or less if can lol

nitram38 - 21/7/08 at 06:28 PM

Neither dvd or hardrive, get an Xacti hd1010 sd card camcorder.
HD 1920 X 1080 pixels. Image stabiliser and face recognition. SD cards of 8gb last about 83 mins, battery about 120mins. 10X optical zoom. No moving parts for recording so should last longer. I am hoping to order mine at the end of the week (ebay...hong kong though, about £370 delivered).

tjoh84 - 21/7/08 at 07:55 PM

let me know how you find please when you have yours

nitram38 - 21/7/08 at 08:54 PM

quote:
Originally posted by tjoh84
let me know how you find please when you have yours


It may take a while to get it so I suggest what I did and that is to research it on the internet and then go to currys and try the lesser hd1000.
The hd1010 has the face chaser software.

[Edited on 21/7/2008 by nitram38]

Hellfire - 21/7/08 at 09:32 PM

I have a DVD Camcorder, and I can safely say it's NOT SHITE.

Yes the DVD's do not hold much information at maximum resolution (1Hr/side at standard resolution). The one I have certainly isn't SHITE... it depends what it is you want. If you want Video suitable for Home/Web working then it's fine at lower res. can't see the point in using a 1Tb drive that takes hours to re-format or is difficult to navigate. I do however concurr with the lens quality. My Panasonic has a great lens, colour is accurate and reliable even at lower res. which is enough for what I use it for.

If your using it at the lower resolutions (non-HD or just TV) then I'd go MiniDV Tape not Hard Drive or DVD just because it's more reliable/proven/robust.

Navigation on DVD is awesome and re-format take 20 seconds or so - I have no gripes with mine and I've had it for about 7 years with no problems at all. (In defence of my DVD Camcorder - which isn't SHITE!)

Steve