Sony DCRDVD100 MiniDVD Handycam Camcorder with 2.5" LCD and Digital Still Capability

the DCR-DVD100 is the "value" entry of the recently released line of miniDVD camcorders from sony. other models in this line are the DCR-DVD300 and DCR-DVD200. the main difference the three camcorders in this line are LCD size and CCD resolution:

DCR-DVD300: 3.5" LCD, 1MP CCD

DCR-DVD200: 2.5" LCD, 1MP CCD

DCR-DVD100: 2.5" LCD, 640K CCD

pros:

records dolby digital stereo.

carl zeiss lens.

10x optical zoom.

video quality almost at par with miniDV camcorders (at slower recording modes).

Super SteadyShot image stabilization system and sony's system really helps.

three low light shooting modes: Nightshot, Super Nightshot, and Color Slow Shutter.

great connectivity options: firewire, USB 2.0, S-video, headphone, mic input, etc.

USB 2.0 support for fast downloads.

the convenience of DVD navigation simply select the scene and you're there!

supports analog-to-digital conversion.

hot accessory shoe with lots of optional accessories.

cons:

inferior CCD resolution vs the DVD200 and DVD300.

expensive as with most sony products, you pay a premium, plus you pay for DVD convergence.

average low light performance.

no memory stick support; if you want to take a still picture, it is saved on the DVD.

mic picks up DVD spinning noise in quiet environments.

finalizing a DVD takes upwards of 10 minutes, and it can be a confusing process.

don't expect much from the still images recorded.

no pop-up flash for taking stills and no built in video light but you can get a flash/video combo light for less than a hundred bucks.

smaller LCD (2.5") vs the DVD300 (3.5").

no manual focus ring.

getting video into editing software (e.g. Final Cut Pro) is harder than it should be.

not Mac friendly.

poor battery life with included battery so add $$ to your budget to buy a higher capacity spare.

compared to current release camcorders, this is a pretty big one at 3.1 x 3.8 x 5.6" weighing 1 lb 6 oz.

this is a nice, solid effort by sony and i give them points for dvd convergence. however, in my opinion, the DCR-DVD100 is too big, not easy to use, and does not use the 1MP CCD that the DVD200 and DVD300 have. it's expensive for the feature set but the alternative to this dvd camcorder (a miniDV tape camcorder and DVD recorder combo) is even more expensive. i already have a dvd recorder so for me, a smaller and easier to use miniDV camcorder makes more sense. if this is your situation as well, i would recommend a panasonic gs-70 or sony's pc-105, both miniDV camcorders. otherwise, if you want a finalized DVD straight out of your camcorder, consider the DCR-DVD100.

a final note. if you have decided you want to record directly to a DVD, which camcorder should you buy? DCR-DVD100 or DCR-DVD200 or DCR-DVD300? i highly recommend spending the extra ... bucks (street price) to get the higher resolution CCD of the DVD200/DVD300. if you want a bigger 3.5" LCD, it'll cost you an extra ... bucks to go to the DVD300. i think this is a fair price for the upgrade too.

i hope this helps you with your buying decision. peace.

I recently purchased this camcorder, and am very happy with it--happy enough that I wanted to address some of the perceived negatives in other reviews.

From jemaer_rf's helpful review:

cons:

average low light performance

I disagree I find the low light performance to be excellent. This is also borne out by comparative tests published in _Consumer Reports_' camcorder evaluation issue.

no memory stick support; if you want to take a still picture, it is saved on the DVD.

This is true--but hardly a disadvantage: surely more people have DVD-ROM drives than memory stick readers.

mic picks up DVD spinning noise in quiet environments.

This is true: you will have to live with this or choose another camcorder. I'd be curious to know if this is the case with other DVD camcorders.

finalizing a DVD takes upwards of 10 minutes, and it can be a confusing process.

It takes about 3 minutes, assuming the disc is full. The less full a disc is, the longer finalizing takes. Since this process is only necessary for playing the disc on other DVD players, I fail to see how it's a disadvantage when compared to, say, a tape-based camcorder (where you can't play the tape in anything but the camcorder).

It isn't confusing either. I'd like to just digress here and say that the product manual is very good--certainly the best manual for a piece of consumer electronics I've ever used--and describes very clearly how to exercise every feature and function.

don't expect much from the still images recorded.

Nothey are 640x480 images: okay for the web and email but not much else. I wouldn't even bother, really--just take a short video shot instead.

getting video into editing software (e.g. Final Cut Pro) is harder than it should be.

I don't know about the specific software mentioned here, but since the video is recorded in a standard format on a standard DVD-R (assuming you use a DVD-R) it's very universal. As I use Linux and Macintosh systems exclusively (Linux rarely supporting a particular camcorder) this universality was a big selling point of a DVD camcorder for me--and thus getting the video into any particular piece of software has been very easy so far.

not Mac friendly.

In the sense that the bundled software doesn't come for Macintosh. But you don't want that anyway--you want to use iMovie, right? I hear (have not done this myself) that this is easily done by using Quicktime Pro to convert the .vob files from the DVD into .dv files, which can then be used in iMovie. Secondly, I will bet iMovie will soon support these camcorders.

