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Suggestions when Looking for a Camcorder

If you are selecting a new camcorder, one of the most important decisions to make is the recording medium that will store your movies. Choosing a storage media first will significantly reduce the number of camcorders you need to consider, this will make later feature-based decisions easier. Let's review the different types of recording media available as well the types of user/usage each media is best suited for.

== Tape Camcorders ==

Despite being the oldest form of recording medium for camcorders, tape results in the highest grade recordings for camcorders. When using tape as a recording media, the image goes through the least amount of compression so the video recording preserves the highest level of image quality. In addition to providing best images, tape-based camcorders are usually cheaper than camcorders that make use of other recording mediums.

One downside to tape-based camcorders is that the tapes are constrained as to how much can be recorded on them to somewhere in the area of 60 - 90 minutes. But the recording tapes are relatively cheap to get, so carrying additional tapes is usually not much of an issue. An additional consideration with tape-based camcorders is that to get your movies onto a format you can share with others (a DVD for example) requires that you download your movie to a computer first. The uploading transfer takes place in real time. So if you are going to upload a 90-minute recording to your computer, it will actually take 90 minutes. You also can't carry out any type of editing (other than backing over the tape and recording anew); any editing that you are going to do has to take place on your computer.

Tape-based camcorders are mostly intended for two sorts of users: people who want high quality recordings, and people on a budget.

== Hard-Drive Camcorders ==

Camcorders that use hard disk drives (HDDs) tend to give the longest possible recording times. With normal amounts of compression, you can usually get as much as 10 hours of recording time on an HDD camcorder. With an HDD camcorder, you never need to buy additional tapes. With some HDD camcorder models you can edit your recordings right on your camcorder. And when it is time to upload your footage to your computer, the upload rate will be substantially faster than when transferring movies from a tape-based camcorder.

The primary knock against with HDD camcorders is that the recorded images are typically very compressed and this results in poorer image quality. HDDs themselves are also relatively high on power consumption and can be more easily ruined by drops or environmental extremes (as can your camcorder itself). But if you break your tape-based camcorder, while the camcorder may be dead, you still have the tape. In the case of an HDD-based camcorder, if the camcorder is ruined, you are unlikely to get your existing movie off the camcorder.

HDD camcorders are very versatile and they are principally meant for the home user.

== DVD camcorders ==

Camcorders that record directly to a DVD as their recording media are a good selection for folks who want a recording format that is widely playable and for those without a computer. There's nothing simpler than filming a movie on your camcorder and popping the result right into the DVD player.

The main problem with DVD camcorders is the recording time and the recording quality. The amount of recording time available will depend on the compression employed, but for the best recording quality settings, you usually only get 20 - 30 minutes per DVD. If you reduce the quality of the compression you can achieve increased recording times, but then your image quality is reduced.

DVD camcorders are an excellent selection for those who have no computer since there is no need to download the video off of the camera; it comes off directly on the DVD. If you have a computer, and it's a model that you do not think is appropriate to the higher demands of video transfer and editing, this may also be a good option for you.

== Flash Camcorders ==

As advances continue to be made in the flash memory field, camcorders that use flash memory for recording are becoming increasingly frequent. Solid-state flash is small and is not power intensive, so camcorders with flash memory as a recording media are usually lighter and smaller than other camcorder models. They are also usually more indestructible and are able to take more abuse such as drops. Like many other models, flash-based camcorders require that their videos uploaded to a computer so that the recording can be transferred onto a DVD, but the download is usually very quick for most models.

As with other camcorders that do not record to tape, there may be issues around image quality and compression. Also, based on the size of the flash memory available, there may issues around the amount of the recording time.

If you are searching for the smallest and lightest camcorder on the market, a flash-based camcorder is probably the right way to go.