Recommend a camcorder to me please!

[MarkBarbieri]

now i remeber my father having a VHS tape that he would put his camcorder tape into and then play directly on the VHS. is there something like that for this?

No. He was using a camcorder that shot on a small version of VHS called VHS-C. It was still VHS but in a different size cartridge. With an adapter a normal VHS player could play it. Your camcorder shoots on a totally different type of tape using a totally different format. It will only play in a MiniDV player.

also what is a memory stick for and do i really need it?

The memory stick is for photos. You will use it if you intend to use your camcorder to take still pictures.

and last the handbook said i could just hook up the camera to the TV and use either VCR / or DVD with burning capability and then play the recorded footage from the camcorder to the tv and recorder onto the VHS/DVD

That is true. You should have a cable that has a little headphone jack looking plug on one side and three plugs (red, white, and yellow) on the other side. If you plug them into the matching "Line In" plugs on your DVD Recorder or VCR, you should be able to record directly from your camcorder to your DVD recorder or VCR. The video quality won't be as good and you'll lose the ability to edit it, but you'll save all of the hassle of using the computer.

BTW, while you probably can hook up your camcorder using a USB cable instead of a Firewire cable, the picture quality will be just awful. It's intended for tranferring low resolution highly compressed video for displaying on the web. Your picture will look something like a webcam picture. It's probably your worst option.

 

[Groucho]

Most of the questions have been answered already, but..

I can certainly believe that a recent PC came without firewire. If anything, firewire is dying thanks to USB2 - the only real advantage for the average user of firewire was faster speeds than USB 1.x, and USB2 is completely ubiquitous, unlike firewire. USB2 is also much more of a standard while firewire is only really used for camcorders. I would expect firewire to die off one of these days, especially when the camcorder designers finally stop making things difficult and let you transfer the ACTUAL DATA ITSELF rather than do real-time capture over firewire. (I know some do let you do it, but most/all DV ones require you to capture the DV. That's kind of defeating the point of a digital camcorder IMHO. But that's a separate rant!)

That being said - yes, installation of a card into a desktop machine is outrageously easy. The hardest part is getting the cover off your machine! Some "big name" companies make it ridiculously tricky, but your manual should help. Ideally you just remove a couple screws and slide the side panel off.

Make sure that you're at least sort-of grounded. Tap the metal of the PC case occasionally - my experience is that static is generally not that much of a danger, but you definitely don't want to be putting shocks through the system.

The firewire card will plug into a PCI slot. Once you have the side off your PC, you'll probably see 2-4 white slots lined up on the motherboard - it shouldn't matter which one you use. Plug it in, use a screw (probably already there) to retain it on the side (this will be obvious when you're actually looking at it), and boot up the PC. It'll find new hardware and may ask you for a driver disk (which'll be included.) If you're feeling really ambitious, you can go to the manufacturer's website and look for a newer driver, but it should work fine with what's in the box.

The cables can be bought from NewEgg (or anywhere), just make sure that you get the right end for the camcorder and for the card (which may or may not have both sizes of plug on it.) You'll save yourself a bunch of money and have the satisfaction of doing it yourself!

As for tape mechanism vs hard drive - well, our camcorder is an old hand-me-down Sony and works perfectly, and I think most are pretty reliable. The big thing is that a tape mechanism problem will probably only either make for slightly poorer quality video/audio (if the head is dirty) or keep you from taking more video - whereas a hard drive will lose everything you've recorded that you haven't moved to your PC. And I am pretty sure that a hard drive will fail much earlier in general, especially if the camcorder is dropped while on.

Ultimately, no system is perfect - but hard drives have been proven over and over to be not reliable storage.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

The big thing is that a tape mechanism problem will probably only either make for slightly poorer quality video/audio (if the head is dirty) or keep you from taking more video

That was the case with analog video, but with digital, it's another story. If your tape heads are dirty or out-of-alignment, it's easy to write data that cannot be read. I've been around the computer industry long enough to know that unreadable tapes are a frighteningly common problem. I've seen lots of failed tapes, lots of crashed drives, and lots of broken tape mechanisms in my time.

No matter how you slice it, both recording media are subject to failures. We can argue all day about what the relative MTBFs are. Even solid state CF card camcorders still have some risk (though much lower than tapes or drives I would wager).

The important thing for people is to take steps to mitigate risk. For the average joe, I think that is easier with tapes because the recording media is a reasonable archiving media as well. I imagine that a lot of people with drive based camcorders leave months of video on their camcorder or simply transfer it to a single drive on their home system.

 

[ntsammy5]

I have the JVC Everio 20 GB and works great.

I have a JVC mini dv that I love and was thinking about the hard drive alternative. How do you like this one?

