David Fiske A subtle blend of affiliate marketing and web development

In the wedding budget, April was the time to order the camcorder. Deciding which camcorder was the result of 2 days worth of research plus 2 days hunting down prices. Some would say that's not very productive and... well, I'd agree!

For all those interested, here's what I found on my journey for a camcorder.
 
The Brief

Nice and simple, simply:

1. Find a good quality camcorder
2. Find the cheapest price

It couldn't have been any easier. However, it turns out that before you go hunting for camcorders, you need to know what format you want: Mini DV, DVD, HDD or flash memory.

As a camcorder virgin, I had no idea what I wanted. What's better? What's worst?

The Format

Mini DV is a mini cassette tape. It's old school. But don't rule it out simply because it's an old technology. I've nothing against the cassette. It allows me to record onto multiple tapes. I'm restricted by the number of tapes rather than the size of the hard drive.

Hard Disk Drives are hard drives built into the camcorder. The benefit here is massive storage. The negatives are that it's not expandable (you'd need something to transfer the data to once it was full (e.g. a portable hard drive?) which means you've got more to lug around) and what happens if it crashes. My computer hard drives have done that. They've had an average life span of 3 to 5 years. Granted they get used more than a camcorder would but it's still a negative point.

DVD's are the modern equivalent to Mini DV, the problem being that there may be capacity issues. Plus, most DVD camcorders look ugly.

Flash memory was my first choice when searching for a camcorder. My SD card is a brilliant piece of kit. So a camcorder that used SD cards would be a sure fire hit. Wouldn't it?

The Brand

Whilst on the hunt, I wasn't impressed by the sample video footage from JVC and Panasonic. There was just nothing to rave about. Sony seemed dogged with technical problems such as this one:



Canon seemed a fairly safe option. I've looked at their digital cameras before and one of those is on my wedding budget for later in the year.

The HV20 vs. the HV30

The HV20 has been recommended before when I asked for advice. Rob's HV20 site has some sample clips on it which I'm really impressed by.

Also on my travels, I found that the HV20 was the winner of numerous 'camcorder of the year 2007' awards. That's a good inkling.

The HV30 is the HV20's big brother. The number's different (30 not 20) which suggests it's got to be better. Unfortunately, going by the number isn't as straight forward as you'd expect as you'll appreciate later.

Anyhow, the HV30 is black (HV20 is silver), some buttons have been tweaked but that's it. It's near enough the same camera underneath.

I would have been happy with either at this point.

The HV20 vs. the HF10

I then stumbled across the HF10. It's a flash memory camera with built in memory as well as an expandable memory slot. It's got better specs than the HV20 ever so slightly.

The HF100 has a bigger number so must be better. Only it's not. The HF10 has built in memory whereas the HF100 doesn't. So that's why the bigger number doesn't necessarily mean better.

The problem here is that it's due out this month and no one seems to have sample footage. Another problem is the lack of a viewfinder.

Overall, my safe bet so far was the HV20. I'd have the HV30 if it was cheap enough.

When Canon release a HV20 crossed with the HF10, they would have the same success that they've had with the HV20 in my opinion.

Buying the HV20

Play was the cheapest place I could find at £569. The only thing there was it's out of stock and their telephone support staff said it typically would take up to 28 days to come back into stock. 'Typically', and 'up to' don't fill me with joy. Incidentally, I've just checked and they now no longer list it on their site so I would have now expected the order to be cancelled.

Amazon, I thought, was a safe bet. I'd much rather shop there. Only their price was £710 yesterday (though today it's £602).

I found this HV20 forum and the advice on there wasn't too helpful on where to buy as it is an international forum. On a side note, it's a great place for sample footage and tips and tricks. Definitely worth a visit.

I tried at least 5 price comparison sites and they were all pants with out of date prices or stock availability (at least Compare Sat Nav is a transparent price comparison with the date and time of the price check).

I then searched google for [HV20 "add to basket"] which worked a treat as it revealed a number of retailers I hadn't considered.

I finally settled on Ask Direct's offer of the HV20 for £570 including delivery. I ordered at 4pm yesterday and it was delivered at 9am this morning. Definitely worth raving about.

First impressions are good. It's lightweight and shiny! The battery is microscopic and is currently charging. It would have been nice for Canon to have thrown in a Mini DV tape but alas they had not so I need to get one of those asap to put the camera through it's paces.

As soon as I can, I'll put my videos on the web for you to sneer at!