[cathruocco]

After much deliberation I have decided to buy a sony camcorder. The 2 I had in mind were either the dcr hc1000 or dcr pc1000. Can anyone give me any advice on which is best. I want to use the camcorder to put together a short documentary and want good quality footage and sound etc. I can pay up to £1100 if necessary. I've heard all about these 3 ccd's which is why I chose the two sony models.

Oh, and can anyone tell me where I could buy either. I've searched the internet for the dcr hc1000 but according to one website its been discontinued. Is this right? I read a review in what digital camcorder a few months back and can't understand why its been discontinued.

and last question, I promise, are both ok to use with my sony vaio laptop!!! I do all my editing on it.

I would buy a panasonic Gs400 instead. Far better.
Yes they will work through the ilink (aka firewire aka ieee1394) however your hard drive might not be up to the job. A 5600 rpm will strugle, anything slower will be absolute pants. An external 7200 rpm drive with twin firewire ports would be far more stable and would cope with the cam daisy chained through the drive into the PC.

[cathruocco]

thanks for the advice. i've decided to purchase a cheaper model now, as my sony laptop has decided to download a virus (so much for norton anti-virus) and i've taken it to a local dealer so that they can get rid of it. I don't know much about viruses so I thought I'd let the experts deal with it. anyway I wanted a sony camcorder as my laptop is sony and I've heard that other brands are not always compatible with sony computers. I know this is probably done so that you will purchase more sony products but they do get quite good reviews so I don't really mind going for a sony camcorder. so now I'm thinking of something like a hc90 which I've heard is quite good.

Originally Posted by cathruocco

... So now I'm thinking of something like a hc90 which I've heard is quite good.

I hear that the colour reproduction and performance in bad light is very good. The Comet website says it has a 3 CCD chip, but I think they made a mistake. The CCD is a big one, though, (much bigger than the others with 800000 pixels). I think it's a 3 megapixel chip. Here's the Comet info:

Digital camcorder
Product code 245844
Special online price £545.00
Store price £699.88

You can also dub a soundtrack straight on to a previously recorded sequence without using a PC editing suite, unlike the Sony DVD Handycams.

When I get the money together, I think I will go for that one.