Camcorder upgrade

[LAURYN]

Hi

Okay I want to upgrade from canon Hi8(yes Hi8)

Looking at sony hc62 or hc 51

Will these give same or hopefully better performance than Hi8

I use ulead to edit and like using tape.

Do not need to go to High Def

Got a budget of upto £200

any suggestions apart from the sony's will be aprreciated, but would like something small.

[senu]

They will give you better than the Hi -8 and they are smaller

As for alternative, The Canon 205/ 235 are felt to be better VFM although absolute video qualty is probably similar
The Panasonic Gs 330 is another but dont pay over the odds insofar as the Sony models are not necessarily the best in that litle group of pocket friendly MiniDV camcorders

[LAURYN]

Ho do you rate canon fs100

[senu]

It is different technology
it is an entry level mpeg2 camcorder which seem well made but will not be used in any serious type video
I rate it above the Samsung MX10 ( which I wrote in a sticky thread on these forums)
It ready made mpeg2 files with easy transfer to PC and creation of DVD if need be and quite decent form factor are strong pluses. Absolute video quality wise though it wont give an entry level miniDV a challenge ,If you dont mind tape I would not consider it

[LAURYN]

Another Question

Which is best Canon m235 or Canon fs100/10/11
and are they both better than hi8 as far video quality is concerned
when written to DVD

and is the md216(jessops) same as md235

Thanks

[senu]

Originally Posted by LAURYN

Another Question

Which is best Canon m235 or Canon fs100/10/11

Different not directly comparable as such Obviusly the quality from the tape model being far less compresses is better

and are they both better than hi8 as far video quality is concerned

Yes

when written to DVD

Both are digital formats DV AVI and mpeg2
and are better but With MiniDV the encoding to DVD can be customised to decent quality while the fs100 output is fixed from wht the camcorder has output.
With the FS100 (and mpeg2) it may struggle in low light
mpeg2 also isnt as robust in maintaing quality if it has been rerendered several time during editing as DV AVI
If your expectations are modest, the FS100 offers a combination of SD card recording and a decnt camcorder even if ultimate qulity is not as good as MiniDV
With it you dont need tapes and dont have realtime firewire transfer to PC
File sizes are smaller
For video quality alone MiniDV is better but that alone may not be the dealbreaker for everyone