[homers]

Hi
I have a Sony TRV240E and have had it for 6 years. What quality do you think this camcorder is. I want to get a HD camcorder but they are to expensive and I tend to upgrade my PC more than my camcorder.

Is this a good camera.

Also, I don't understand this. If I went out and bought a £200 really good lens for the camera, would that not make the quality really good? Could I not add a HD lens.

Lastly. Why do some of the latest cameras only have 200X Digital zoom but this has 700X?

Thanks

[raigraphixs]

Originally Posted by homers

Hi
I have a Sony TRV240E and have had it for 6 years. What quality do you think this camcorder is. I want to get a HD camcorder but they are to expensive and I tend to upgrade my PC more than my camcorder.

Is this a good camera.

Also, I don't understand this. If I went out and bought a £200 really good lens for the camera, would that not make the quality really good? Could I not add a HD lens.

Lastly. Why do some of the latest cameras only have 200X Digital zoom but this has 700X?

Thanks

firstly afaik you cannot remove lens on a camcorder, unless you're a camcorder genius. So you cannot replace the lens. Adding a HD lens to your camcorder would not make it HD, as the electronics inside the camcorder need to be replaced to capture the higher resolution.

Digital zoom is not great, not sure whats yours is like, but i guess 200X is the max most makers stop at before it looks bad. You really want the best optical zoom you can get. Yours has a 25x optical which is great.

I want to replace my camcorder because i want something smaller and HD. Thats enough reason for me to upgrade.

Are you happy with your camcorder?, do you use it alot?, you use your pc more i suppose hence it gets updated more. But 7yrs is a long time in electronics, so something new could be better and more responsive, its really up to you.

.

[felix2]

Hi homers,

I've got a Sony TRV245 that I've had for 5 years (well actually a bit less 'cos it replaced a 235 that broke down...). For the last year I've been using a Panasonic GS180, 3-chip camcorder (around £300), which certainly gives a much more vibrant, crisper picture outdoors / in good light. But actually in difficult(-ish) conditions, I still find the old Sony's exposure, white balance, and image stabiliser more reliable. Short story? The Sony Digital 8's are still pretty decent cams and if you're happy with its results, then you don't actually need to fix what ain't broke.

Having said that, for what you paid for the Sony could get you a very nice new SD (standard definition) camcorder now, or possibly even just about a very nice HD one. Technology has improved, and although the manufacturers have been dumbing down camcorders (stripping off useful features and controls) for cheaper models, you could certainly get a noticeable improvement over your current cam if you wanted to spend the money.

There's no way either of changing the lens on your current cam, or of making it HD (the image sensor and electronics / coding system are very strictly SD - it simply hasn't got enough pixels to "see" in HD). For consumer cams, they generally seem to be designed so all the components are set to a similar quality / budget - i.e. moving up the range, the lens, image sensor and extra controls all increase / improve together. So even if it were possible, it's not worth upgrading one part, as the other parts would then let it down.

I'm soon planning to upgrade to a HD camcorder, and the jump in image quality "wow factor" from any SD camcorder (especially a 1-chip 7-year-old one) up to HD is very impressive. There are plenty of threads around here recently about the different options for HD formats and models, but you'll probably be looking at something in the £450-£800 price range.

Digital zoom really isn't worth anything and is best left switched off, as when you start to zoom in using it, it reduces the picture resolution and starts to look rather poor. If you really needed to zoom in beyond what the lens will offer (optical zoom), you can always do the same job in editing software anyway (again reducing - or interpolating - resolution). Optical zoom of 20-25x on the Digital 8's was nice, but anything over about 15x isn't often used all that helpfully because of the amount of wobble you see when you're that zoomed in (unless you've got a good tripod &/or are a wildlife cameraman!).

[homers]

Hi
Thanks for the replies. I think I will stick with this camcorder for a while as I still think the quality is good.

Thanks