what kind of camcorder hard drive or dvd?

[rapunzal]

My husband is computer savvy so a either would be great. Looking for something easy to use, not too big, and which is better? Will spend up to $500.

[JR6ooo4]

My husband is computer savvy so a either would be great. Looking for something easy to use, not too big, and which is better? Will spend up to $500.

I think the hard drive camcorders start at about $700 and go up.

the mini dvd camcorders only get about 20 minutes per dvd unless you chop down the quality considerably. (THen why go DVD... right?) And the mini dvds are expensive.

we went with DT when we bought one last month. Digital tape is still a digital signal saved and sent to your computer for editing but you can fit about an hour on one little tape! The tapes cost about $15 for a pack of three when I bought them. Save the extra money on a DT version and get an extended battery and extra tapes and a case and, and and...

Mikeeee

[AKLforever]

Harddrive camcorders? I didnt even know they came like that, cool. How much to they cost, and how much can they store? If it works like I guess (and Im a computer tech, a plus) Then it seems like thats the way to go if your working with a person who knows how to use computers. Man, I need to get out of my cave and look around some times, lol, I didnt even know about those. Sheesh :crazy2:

[Groucho]

Neither one will have the video quality of a good tape unit, plus they cost more... basically, you spend more for a jump in convenience but a drop in quality.

The quality is lower because of higher compression (used to fit more video on there), and hard drive camcorders have the further issue of being based on a hard drive, which is going to go bad sooner or later, and when it does, you've probably lost everything on there. Hard drives just have too many reliability issues for me to want to go down that road... and I'm not sure how easy they make it to swap out a bad hard drive for a replacement.

[Jewels*CPA]

I don't know if you would be interested in this or not, but there is a program at called Dazzle premium video editor. It connects to your computer, and then you can plug anything into with RCA cables..for example, if you had a mini DV camcorder, you could plug it into the dazzle, which would then put it directly onto your computer. The dazzle comes with editing software and everything. You can buy it at any Office Depot for $50 (basic version) or the Platinum version for $80. It is neat...I know just a regular DVD recorder is hard to edit.

[JR6ooo4]

I don't know if you would be interested in this or not, but there is a program at called Dazzle premium video editor. It connects to your computer, and then you can plug anything into with RCA cables..for example, if you had a mini DV camcorder, you could plug it into the dazzle, which would then put it directly onto your computer. The dazzle comes with editing software and everything. You can buy it at any Office Depot for $50 (basic version) or the Platinum version for $80. It is neat...I know just a regular DVD recorder is hard to edit.

If you get a digital vidcam then you want to copy the digital file to your harddrive. On my camera, transferring through rca and then doig a capture will be an analog file transfer. If I transfer through the firewire port I get the digital feed.

Mikeeee