Can Anyone tell me about a good Camcorder to buy??

Manchester_Lucy

I'm looking for a decent camcorder but I am completely lost as to what is good and what isn't.

Use: Usual family stuff. Our son is now almost 3 and we're hoping for another so something that is durable and can be transferred to tape/DVD easily to show doting Grand parents etc....!

Price: Ideally about £300 but if someone convinces me that I will get a lot better value for a little bit more money then I'll go for it.

Basically there's a lot of jargon out there and I have no idea what I should be looking for or what combination of features would best suit me. If anyone could speak to me in plain English then I would be most greatful. All I have to go on is looks and that doesn't usually get me far! ;-)

lynseyf

Hi
I don't know much about camcorders but we bought one off of ebay. Canon have a refurbished shop where they sell all their camcorders etc at a lot less than you would find every where else. they are refurbished but come with 1 years warranty so basically as good a guarantee as you get buying from a shop. As you can see they are a lot less than £300 as well, we've had no problems with the one we bought which was a MVX250i, BF chose it though so don't know why we bought that one . If you want one in particular it might be worthwhile checking every now and again as they do seem to get different stock at differnet times.
heres the link to ebay
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Canon-Outlet_Camcorders_W0QQcolZ4QQdirZ1QQftidZ2QQtZkm
and I did a quick search to see if I could find the cameras else where
http://www.shopzilla.co.uk/7S--Camcorders_-_cat_id--11140000__keyword--canon%20mini%20dv__lp--10__mkt_id--22605549__start--15
and found the MV750i for £280.

Manchester_Lucy

Thanks for that.

OK I've looked into it a bit more now. Is a DVD camcorder better than a mini DV or is it the other way round???

Also can do you watch film from a MiniDV? Is this in VHS or can you transfer to DVD (via computer???)?

These questions probably sound really stupid but there is so much choice out there that I really don't know where to start :-(

statman

Mini DV are small tapes that you can play back through the camera but they are not VHS. Presumably you could play the tape back through the camera onto a TV and record(?) the output onto VHS.I have had a Mini DV recorder for a few years now and only recently have I made the effort to go and buy a firewire cable that allows the tapes to be played back through the camera and onto your computer.
In my opinion I would buy a straight to DVD camera so you record directly onto the medium that will play rather than doing those transfers that never get done!!
Please note I am not a techie therefore these are just my thoughts having owned a mini DV, I am not taking quality of picture into account.
Also didn't Aldi have a camera on their weekly offers recently?

Good luck

marco_79

Hi Manchester_Lucy

Buying your first camcorder can be quite a daunting process. The factors you have to look at first are-

1. What you want to do with your footage i.e do you want to edit it or just play it as it is.

2. How much do you want to pay. In genral the more you pay the better camera you can get but there is no use buying a camera with loads of fancy features if you won't use them.

If you want to edit your footage I would advise against a dvd cam as you are going to get a quality loss during conversion. Also dvd cam technology is very young and has a lot to learn.

Personally I prefer mini dv at the moment although some of the new cams with hard drives look like they are going to be the way the industry moves.

Good source of info is https://www.simplydv.co.uk espcially there forum.

Marco

wazza

i'd go for minidv which you can reuse the tape. with the dvd camcorder you can only use the dvd once unless the camcorder is capable to record onto dvd-rw/+rw.

you can connect the camcorder to vhs or pc. most camcorders have built in basic editing feature

Manchester_Lucy

Hey guys, after reading what you've all said about DVD camcorders and miniDV I think I'll go for the MiniDV. I'll probably want to upgrade in a few years anyway so maybe then the DVD camcorderes will offer better value for money.

I've seen this one on Amazon and it seems to be the cheapest around (about £100 cheaper than Argos evan after their 'speacial offer' price)

Sony DCR-HC39E Handycam MiniDV Camcorder (1Mp, 12x Optical, 2.7" Wide Hybrid LCD)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0007NLHAC/ref=wl_it_dp/026-3919359-0790066?%5Fencoding=UTF8&coliid=I3ZGUCJAXIDLQ&colid=2ZNYP464QR471

Can you tell me if it offers good value for money? Another thing, do you need a DVD burner (probably a very silly question) to transfer to DVD through the computer? We only have a CD re-writer but my father has a DVD burner so we could always use his, however he has no firewire.

Cheers, you've all been really helpful!

Lucy