Digitcal Camcorder

[Evan]

I am thinking about buying either this (http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4027174) or this (http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4027174) camcorder because they're both a lot cheaper than I thougth digital camcorders were. I'm guessing there's a reason for this, are they horrible? I don't need anything that can take high quality video, and in fact I would prefer not to have that. This is mostly going to be used to capture stuff drunken insanity. So are they both sufficient for that?

My next question, and maybe the more important one, is how much SD memory do I need? The site has this info about the camcorders, "Movie file format: MPEG-4, Sound available / Movie resolution: 640x480 pixels, 15 fps; 320x240 pixels, 30 fps". Can you tell from that how many MB/minute I'll need?

I need to know by Saturday because if I buy it it will be to use on Sunday. I really appreciate any responses. Thanks.

[Freakin]

This looks pretty terrible.... like webcam quality cameras.

The first indication is that they don't even take miniDV tapes, but store it all on SD...

I think these are basically throwing away money if you're buying them as camcorders.

Consider the movie recording a bonus feature they added to a poorly designed digital camera.

[tonypaladino]

The thing is, there is no optical zoom on these. Digital zoom is worthless. I imagine that's why they're so cheap, but for our purposes they might be ok

[Evan]

Okay, I know very little about this [censored]. I really don't care THAT much about quality. This is stuff that will never be watched on a TV. I obviously want to be able to identify people's faces though.

I don't really know what the differences between SD and DV tapes is (otehr than they physically look different). Here are some links toa couple cheap camcorders that use mini DV:
http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4032604
http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4022772

Price is definitely an issue here, I don't want to spend a lot more than these, is that possible? If yoyu have a better one you can reccomend in the same price range than let me know.

How long do batteries last on these things? How long does a miniDV tape last (in terms of hours of video)?