Sony HDR-SR7 AVCHD 6.1MP 60GB High Definition Hard Disk Drive Camcorder with 10x Optical Zoom by Sony
|
List Price: Our Price: Calculated in a shopping cart Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Category: Digital Camera See more digital camera details and other models |
|---|
Digital camera reviews of Sony HDR-SR7 AVCHD 6.1MP 60GB High Definition Hard Disk Drive Camcorder with 10x Optical Zoom
Digital camera Review: Great camcorder, good in low light, still have space after Christmas on drive
Summary: 4 Stars
I had an old DAT based Sony camcorder that had to be repaired, but the cost was almost what I paid for the thing originally. At that point, I figured I'd bite the bullet and get a high def hard disk based camera. I did consider the memory stick model, but didn't want to buy 60Gb worth of memory sticks.
The SR7 was pretty easy to use. I still haven't opened the user guide. The touch screen controls are a lot easier to use than the old menu system in my DAT camcorder were. I recorded our kids all through Christmas day, and on-and-off through New Years Eve, and didn't yet run out of space. I did have to order some software to edit the AVCHD recordings, and am waiting for it to arrive.
Overall, I'm pleased with the SR7.
Digital camera Review: Great camcorder that can still be improved
Summary: 4 Stars
Picture quality is much better than the last camcorder I bought which was a JVC non-HD camcorder. In good lighting, this camera looks really good. In low light, sometimes it looks decent. In really low light, you need the night vision turned on; you can see everything but it looses almost all color. I did get an "Buffer overflow" error filming a loud rap performance. My film major friend tells me it happens to all digital camcorder with loud music. The build-in mic captured sound well and seemed to cancel out most of the noise during the concert. I really enjoy the fast frame rate filming, it allows u to slow down time, but only last about 12 seconds. Overall it has been great. I've decided to use this camcorder and make home movie on my wedding coming in 6 month than to hire professional videographers. I think this camera will be fine for that. Oh last problem with this camcorder, and all other AVCHD camera is that I don't know how to share it with friends yet. I can burn it on DVD, but I don't want to have to burn one for ever one of my friends, and YouTube seems to public and looses a lot of quality. I'm still waiting for a web service that can handle AVCHD. I would recommend this to anyone. Btw, I bought this for $999 in Nov 07. I'd wait for price drop if you can. The older model is now like $600, so I imagine this model will be too in another 6 to 9 months.Digital camera Review: Works perfectly with a Mac!
Summary: 5 Stars
Crystal clear imaging. Excellent night filming. Christmas lights in lovely downtown Littleton, Colorado look PERFECT, and you can clearly see people walking 4 blocks away at night while filming Christmas lights. Excellent zoom. TINY camera! Plug it into a Mac, open iMovie, start the camera and select "Computer" from the camera's intelligent menu system, and import any or all clips right into iMovie. A no-brainer! Viewing clips in the Finder's "Cover Flow" works perfectly too.Digital camera Review: I purchased the 100 gig hard drive version.. HDR-SR8
Summary: 5 Stars
I ordered the HDR-SR8 from Sony's website. I just received it, and am giving my non-expert opinion on my experiences so far on the HDR-SR8 page... I think that the HDR-SR7 is identical to the SR8 except for the hard drive size, but I thought I should put my review on the correct page.Digital camera Review: Takes outstanding video but sometimes hear hard drive clicking
Summary: 4 Stars
This camera takes great video. I originally ordered the HC7 but couldn't deal with the tapes. It took me back to the VCR days. It took great video as well but I can't say I noticed much of a difference between tape and HDD. I'm sure the professional can but it satifies my needs and then some.
Low light isn't a big issue. If the lighting is too low it does have a lot of noise but simply turn on your indoor lights and it's plenty of light. Outdoor video is spectacular. I took some video of some flowers in my wife's garden with the Telemacro function on to blur the background. It looked like some of the video on Discovery HD. Everyone I show it to is very impressed.
You will need an external hard drive to store this stuff. One hour of AVCHD video is approx. 7 gigabytes so your computer hard drive will run out of space fast. I still have a Pentium 4, 3.0 Ghz processor with 1 GB RAM. It's fast enough to use the stock software but I will probably have to upgrade if I'm going to do any serious editing. This stuff can be taxing on your system.
Overall great and I would recommend this camera. Also impressed with Amazon's return policy on the HC7. No restocking fee like the brick-and-mortar stores.