Sony Reviews

I received this camera as a gift last year in anticipation of the birth of our first child. It seemed cool enough. Native mpeg2 format, cool Java tools on-board, etc. Well, it's swell if you just want to jerk around with the camera, but there's no effective way to REMOVE video from the camera in digital format. The Amazon review talks of the ethernet connection. Yeeha. Guess what? No sound comes across with the ethernet connection. Additionally, the transfer rate is abysmal, even without the sound. So, you're left with the fabulous option of converting digital sound to analog and back to digital if you want to be able to get your video into a PC editor, or burn a DVD, or something crazy like that. Sony quickly discontinued this pile of crud and doesn't support it. There are currently no commerically available MD Data drives for your computer either. This thing is going on EBay asap. I, for one, will never purchase Sony again.

I'm impressed of the design. I like the ideal of using disc instead of tape form. Waste no time for rewind/forward. Of course, the function r veri limited. Perhaps Sony should seriously re-evaluate the next disc cam in the near future. Hope that they launch 2nd generation mini-disc cam have IEEE or usb support, lower the price of the mini disc. Current disc data allow only 20mins of visual recording r really short. I am convince the disc can be compressed to higher grade. Depending on Ethernet port r not a veri ideal. Feature r great but concept r still veri conventional. Despite of this, this set has the x-factor. Great for taking lots of still pictures..

This is an excellent video camera, ahead of it's time in some aspects. However, it has some downsides.

short recording time per disk
disks available only in few online outlets
no USB capability (has ethernet connection, but it's slow)
uses "quicktime" output for video clips
no "nightshot" capability
unable to move files from one disk to another (I believe Sony offered a patch for this, but I was unable to find it)

just to name a few

here's some of the good sides of it...

good resolution for video mode
seemless and static free slow motion
color viewfinder & large display screen
touch screen interface with video editor
ability to control each "track" as a file in moving it around in sequence
S-video output
compact size

I'm believe at the time this camera was designed, it was outstanding, but today and a few years later, there have been some advancements in video cameras. I certainly hope Sony follows up this camera with another that records on disk or mini-disc, I'm not a fan of video tape. Though it is superior in capacity. Sony had the right idea on this, they just need to catch up with some better options on new models. I don't think people mind sacrificing a little bit on size as long as it has the options we want.