Dvd Camcorder?

Question

which one should i buy a mini dv camcorder or a dvd camcorder, what i know is on a mini dv you can do long play and record upto 2 hours of video however is it true that on a dvd disk you can record only 30 mins? how much can you record on a dvd disk for a dvd camcorder and is there any thing like long play to make the 30 mins longer?

Answer 1

well to get a really nice picture on a dvd camcorder you gotta spend a little extra. dvd's recording times are ....

60min

30min

19min

not down to the second, and sometimes it may be a minute or so difference. obviously the higher you set the quality the less recording time there will be. But if you get a camcorder that supports DL (dual layer) discs then you can buy dvd+R DL and have twice the time to record. also they sell double sided discs also.

Answer 2

A MiniDV camcorder, consumer format, has standard and long-play recording times. Standard time matches the time on the tape, LP is 1.5x as long. Tapes are typically in 60min (12GB) and 80min (16GB.. some pro-quality tapes in 63min and 83min), so you can get about 120min (2 hours) on an 80min tape in LP mode.

The key here is that format-wise, DV is DV is DV... SP and LP modes record exactly the same quality video. There's also a professional mode, DVCAM, which also does, only yielding 40min on a 60min tape. The reasoning here is simple: faster recording yields a more reliable tape read-back.

On DVD, you're recording in MPEG-2 format to an 8cm DVD, which stores about 1.4GB of data. MPEG-2 certainly crunches down better than DV, but you're still talking a 10x advantage with the DV camcorder.. you do a bit better with the dual-layer 8cm DVDs, which store 2.6GB.

Like most "computer style" camcorders, the format is "just data", so it can be written at different rates. The top quality on any DVD camcorder is the maximum DVD video rate, which is about 9Mb/s. At this rate, you can fit about 19 minutes on a single sided DVD, 35 minutes on a dual-layer disc. This can be extended to 30 minutes (6Mb/s) or 60 minutes (3Mb/s), at the cost of quality. DV (depending on the camera) is better than the top quality here, though pretty comparable, particularly in a consumer camera, where the sensor and lens are also limiting factors.

The advantage to DVD, of course, is that you have that disc to play directly in your player... assuming, of course, your player is compatible with the disc format you're using (DVD-R, DVD-RDL, etc). However, DVD-R is the fastest growing camcorder format in the consumer market, having outsold DV in 2007... so this is likely to be popular enough. And pretty much all PCs read these, so your transfer for edit is very quick (though editing will be slower if you don't have a very fast PC).

Answer 3

yes, if u adjust the quality of the cam, it can save more time, but i would rather recommend hdd or flash memory cams, because u can record as much as u want, much more than dvd cams, and they are worth the price, flash memory is cheaper than hdd cams, and plus memory cards can be cheaper if purchased at factory stores or liquidation stores, really cheap alternative than spending on dvds