Thanks.

 

[Groucho]

The important thing for people is to take steps to mitigate risk. For the average joe, I think that is easier with tapes because the recording media is a reasonable archiving media as well. I imagine that a lot of people with drive based camcorders leave months of video on their camcorder or simply transfer it to a single drive on their home system.

I agree 100%. And your point about digital vs analog is a good one, though again, you're still not going to lose any older video that you've shot (as long as it was before the head got dirty/out of whack) unlike with a hard drive one.

(This is also an advantage of a camera that lets you transfer the raw data directly to PCs. I was shocked when I first researched DV camcorders and found that you had to manually capture the data, just like you would off an analog camcorder.)

My dream camcorder would be one that was light enough to carry easily, just big enough to fit in your hands well (like small DSLR size), shot in high-def or DVD format, stored lightly compressed mpeg2 format video which could be natively copied to a PC over USB2 and is ready to burn to DVD (if shot in that resolution), and used some sort of random-access storage that would almost never have any storage problems - like a big flash-memory hard drive. While I'm dreaming, let's have it sell for $250 too.

 

[kitner25]

I've had the Everio since June and haven't had any problems yet. I replaced a VHS-C camcorder and the size of Everio is perfect, much easier to record events when your arm does't feel like its going to fall off. I can record up to 7 or 8 hours of video before I need to download or copy to a DVD. I haven't bought a memory card for it yet for stills and really don't want to use for pics. The battery only last for about an hour, so having a back up would be a good idea. Overall, it's easy to use and not a pain to carry around.

 

[Graeme]

Rosiejo,

I use the DCR-HC24 at work and it's fab. Much the same controls etc. I would look around before you go to the states though, A lot (if not all) of the camera shops along Idrive will sell you old stock for new prices. For instance, The HC24 is now the HC26, but I bet it's still going strong as the HC24 in some of those shops!

There's Ritz cameras in the Mall at Millenia, and another shop there, whose name i cant recall, on the upper level which had up to the minute stock and seemed well priced. (it was all glass and perspex display cases).

Have a look on Kelkoo or pricerunner and there are plenty of UK based online shops doing good deals, (£240 for the HC36), and you get 3 pin plugs in the box.

Whatever you do, Don't go to Global Camera Gallery on I drive near central Florida Parkway.

 

[fuse04]

Rosiejo,

I use the DCR-HC24 at work and it's fab. Much the same controls etc. I would look around before you go to the states though, A lot (if not all) of the camera shops along Idrive will sell you old stock for new prices. For instance, The HC24 is now the HC26, but I bet it's still going strong as the HC24 in some of those shops!

There's Ritz cameras in the Mall at Millenia, and another shop there, whose name i cant recall, on the upper level which had up to the minute stock and seemed well priced. (it was all glass and perspex display cases).

Have a look on Kelkoo or pricerunner and there are plenty of UK based online shops doing good deals, (£240 for the HC36), and you get 3 pin plugs in the box.

Whatever you do, Don't go to Global Camera Gallery on I drive near central Florida Parkway.

Now i am confused. in the Uk and o Sony website it appewars the HC24 is the newwest model but you are suggesting it is not....how does the HC35/36&39 fit into this?

thanks
Fuse

 

[Graeme]

Now i am confused. in the Uk and o Sony website it appewars the HC24 is the newwest model but you are suggesting it is not....how does the HC35/36&39 fit into this?

thanks
Fuse

I've confused myself actually!! I can't remember where I looked for that info, www.simplydv.co.uk has plenty of reviews and info, but according to www.camcorderinfo.com the HC26 is the entry level camcorder. I'm wondering now if they've got different numbers on different sides of the Atlantic. Lots of UK based shops are showing the HC26 in stock though

 

[fuse04]

I've confused myself actually!! I can't remember where I looked for that info, www.simplydv.co.uk has plenty of reviews and info, but according to www.camcorderinfo.com the HC26 is the entry level camcorder. I'm wondering now if they've got different numbers on different sides of the Atlantic. Lots of UK based shops are showing the HC26 in stock though

Yes I think you are correct about the different labels. After I posted I had a quick look and I think the HC24 (Europe) is the same as the HC26 (USA) and can only assume there will be similar numbering differences throughout the range.....doesn't make life easy does it! Not sure why the HC26 would be sold in UK...perhaps the sites have copied text from USA sites?

I am still trying myself to make a decision about a new mini Dv Camcorder, the main sticky point is trying to fet a recommnedqtion for good nights hots in the parksd and fireworks....looking at the Sony hc46 or 96, Panasonic Gs180 or GS300, or maybe the Canon MVX460 (think this is the Elura 100 in USA)

Fuse04

fuse04