Sad Sorry State of Consumer HD

OK...

1. Canon HV10:

- no external microphone input
- no HDMI port
- no great stills

2. Sony HDR-HC3:

- no external microphone input except through Sony's cruddy proprietary
hot shoe
- no great stills

3. Sanyo HD1:

- crummy MPEG-4 that isn't H.264
- crummy image
- disturbing reports of reliability problems

4. Sony HDR-SR1:

- data rate constrained to 15 Mbps
- stills aren't that great

5. Sony HDR-UX1:

- data rate constrained to 12 Mbps
- stills aren't that great

Richard Crowley...

What's the fascination with stills?
IMHO *real* video cameras don't do "stills"
and *real* still cameras don't do "video".

C'mon.

You camcorder manufacturers can do better than this.

Throw us a bone, eh?

Is the camcorder industry performing this poorly for a reason?

Martin Heffels...

No, not at all. If you want more, you can buy the professional products,
which are obviously more expensive. As long as you see high-end HD-camera's
in their current state, don't expect the manufacturers to produce a
consumer-model which can perform equally for a tenth (or even less) of the
price. I'm sure all manufacturers learned from what happened to Sony's
high-end camera-sales at the start of mini-DV/DVCAM.

Ken Maltby...

It's more a perceived loss of potential sales. The professional
camera crews in the field, didn't turn in their BetaCams, for
Mini-DV. A professional event photographer that only has a
few Mini-DV cameras, isn't competitive or able to get much
work, except from friends & relatives. I doubt that there was
any great reduction in high-end professional camera systems
sales. In fact there is more of a growth/sales potential in all
the additional "Prosummers" looking to upgrade, or out for
bragging rights. Even corporate photography, on a budget, is
unlikely to adopt Mini-DV as a viable option.

What got traded in were the VHS Camcorders.

Sooner or later, the industry will realize that as the low end
"Home Movie" point&shoot crowd gets saturated with cheap
but consumer satisfying cameras, the potential to increase
sales at the high-end will have to be generated from a middle
"Prosummer" market. They need a customer base that will be
interested in, and have an understanding of the value of advanced
features in the high-end offerings. The professional markets
grow at a much slower pace (especially in terms of advanced
features) than the recreational markets.

Luck;
Ken

P.S. Flame away.

Mike Fields...

Well, I don't know about "flame away", but to a degree
the manufacturers already did that game. Look at the
Sony camcorders (D8 like mine etc). They put in
cheaper, smaller sensors with "more pixels" (but worse
low light performance), added all sorts of new
"digital features" (digital zoom, overlays, birthday cakes
etc) and kept the price the same range. The hardware
got significantly cheaper, the price stayed the same or
went up with all the new "digital features" (that other
than development cost initially, cost nothing to add).

Such boredom.

No more disappointment, please.

Jerry Jones