Question about small hand held digitial camcorders

[wdwlovers5]

Hello all: I am new to the photography board and gotta say you all take such great photos and are so knowledgeable. I thought I might be able to ask a question about the inexpensive hand held digitial camcorders - the one's that run from $99 to $199 - I saw these two brands :
CAA-03040S: Digital Video Camera
3.0 megapixel CMOS sensor
2.4" bright color TFT LCD
4x digital zoom
USB interface
16MB built-in storage
SD and MMC compatible for expanded memory

and

Aiptek MPVR 6MP Digital Camcorder

I saw them both at Target and was thinking of getting one of them for my son for his birthday next week to take on his Dracula Tour - he is going to Romania and tour the Dracula sites. They are so small and lightweight I thought they would be perfect but I'm not sure if they would take decent video. At those prices I know they would not be the best but I was wondering if anyone might know if they would be pretty good.

Thanks for your advice. If anyone knows of any others that might be good please also let me know I would pay a couple of hundred dollars more I am looking for the convenience and lightweight capabilities since they will be on the go for 6 days and were advised to travel very very light. Thanks again.
Mary
P.S. Of course I have another motive - we could then use it for our annual Disney trips

 

[Anewman]

You can buy MiniDV camcorders for less than $200 now, I would guess that miniDV would give you better IQ, and more recording time per $.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/JVC-...42857/catOid/-13063/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

 

[Groucho]

I would guess that those little things are going to have pretty mediocre quality. I think you'd do better with a basic small digital camera that has a good 640x480 30fps recording mode, ideally one with a true zoom.

Coincidentally, I just added my Romania honeymoon photos to my gallery... we went in 2002.

Hopefully he'll be able to see more than just the "Dracula" stuff - it's a beautiful country especially once you're out of the cities. But there are a few Dracula sites in the Transylvania area that are hard to miss.

Here's the "real" Dracula's castle... 1400+ steps up. We got up about 350 of them.

Bran Castle is usually advertised at Dracula's castle, but he might have been there all of a day or two.

The countrysides are really nice...

But the Bicaz Gorges were my favorite!

 

[wdwlovers5]

for your responses. I believe I will check out the cameras you suggested.

Groucho you pictures are very nice. Thank you so much for posting them. I also checked out the website you posted. The countryside in Romania looks quite interesting. I forwarded them to my son. I don't think that my son will be seeing much of the larger cities - he will be in Bucharest for two days, the first day and the last day. Other than that he will be on a motorcoach touring Dracula's sites. The tour he is going on is specifically for Dracula fans and concentrates on the Dracula sites. Most of the hotels he will be staying in are in the villages. I had seen those 1400+ steps leading to Dracula's castle before. I hope my son does not attempt to reach the top. He is diabetic and has high blood pressure - on top of which he is basically a sedentary person, having a job where he sits behind a desk all day. It's kinda hard to believe that people actually make it all the way to the top. You mentioned you made it to 350 - that's great - myself, I'd be lucky to make it to 50

 

[webshark3]

Go with a cheap DV camcorder over the other ones.

1) Quality will be MUCH better.
2) DV tape is cheap, and can be bought everywhere.
3) DV tape is durable, and near archival quality.

Even Panasonic cheap low end DV camcorders are excellent buys.

 

[Groucho]

Well, he'll have an advantage in the motorcoach that he won't have to worry about getting lost when driving, like we did a few times... or there was the time that the only way to get to our hotel was to drive the wrong way down a one-way street (a hotel worker came out and rode with us to show us!), etc...

I'm sure he'll have a good time. It's definitely worth taking photos! I wish I had my DSLR when I went, but I was pretty happy with my 2mp PnS, and the whole 3 128m cards that I had at the time...!