MiniDV vs HDD camcorders (help me decide)

[b0ld]

Just making this thread to see if anyone is involved in the industry/sales involving camcorders and can offer any advice.

I'm thinking about purchasing a sony dcr sr45 hdd camcorder. I've been reading up on +/- reviews on hdd camcorders. Been seeing things about how hdd camcorders compress the video formats to a degree where sometimes the quality isn't all that there opposed to minidv. Also some concerns raised when if the hdd crash's your pretty much SOL...

Benefits of course is being able to drag and drop video files directly onto my computer... not having to worry about tapes..

Anyone ever experienced with either formats? whats your take?

[inside]

As an x pro in the electronics game, I would say that a flash format is the best way to go. Way longer battery life, less moving parts so less chance of somthing going wrong, easy transfer of files over to the pc/mac.

One thing that I didn't investigate in my career was being able to change the sensitivty of the mic. I hate watching videos of show where the audio clips. If you find such a camera let me know.

Option B would be to go with a hdd. Way longer recording times, and you don't have to buy any extra dvds. You only get about .5 hour per dvd on dvd quality setting. I think two dvd cost about $12, and you would have to finalize if you want to play in dvd player, or transfer the files to the pc/mac by popping in the dvd. I'm not sure what the file transfer is like just hooking up the dvd cam to the pc, you might have to record in at realtime, which would suck.

[stephen_c]

join/ask/learn The Digital Video Information Network

[thebobman]

MiniDV is a (nearly) dead format. SD cards are plenty cheap enough to make the cheap cost of a MiniDV tape a moot point.

[decypher]

I've heard of compatibility issues using the hdd compression format with Final Cut Pro. It would take a mac running intel processors and the latest updates for it to be compatible i believe. I've also heard that working with the compressed format from the HDD camcorders takes a lot more computer resources.