Sony HDR-SR1 AVCHD 4MP 30GB High-Definition Hard Disk Drive Camcorder with 10x Optical Zoom – Customer Reviews
High definition record time please?
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After hours on the Sony website, B&H photo website and here I still can't find any mention of the record time in high definition mode. Does anyone that owns one of these cameras know this very important tidbit? I know the camera is new but that is absolutely no excuse for Sony to omit this type of specification from the spec sheet. Would someone sell mini DV tapes without a record time listed on the tape? Same scenario just seems to be lost in the hype of a hard disc based camera.
This is not an inexpensive camera and from the sounds of the clunky software a bring along laptop is a must if you're away from the main home/office computer for any length of time. Once again one does not know if the laptop must be carried on site since we have no record times listed for the drive.
Does anyone know or more importantly care? Maybe I'm way off base but once the drive is full the camera becomes an expensive, delicate paperweight until the files are off loaded.
I won't make the mistake of purchasing to do Sony's R&D for them and pay a 20% restocking fee in the process.
Feel free to reply, please , anyone10/30/2006 12:00 AM | Rating:
Love it!
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Have had the camera for just over a week and can't complain about anything.Video plays perfectly on both our HD LCD and HD projector. We have a HTPC so this camera is perfect for our needs.
Also figured out that renaming the HD video files to .mpg allows you to play them in PowerDVD, so no burning to disc or conversion necessary...
Bought this in Canada (the NTSC version) and was a little worried about compatibility problems here in the UK (PAL) but everything works perfectly on our system.
Have waited a year for this camera, and very glad I did.10/28/2006 12:00 AM | Rating:
This High def., Hard drive camcorder is just perfect.
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This camera was perfect for me. At first I was looking at sonys dvd-505 because of the burn to dvd. Then I saw the HC3 with the High def. but i didnt like that i had to buy small dvds or tapes. When I saw this camcorder and the options that it had, it was perfect.
I have had it for about a week and a half now and I only paid 800 for it. I have only been doing a little recording but when I do it looks perfect on my 57inch sony high def tv. Also when i played it back on the tv I thaught that my lens had something on it. Turns out my tv had a spider in it and had put a spider web on the screen. I didnt see that before playedback with this camcorder.
I was thinking that with the hard drive that i would have to wait for it to be stored for like a min or two. But it is like only 2 seconds then I can record some more.
The sound quality is also very good. When I played it back on the tv it recorded the door opening and everytime i watched it i thaught someone came into my house.
The 3.5inch touch screen for me is very easy to use no problums with that. I find that all the buttons are easy for me to get to.
I have a HP media center computer m7570n and when I went to make a dvd it was really very quick with the on touch button option and with the supplied software but I dont really like the supplied software. Playback on the dvd was also very good.
I would say that if your looking for a high def. camcorder get this one you will love it.10/27/2006 12:00 AM | Rating:
Amazing camera
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I have had my HDR-SR1 for a week now. It is my first high-definition camera, and my second hard-drive based camera.
First, I'll get the bad comments out of the way...
The camera takes about 7.5 seconds to power up and be ready to shoot. Although this is shorter than my last hard-drive camera (JVC - was 10 seconds), it's still longer than most tape-based cameras. It isn't unreasonably long, but I like a quick power-up time so I don't miss an opportunity to shoot something happening NOW.
The AVCHD format is so new that it is not yet supported by any other software other than the Sony software that comes with the camera, and it only allows playback - no advanced editing. However, I did not take away any stars in my rating for this, because I fully expect the AVCHD format to be widely supported soon enough-- otherwise I wouldn't have bought the camera. Besides, even if I won't be able to edit the footage until sometime in the future, I figured it's more important that I'm at least shooting my footage in high-def... these moments will never occur again!
The camera is a little bit on the large side (compared to most new cameras available today). But it's not so large that I would consider it "bulky". It's probably about the size of a typical new camera a few years ago.
And now for the good...
The picture quality is excellent. In bright light, the video is crystal clear and there are absolutely no visible compression artifacts at the XP and HQ settings. I've never seen HDV footage but can't imagine it being better than this. SP and LP modes are not to bad, but the compression issues become noticeable. In low light the camera does have the typical amount of noise in the image, but it looks more like analog noise than digital compression noise, which I find much less annoying. I consider this camera to be a good low-light performer, but of course it's all relative and this is just my opinion. There is a Night-Shot mode (infrared light/greenish image) which workes well in TOTAL darkness up to about 20' away, at full frame rate. Super NightShot mode and Color Slow Shutter modes offer even more light in the image, but sacrifice shutter speed and everything gets blurred.
