Review 2 of 2
Summary: The Panasonic PVDV800 Digital Camcorder is a great camcorder to use. It's smaller than most Digital Camcorders so it's easy to carry around. The eject mechanism is also built better than most digital camcorders as the tape compartment is in one piece and not a two step operation. This camcorder was used during our vacation and it handled all the situations superbly. The 3.5" LCD panel works great, it opens 90 degrees before you can rotate it 180 degrees and then you can fold it for your viewing pleasure.
The camcorder handled the different lighting situations without too much interruption (automatic backlighting, going from indoors to outdoors, going from complete darkness to bright sunlight). The automatic focusing handled most situations very good, except in real low light or with very long distances (it has 2 digital zoom features). Each problem was handled with switching over to manual focus mode.
The IR filter is fun to use, you have different filter colors to choose from b/w, green and blue.
The other cool feature is the memory stick that comes with the camcorder. It has a slot for a memory stick the will hold between 60 (in fine mode) images to 120( in normal mode). The stick is located between the LCD panel and the camcorder. The transferring of images is made easy with the standard connectors that come with the camcorder or you can send away (at least at the time of my purchase) for a FlashPath Card (a floppy disk with a hole cut out for the memory stick).
We had a blast using this camcorder that we used 16 videotapes in a 3 week period.
I would definitely buy this camcorder again! During our vacation we were with some folks who had purchased a Sony - DCR-VX2000, they were not too happy, they only shot approx. 15 mins. worth of tape because it was too big to carry around, 10 mins. of the tape was at the airport. Strengths: Size, ergonomically fits the hand.
Photo Mode that goes straight to memory stick.
Ease of transfering of photo images to computer.
Ease of use. Weaknesses: External video light; hard to carry around, if it's put on the shoulder strap as recommended, it gets bounced around quite a bit. Although it wasn't used much.
FlashPath software converted image icons from photoshop to QuickTime. Which caused my computer to hang when double clicking on an image.
I will try reloading this and see if it happens again. Similar Products Used: Sony - DCR-TRV8
Sony - PC100
Sony - DCR-VX2000 Customer Service: Hadn't dealt with them yet and I hope I won't have too. :^)
| 
More Products from Panasonic
Link to this page
5 of 5
4 of 5
