Looking at flash memory Camcorders - suggestions please

[bgiddins]

Looking to get a camcorder (baby on the way!) - but I've never owned one. From doing some reading, I would like one that records to flash media (SD cards etc) rather than DV or DVD. I like the look of the Canon FS11 (or the upcoming FS22), but apparently the video quality is crap judging from a number of consumer reviews.

Any suggestions? I don't need HD (don't even have a HD TV to watch it on), but obviously will eventually have HD TV one day - have a budget of around $700 USD to spend. Are there good SD (or entry HD) camcorders for this sort of money that don't have "budget" video quality that have flash media?

 

[csshih]

There's very basic, average, rough, easy guess to find out which camcorder has high quality.... the lens size.. bigger lens size normally means a relatively bigger sensor, which gives you better quality.

Problem is, better quality, higher bitrate, which means, more bandwidth.. less video time on an SD card.

The SD card-only camcorders are built for portability, not quality.


Also, another limitation;
well, see, lets look at a blue-ray disc. they're true high definition, and one disc can store 50 GB.

The current biggest SD card you can buy is 32 GB.. runs from 100$ to 300$ for the card itself. pretty expensive.

Also, of course, higher bandwidth, you need better circuitry, and more power along those lines.


I don't know. I might just be rambling at this point.

 

[glasseye]

I purchased six Flip camcorders to use in a video class. The students (mostly high school students) loved them, as did I. Great sound, good but not stunning picture, incredible ease-of-use. Excellent value at about $125 in summer of 08.

They have a hi-def version now, but editing its footage may be problematic. The SD Flip works perfectly with Windows Movie Maker, which is free with Windows.

 

[Flying Turtle]

We got my son a Samsung SC-MX20 for Christmas. At the time most places sold them for about $200, but we found one at BJ's for about $170. All other similar ones (flash memory) were at least double, but probably better since they were Canon, Sony, Hitachi, etc. On paper, anyway, it looked pretty good. I saw them for sale everywhere in late Nov. By Christmas you couldn't find one, so I guess they were popular.

My son says it works fine, but I don't think he's really played with it much. I checked some reviews before buying, and there seemed to be more raves than rants. I figured it had to be better than the flip ones for not much more money.

Geoff

 

[gorn]

I currently have a Sanyo Xacti model that is water proof to 5 feet or so. It is an easy to use unit that takes nice video. I haven't taken it in the water but I thought that would be a nice feature to have. As to buying expensive 32Gb SD cards. There is no reason to. I usually run a 4 gig card and have not had a problem with the card filling up. I think the battery would die before that happened.

That is something you should consider. If you get one of these camcorders you probably will want to get an extra battery for it.