Sound is incredible. 5.1ch surround really makes you feel like you're there. Note however that there really is not a centre front channel microphone. A centre channel of sound is digitally created by the camera combining the front left and front right channels. Still sounds fine to me though.
Automatic lens cover is a joy! Opens when you turn it on and closes when you turn it off.
The SteadyShot mode does NOT affect picture quality. With most cameras this does decrease image quality in some way, but not with the SR1.
The lag time from pressing the record button to when the recording actually begins is only about half a second. Pretty reasonable. When you press the button again to stop recording, it takes about 1 second to respond.
The photo quality (4.0MP) is the best I've ever seen on a camcorder, but still doesn't measure up to a 4.0MP still-camera. In other words, personally I won't give up my 4.0MP still camera yet for very important photos, however if I only have the SR1 with me, I will still take photos with it (the photos are good enough to make decent 4x6 prints). With previous camcorders the photo quality was so bad I always carried my still camera with me too. Now I don't have to. Please note that if you're taking photos with this camera while in video mode (either while the camera is rolling or not) you are limited to only 2.3MP images. Nice thing is that this camera DOES have a flash for photos. The only time it won't work is while the camera is recording video. Also, if you try to take photos while the camera is recording video, you are limited to only 3 photos until you stop recording so the camera can save the images.
InfoLithium battery is wonderful. The screen always displays reminaing battery life in minutes. It even takes into account the current state of the camera's use (for example if you turn on the NightShot IR light, it will decrease remaining battery time by about 15% since it takes more power). It's even accurate right down to the minute. Of course, if you're doing a lot of zooming then you may notice the minutes counting down a little faster than real-time, as it recalculates the power usage. By the way, installing the battery does not add length to the camera is it does with most, as it is actually recessed into a slot in the back. Only the extended-life batteries will add length/bulk to the camera.10/24/2006 12:00 AM | Rating:
Excellent Camcorder, Can be used with a Mac
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This camcorder uses a new file format (AVCHD) which is based on current popular standards. AVCHD is simply a streaming version of H.264 video with Dolby 5.1 surround sound audio.When producing an HDD camcorder, Sony had to decide between using the current standard and making a new one.Since the current standard is MPEG-2 video and stereo audio (eg: HDV) at a constant bitrate of 25mbps, the AVCHD format provides a number of features: 1) Better audio, with 5.1 channels recorded by the camcorder.2) Better video as AVC is H.264-- a modern codec that privides much higher quality data for a given bitrate than the ancient MPEG-2 video that HDV is based on. 3) Much more flexibility-- to be HDV compatible would have meant recording constantly at 25mbps, and this is too fast for the CDR version (the HDR-UX1) and is unnecessary.15Mbps H.264 should provide better quality video than MPEG-2 at 25Mbps!
The downside of moving into the future in this way is that current editing software does not yet support the new format.Thus, either you use Sony's supplied software on windows, or you wait until your software company produces an update that supports the format.
AVCHD is the next generation in consumer video and I expect it will be widely supported.I am betting good money (eg: I bought an SR1) that Apple will release updates to Final Cut and iMovie this January that support AVCHD.
However, if you are happy shooting in SD for now, you can get a workflow that works on the mac.The SR1 shoots SD in MPEG-2 format, and while iMovie doesn't yet support Dolby 5.1 sound, it can be easily converted.
All that's necessary to work with an edit SR1 video (in SD mode only) on a Mac right now is the Apple $20 MPEG-2 decoder add on to quicktime (from the Apple site, but included with Final Cut and DVD Studio Pro) and a conversion application to make use of it.I found StreamClip to be a great (Free) solution from Squared 5... their website is at www squared5 dot com.[...]
Additionally the picture taking mode saves data to the hard drive, so this camera really is the one solution for all my imaging needs.30G will store a lot of pictures!
If you want to work with HD right now, you need to go with the Sony Windows software, or go buy an HDV camcorder.But if you're willing to use it in SD mode now, you can get a workflow going on the Mac with the SR1.And I really expect full HD support for this camcorder will be in the next revision of the software.
Don't bash a product because it uses a new spec that the software doesn't yet support!The products have only been on the market a week or two.Apple and Adobe and everyone else will surely support these cameras.
And when they do, these will be the solution that can't be beat!
I bought an M71 battery and spent 4 hours driving around shooting video-- at the end of it, only had 5GB of video and still had batterylife left... this camera is nice to the batteries, and the hard drive is so big that in SD mode, you can get 27 hours of footage at the highest bitrate!Its nice to not be limited by having to swap tapes.
Great Camera all around, fully featured and image quality is great, though if you do a lot of night shooting you probably want a three-chip camera.10/16/2006 12:00 AM | Rating: