kalmar wrote:
I asked a similar question a while back but my budget was £50. I got an excellent JVC "mini-dv" (which means digital tape) recorder off ebay for £23 in the end.
This type all have a firewire socket which you can get the video out of without needing any special driver on the PC. Works a treat.
It's all about the solid-state ones these days admittedly.
DV is still good! Don't fall for the marketing!
There are great bargains to be had and on paper at least the tech specs of DV are better than some of the solid state cameras. DV is also dead easy to edit unlike MPEG variants. OK so I now edit on an MPEG 2 varient (XDCAM) but if you are on a weedy home computer DV is great. Lets face it I was editing DV happily on a P166 ten years ago.
+ You can stick a DV tape on the shelf and keep it for years. No need to backup your footage or run the risk of losing the footage. Decent Sony tapes are as little as 2 quid an hour and anyone who reuses DV tape is a cheapskate of the highest order.
Also keep in mind that a good SD camcorder will be better than so called "HD" camcorders. Just because you have the pixels doesn't mean you have the resolution. I speak as someone who owns 2 professional HD cameras and my newer more expensive one is far better than the older one.
If you do go for solid state, ensure you get something that edits to an established standard. Nothing worse than to have an OS upgrade and then find the driver for your camera doesn't work and EvilJapanese Corp won't be producing a new driver.