How can I connect my sony handy-cam camera to my iMac? Is there something I need to download?

Question

I have still tiger not leopard if that makes a difference... I've tried connecting the usb to the iMac but it won't show anything

Answer 1

I'm assuming that this is a minidv camcorder. You need to connect your mini dv camcorder via a fire wire cord. Your imac, might have a fire wire port, but if it doesn't you will need to purchase one, if it's a laptop make sure it has an extra bay.

Answer 2

Snowwillow is correct - but all Macs have a firewire400 port - they have been standard for almost 10 years. The only exception is the new MacBook Air - no firewire port. iMovieHD will not even recognize that USB is connected for transferring DV. You will need a 4-pin (Camcorder DV port) to 6-pin (Mac Firewire400 port) firewire cable. Firewire, DV, IEEE1394a and i.LINK are all the same thing.

The USB connection is used by iPhoto to transfer stills from a memory card, only... if your camcorder has this capability.

If your camcorder is hard drive or flash memory based, you will use USB - but the camcorder should mount like any other mass-storage device and you need to copy the files from the camcorder to the Mac... and use StreamClip

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/vi...

to convert the hight compressed MPEG2 files into something iMovie can use. Once converted, you can import to iMovie.

If you are using a DVD based camcorder, your best bet is to get an external drawer loading DVD drive like those from LaCie

http://www.lacie.com/us/products/range.h...

Finalize the disc in the camcorder, take it out of the camcorder and put it into the drawer loader - NEVER put a small or odd-sized disc in a slot loader - you will break the drive and scratch the disc.

Then you will need to download and install HandBrake

http://handbrake.fr/

to rid the video from the DVD. After the video has been ripped, you can import to iMovie.

Answer 3

Technically you can connect most new Sony Handycams via USB, but you will get significantly reduced quality, and you must enable USB streaming in the camera's menu. It's mostly so you can use it as a webcam though, and not for video capture.