what camcorder to buy?

[looney]

My Uncle is looking to buy a camcorder, something small and portable and relatively cheap, like under £200, but i'm not that clued up in this field, so not sure what to recommend or get, help!

I was thinking of either mini dv camcorders, but not sure about there size, hdd camcorders but again not sure baout the size and quality, or these new pocket hd camcorders you get that record on sd cards.

ive been looking at the Sanyo Xacti VPC-CG10 HD Camcorder which costs around £150, but i have no idea how good these camcorders are and there limitations and so on.

any help would be appreciated.

thanks in advance

[fuddam]

quick cut ' n paste job:

>>>>>>>>>
1) Quality: Sony, Canon, JVC, Panasonic, with Sony prob the best / most robust

2) Video Quality: MiniDV tape is better quality than using a camera with a harddrive or DVD capture. Both of the latter types are becoming more popular, but the video is more compressed, so after you edit it, one winds up with real crap. If intending to edit the video, better to use a camera based on tape, although HDD & DVD are more convenient.

3) Optical image stabilising (not electronic - it messes up the video quality something chronic)

4) Optical zoom (ignore any digital zoom - again, just churns out crap. all cameras offer it, but ignore the fact)

5) any option that allows external microphone to be attached is good, but prob not going to find it easily. onboard microphones are crap, but will prob have to accept that will be only option.

6) firewire connection (1394a) is better than USB2, though might find USB is the flavour of the day now.

7) HD vs SD - prob find only SD available under that budget - not a big deal, since not going to be that great with a smaller camera

8) 16x9 option is preferable over 4x3 aspect ratio. Dunno how feasible though, with that budget. I don't have it myself, since my camera is kinda old by today's standards

9) 3 chips is better than 1, though again unlikely to find it

10) Dv-In is nice, but not necessary. All cameras over DV-Out, but DV-in is useful, if available.
<<<<<

If wanting just for youtube, SD DV (rather than any flavour of HD) will be fine. Also, when it comes to editing, you need a newish machine to edit HD/HDV without pulling out your hair. If it records in AVCHD/H.264, you REALLY need a fast machine.

the ones that record to SD card are also AVCHD format...

[Agent]

Gadget show did a small round up this week: http://fwd.five.tv/gadget-show/blog/candid-camcorders

Not in depth though

[looney]

cheers for the replies, never knew minidv was better quality, still a bit confused on the wide range of options!

i've narrowed it down to the panasonic sdr-s26 and sdr-h80, the latter being a hdd model, but not really sure hwich one would be better, one review said the h80 has poor video quality, plus its £70 quid more then the s26.

[fuddam]

well, I wouldn't say minidv is better than some of the more recent codecs for quality, BUT it is better for editing, as it is less compressed AND you have a low budget....

you could buy one of those Xacti (eg) or Flip HD etc, since they shoot in HD, but just as long as you know it's harder to edit, and strictly speaking, not designed for editing. They do have a benefit of shooting in 16x9, esp if you want to output on your widescreen telly.

hehehe - not trying to make your life difficult - lol

[collettnj]

I have an SDR-S26 and the zoom is amazing - it's a great little camera to use and feels very well made.

The video quality isn't amazing, but its good enough for what i've been using it for. In lowlight conditions however it gets pretty grainy, though not as bad as some. The inbuilt microphone is brilliant imo.

[looney]

^ is it dvd quality?

also which is better a sd card cam or one with a hard drive?

the hard drive one is the sdr-h80 which is like £250 and seems to have the same spec as the s26, but not sure which platform would be better.