This might have been asked before so apiologies if it has.

I'm looking to buy my first camcorder. Looking to spend around £200-£300
I don't have a stand alone DVD recorder so I will have to put film onto DVD via my PC so I guess I will need one with Ilink. Any recommendations?

Also, how much hard disc space will I need to download a 45min tape to the PC?

Thanks

Marcus

[MarkE19]

TBH your best option is to go out and actually hold a few camcorders within your budget. For you to use it you must find it comfortable to hold and only you can decide if that is the case for the camcorder. I doubt you would be dissapointed with any of the cams from Sony, Panasonic or Canon but you do need to decide on the features you need. Will you need good low light recording, widescreen recording etc etc. All digital tape camcorders will have iLink, so that shouldn't be an issue.

Copying footage from miniDV tape to the PC will eat up 1Gb of space for every 4 minutes captured, that's a massive 14Gb per hour or 10Gb for 45 minutes - all space is very approximate. Also remember you will need extra space for editing and file conversion, so I suggest you make sure you have around 30Gb free to edit a 1 hour tape.

Mark.