MiniDV or DVD camcorder ?

King_Cold · Post by **King_Cold** » Sat Apr 19, 2003 3:23 pm

I wanna buy a camcorder and I can't decide if I'm gonna take a DVD cam (should be the DZMV270A from Hitachi)or a MiniDV (don't know wish yet). I don't really know what are the advantages of a DVD over a MiniDV or the downfalls of it. Could you land me a hand here?

I also wonder if a 3 1/4 CCD cam has a significant increase of quality over a 1 1/4 CCD cam or must you be a trained eye to see the difference?

Thanx

iserlohn · Post by **iserlohn** » Mon Apr 21, 2003 1:14 am

I've been shopping for a camera lately myself and think I'm going to go with the Sony TRV38 ($900MSRP, miniDV). The DVD cameras seem to remind me too much of the mini-CDR still cameras - a neat idea but not really practical. DV's nice because you can firewire it right to your hard drive and reuse the tapes (not recommended, but if you're on a budget you do what you gotta do). I don't think they make chibi-DVD-RW's, but I could be mistaken. The only advice I can really give you, though, is to buy sony if you're going under $1G, they seem to make the longest lasting of the low end cameras, even if they DID make the fatal design flaw of moving manual control to the touch screen...

anyhow, enough rambling. Good luck with your purchase!

TaranT · Post by **TaranT** » Mon Apr 21, 2003 12:33 pm

iserlohn wrote:...I don't think they make chibi-DVD-RW's, but I could be mistaken...

The Hitachi uses mini DVD-RAM (3", 8cm). One of the local Circuit City's had both media types on the shelf at ungodly prices; I think it was $10 for the mini-DVD-R and $25 for the mini-DVD-RAM. Those are under 2GB each, so...maybe less than an hour of recording time (I'm guessing).

iserlohn · Post by **iserlohn** » Mon Apr 21, 2003 1:38 pm

ahh, it writes to DVD-RAM. Still, like you guessed, the max is, IIRC, 1 hour at high quality, and maybe 2 if you do it at VCD res instead...I'm willing to swap tapes at the 90 min. mark (DV normal tape in LP mode, you can get up to 2 hours if you buy overpriced 80 min. DV tapes) and get the same res with less worries about jolting the laser too much.

In the end, though, it comes down to what you want to spend and if you think the technology is going to be around for a while. DV doesn't seem to be going anywhere (although Sony finally had the sense to kill off their bastardization known as Digital 8...), so you're probably better off that way, but YMMV.

DreamsofaCobra · Post by **DreamsofaCobra** » Tue Apr 22, 2003 3:04 am

King_Cold wrote:I also wonder if a 3 1/4 CCD cam has a significant increase of quality over a 1 1/4 CCD cam or must you be a trained eye to see the difference?Thanx

I think you can tell the difference, all pro and most semi-pro cams use 3 chips, and for good reason. Question is, what are you shooting that would require the increase in quality? Is this for pro-quality production, or the family picnic? My 2 cents, good technique can make something shot on a 1 chip cam look really good, while average technique will take a 3 chip cams videos look amatuerish. (in other words, the user affects quality more than the camera) So if you are going to take the time to do proper lighting, pre-production, composition, wating for the right timing, etc, then yeah, go for the three chip. you will like the difference. If you are just messing around, save the money and work on other ways of making good home movies.

Also, I would go for miniDV, it is a good and widely accepted format. I dunno about the quality/durability of DVD cams, but it seems kinda gimmiky for me.

The Wired Knight · Post by **The Wired Knight** » Tue Apr 22, 2003 11:23 am

I use a sony DTRV mini dv camera and they're great so I can't emphasize those enough. The quality is great (although the memory sticks will cost you an arm and a leg).

ongakuka · Post by **ongakuka** » Tue Jun 24, 2003 3:36 pm

Get MiniDV. It's a higher quality recording and it's erasable.

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MiniDV or DVD camcorder ?

MiniDV or DVD camcorder ?

Re: MiniDV or DVD camcorder ?