From an anonymous review:

There is a significant delay between when you push the record button and when recording actually starts, in the neighborhood of a few seconds.

This is true. I have gotten in the habit of recording extra footage before and after what I want to capture, and editing it later on the computer, so this doesn't bother me.

Also, there is no editing as-you-go with DVD. If you are used being able review the last part of what you taped and record over it if you don't like what you see, you will be frustrated with DVD recording. There is no editing unless you transfer it to your computer and then of course you need to record it again on a DVD burner or video CD.

This is only true if you are recording to a DVD-R (write-once media). You are free to record to a DVD-RW and erase/edit as you like.

These reviews do not mention two other potential drawbacks: namely (and this applies to any DVD camcorder) the media is low-capacity and somewhat costlier (I found DVD-Rs for $3 ea; they record 30 min in standard quality and 60 min is extended play mode) so you may be paying more per minute, and changing media more frequently, than with a tape camcorder.

The second is that the camcorder doesn't support Firewire, only USB 2.0, which you may not have if you don't have a fairly new computer. Again, this wasn't much of a disadvantage for me since I always planned on reading the DVDs directly rather than transferring the video using the camcorder (popping the disc into the DVD-ROM drive *has* to be faster than transferring the files by wire.

Overall I'm extremely pleased with my purchase. I decided not to spend an extra, about, three hundred bucks, for the DVD300; and I'm so happy with the image quality: excellent low-light, image stabilization, nightshot (and aren't these what you're buying a camcorder for?); that I'm convinced it was the right call.

Buy Sony DCRDVD100 MiniDVD Handycam Camcorder with 2.5" LCD and Digital Still Capability Now

While this camera has drawbacks, and it does have them, on balance, it's a good buy.

I am replacing a TRV-340 (Digital 8). I had no problems with that camera, but my wife, who is technologically illiterate, could not understand the process of finding the cables and hooking the camcorder to the TV and playing the tapes, or hooking it to the computer (or standalone DVD recorder) and burning the tape to DVD to watch.

So she saw this camera and liked the idea. So we spent the money, brought it home, and lo and behold, used our first DVD-RW (8 cm) disk. We recorded a few clips over a few minutes. We popped it out and put it in the small portable DVD player that we have, and sure enough it played (without finalizing). She was happy, and as a consequence, I was happy.

Drawbacks: It sucks down a lot more juice than my tape camcorder. I get barely 60 minutes per 50-sized battery, according to the screen. But worse yet, 30 minutes per disk on the SP setting (around 4000 kb/s bit rate, or so...mid-DVD range, which is roughly 8000 to 2000, more or less, I haven't had time to calculate 1.4 GB over 30 minutes, yet.).

Still picture capability is on disk-only, and it's only 640x480, but I prefer a still camera for special still shots, and use 5+ Megapixel for those.

Disks are still expensive, but as I've seen three different companies (at least) in the store with DVD camcorders, the generics should freely flow soon. Until then, I'll use DVD-RW, burn to DVD-R by computer, and erase.

Read Best Reviews of Sony DCRDVD100 MiniDVD Handycam Camcorder with 2.5" LCD and Digital Still Capability Here

We are extremely pleased with this new Sony product!! We went with the 100 series only because of price. We found the mini DVD-R and DVD-RW discs very difficult to find during the Christmas shopping season, but I did find some discs and used our camcorder for the first time at Christmas with our family. It was very simple to operate, made an exceptional quality recording which, after 1 minute of finalizing (quite simple actually), played in our DVD player perfectly! How much more convenient can it get? No a/v wires, no special connections to hook up to your tv to play your 8mm, etc., just plain simplicity -go right from the camcorder to your DVD! I am very excited to use the movie editing software included with the camcorder to edit, print stills, etc. What more could you ask for than a movie/still digital camcorder that records on, above all, DVD discs? It can't get much simpler than that! The instruction manual that comes with the camcorder is very easy to follow -I sat down for a little over an hour reading the entire manual and was able to operate this camcorder quite proficiently. All the necessary operations are right where they need to be on the camcorder -in other words, it is user friendly and functionally intelligently designed. If you want an easy to use camcorder with the versatility and quality of a DVD, this series of camcorders is for you!!

Want Sony DCRDVD100 MiniDVD Handycam Camcorder with 2.5" LCD and Digital Still Capability Discount?

Sony DVD Handycam has great picture quality, if all you want is to film and playback on your DVD player. I wanted to make a compilation DVD but The "ImageMixer Ver.1.5 for Sony DVD Handycam" sucks. I bought another Movie editor but it cannot read the MPG created by the Sony software. So you have to convert the file to MPG2 format.

It takes six minutues or more to finalize a dvd, It's faster to download using USB2 to finalize, Unfortunatly the Sony Software does not reconize the dvd it not finalize.

I can't belive how hard it is to find, Sony minDVD media. I tried other brand names, but I lost some of the DVD because it did not finalize correctly.

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