Hardware What is the Best Mini Camcorder?

You might use your mobile phone for taking the odd spontaneous snap but a decent digital camera will yield much better results. The same is certainly true for video. We take a look at six of the latest mini camcorders and compare them to the popular iPhone 3GS.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/peripherals/2010/01/14/what-is-the-best-mini-camcorder/1

 

thansk for the review, great work.

 

I would love to try straping some of these to my helmet when I go riding.

 

For the love of god i hope you mean cycling...

 

there's already tons of helmet cams for the sports minded out there.

I'm interested in that Flip though, what format is the video in? My digi cam uses the AVHCD format which I don't really like, is this the same?

 

Clearly you've never met Jamie........

 

I got the Flip ultra HD as xmas present to myself -glad I made the right choice

 

didn't I read this review in the mag? or am I living in a parrallel world where I pay for a magazine only to get the same content for free....

 

What no Kodak Zi8?

 

+1

 

Sound was completely left out of the evaluation? An external microphone is preferable in most cases, to improve the sound so it is on par with the image quality. On Gizmodo was a small report on these user created combos of camcorders, microphones and lights on various mounts.

 

So, the thesis of this article is basically "How do these stand alone cameras fare when we have built in cameras in our phones that do relatively the same thing". But you avoid addressing the interesting question and just do straight reviews of these stand alone cameras.

How about reviewing a couple of phone video cameras in the articles to get apples to apples comparisons. That would have made this a far more useful and interesting article.

 

Theres no need for a dedicated videocamera anymore, as the new dslr cameras can do more than good full-hd video for around $1000 and up. I can see these are in a different category, but hey, regular digital cameras also have been doing 720p/30 for a few years now. Gotta love technology I remember not more than 10 years ago i had my eyes on a cheap digital camera, it did vga-res !!!!

 

My wife got the regular Flip as a door prize a year or so ago. It's REDICULOUSLY simple to use. And for SD, the video is actually really nice quality.

 

What, no...RCA EZ209HD?

 

Some rather important info went missing about the Flip, the absolutely pathetic 90 day warranty, yes thats right, 90 days.
http://www.theflip.com/en-us/support/warranty.aspx

 

Jamie is the secret employee that keeps the site up. He doesn't get out much.

 

I almost didn't need to read this - as soon as I saw the camcorders under scrutiny, I always thought that the Flip would come out on top.

I'm not a fan of the "new breed" of compact digital camcorders. I still prefer MiniDV tapes (even with the associated complications of magnetic contact heads) because of their low cost and quality. That said, I've never really been interested in quick-point-and-shoot devices... Probably why I also still use film SLR cameras...