Which type of camcorder is better?

Question

Hard Drive(60GB) or MiniDV?

Answer 1

Better for what?

Video quality? MiniDV tape.

Ease of archiving and long term shelf-life? MiniDV tape.

Shooting continuously for more than 5 hours? Hard drive - but the video will be automatically broken into 20 minute segments. Plus, unless you are plugged in or have a monster battery, the included battery won't last that long.

For editing? MiniDV tape (import over firewire); HDD copies over USB.

When you drop and break the camcorder, miniDV tape will be easier to get to than the hard drive. And once I get the tape out, I just need to find another miniDV tape camcorder... with the hard drive camcorder, what happened to all that video I have not yet been able to transfer? The hard drives are not easily removable.

Answer 2

HARD DRIVE ANYDAY AND I HAVE BEEN SELLING CAMERAS AND CAMCORDER FOR 5 YRS

Answer 3

The choice between a Hard Drive or MiniDV camera depends on your intended use.

A MiniDV camcorder, records at a higher quality picture (less compression) than a Hard Drive camcorder. This is particularly important if you ever want to edit the video on your computer. You can edit the video from a Hard Drive camcorder, but the finished result will have more compression artifacts and rendering will take longer. The average user will probably not notice the difference in quality.

With a MiniDV camcorder, in order to get your video into your computer you have to “capture” the video in real-time, i.e. an hour of video will take an hour to ingest into the computer for editing. A Hard Drive camcorder records files that can be copied to your computer in seconds.

Because a MiniDV tape holds one hour you have to stop and change tapes each hour of shooting. A Hard Drive camcorder can record for many hours if the hard drive is empty, as long as you have a multi-hour battery. However, hard drive in a Hard Drive camcorder will fill up and you have to transfer the video to either your PC or a DVD in order to record more video. With a MiniDV camcorder, you simply put in another tape and keep going. The MiniDV tape is very durable and great for archiving your raw footage. Tapes ran about $2.50 each from places like www.tapestockonline.com.

Most MiniDV camcorders have an eyepiece viewfinder as well as the flip-out LCD. Most Hard Drive camcorders do not have a viewfinder, so you have to rely on the LCD for shooting and that can get real tiring as you hold the camera out in front of you. It is also harder to hold the camera steady in front of you. A viewfinder allows you to hold the camera against your cheek for added stability.

If you expect to do heavy editing, want the best quality picture, and want a good permanent backup of your original footage, the MiniDV tape based camera will be better. However, to get your video into the computer you will need a Firewire interface unless the camcorder uses USB. Make sure your USB or Firewire interface is OHCI compliant to allow the capture software to control your camcorder.

If you don’t care about a viewfinder and don’t expect to do a lot of editing, the Hard Drive camcorder will be easier for casual shooting, but make sure you have plenty of computer hard drive, or a DVD burner, to offload the files as your camcorder’s hard drive fills up.

Keep in mind that there are other differences between models, such as the presence of microphone inputs, headphone outputs, AV in and out jacks, etc. Make sure the camcorder you buy has the features you need.