SONY: HDV vs HDD

Hi,

I've got a Light and Motion Stingray off a mate and want to get a camcorder to go inside. I'm looking at the Sony range. Either the HDD-SR12 or the HDV-HC9E.

the HDD-SR12 has better features for sure, BUT I have been told by different people that they would go with the HDV because of the end quality, in that you lose image quality due to compression on the hard drive. Is this true??

Also do hard drives get hotter and make the lens more prone to fogging as well? If so I'll have to go with the HDV until the hard drives are better equipped.

I'm running everything through a Macbook pro if there's a difference, so no blu-ray either!

Many Thanks

Sam

Hi Sam

Tape or tapeless, they both have pro's and cons.

Do a search here, there has been much talk about it.

My thoughts....

Tapeless- AVCHD may technically be a better compression format than 25mbps MPEG2 HDV but it is more compressed = less quality.

AVCHD was invented not so much for quality but more for how much they could compress the video into the smallest size to fit onto the camera's drive etc.

AVCHD is pretty hard to edit on any computer unless you convert it to another codec or set your preview window to a very low draft quality to be able to edit multiply streams with effects in realtime.

Converting AVCHD footage to another easier codec to edit is about 1.1 speed on a fast Quad computer.( ie 30 mins takes 30 mins)

You can do basic editing cuts in camera.

It's costly and time consuming to archive you raw footage to a safe medium. (A hard drive is not a safe medium)

Tape is cheap and you instantly have a archived copy once you have sucked it into your computer... if you loose a hardrive you can suck it back in again.

Anyhow it's up to you in the end.

Good luck

Hi Wagsy,

Thanks for response! I love the features of the SR12 AVCHD, but if the quality and time of burn are low then I'm investing in something that will limit me. I work on a yacht in Thailand and Indonesia and have just got a Macbook pro, which is new enough. I'm stuck with the housing (Stingray Light and Motion) so think I'll get the tape HDV until technology catchhes up. Probably by the time I get back from my first trip!!

Any jobs in your neck of the woods? A place I've always wanted to go, you lucky man! But then so am I, I suppose !-)

Hi Sam

Tape or tapeless, they both have pro's and cons.

Do a search here, there has been much talk about it.

My thoughts....

Tapeless- AVCHD may technically be a better compression format than 25mbps MPEG2 HDV but it is more compressed = less quality.

AVCHD was invented not so much for quality but more for how much they could compress the video into the smallest size to fit onto the camera's drive etc.

AVCHD is pretty hard to edit on any computer unless you convert it to another codec or set your preview window to a very low draft quality to be able to edit multiply streams with effects in realtime.

Converting AVCHD footage to another easier codec to edit is about 1.1 speed on a fast Quad computer.( ie 30 mins takes 30 mins)

You can do basic editing cuts in camera.

It's costly and time consuming to archive you raw footage to a safe medium. (A hard drive is not a safe medium)

Tape is cheap and you instantly have a archived copy once you have sucked it into your computer... if you loose a hardrive you can suck it back in again.

Anyhow it's up to you in the end.

Good luck