Sony Handycam® DCR-TRV460 Digital-8 Camcorder

Now that I am on my 5th digital camcorder, and 4th digital camera, I have some standards to weigh against. Admittedly this is a biased review because 3 of my last 5 camcorders were Sonys, including this one.

What's in the box: The usual suspects... You get a lens cap, shoulder strap, software, cheesy battery, (especially in cold), remote, usb cable, lens cloth, RGB cable, software, and documentation.

First off the DCR-TRV 460 has imploded from my trv-270 to about half the length. It is still stocky compared to the new digitals, mini-dvs, and what have you... about once and a half the size of my Panasonic pv-gs200. I prefer smaller, but some say that you need some bulk to keep the camera more steady... Might make some sense.

I was confused when I took it out of the package and opened the view finder. No controls! Eleven buttons and switches total on the outside, including an open/eject on the bottom, an easy mode button, night switch, charge mode, record zoom, charge, battery check, backlight and light. How do I fast forward and rewind, etc.? Easy, the controls are on the lcd touch screen. Oh brother, I thought. I'm a mountain biker and to record stuff on the fly, I'm gonna get this dirty.... But no, once set, you don't need to play in there too much until after you shoot, or for rewind and playback. I haven't scratched the tough lcd yet with mt biking fingers. The display is very intuitive with great feedback and displays, I love that the display/battery info button tells you exactly what you have left in minutes on the lcd right-off.

Obviously this unit was designed by a Human Factors engineer that had taken some user feedback. It is very nice to use. Easy mode keeps it basic for most shooting situations. It is much better than I first expected, when I flipped open the lcd and was disturbed that I didn't find the usual clutter of buttons.

The video quality is what I've come to expect from Sony, very nice and predictable in a range of situations. I never record to Hi-8, just digital, which leads to a disadvantage of the format, recording time for a typical cassette is half that of hi-8 which means a 60 minute cassette gives you 30 mins of digital.When you are letting your helmet cam roll for a 45 minute decent down Killington, and will edit later, this kind of sucks. And its heavy for that sort of thing too. But it is durable, and handles the changes in light from bright sunny slopes to dark pine woods at 30+ mph very nicely,(at 30 fps - there's a potentially useful distance per frame equation in there somewhere).

Three wonderful things about all my Sonys, including this $300 dollar one:

Best steady-cam of any I've had or tried, or borrowed, or used on site (I occasionally produce videos for clients), for under $1,000.

Best night shot of any period. I think they got their technology from Roswell, it is very cool, until I find one that lets me shoot effectively through my sliding glass windows into the woods.

Transfers nicely to my PC.

Three expectations to forget when shopping for a dv camera.

Low light - make sure you have an external lamp or it has one built in, (like my Sony), cause no matter what the Lux, you'll get noise.

Still images - boo! some cameras are coming with an integrated still camera and lens all separate from video to try to offer a solution... Whatever, just get a Nikon digital camera for your still shots until something great happens where you can shoot and store to a new (not ntsc or pal)color pallete.

Stock battery stinks. Buy a juicy one upgraded from ebay for cheap, this is where most camera stores make up margin, so if you buy it separately, you'll usually get a better deal.

I just spent $700 on a Panasonic mini-DV 3ccd, but after xmas Walmart put the Sony on sale, I had to get it too, to transfer my digital 8s to dvd cause I destroyed my broken trv-270 trying to extract a tape with no power.

When I decided on the more expensive Panasonic, I thought Digital-8 was going away and wanted something tiny and cool. The Panasonic, though cool looking, was a disapointment, and is going on ebay. This camera will be my workhorse, even it it is somewhat obese compared to the minis. I works for clients, my hobbies and family shots. DVD transfer will be my storage, so I don't really care about the digital-8 media for long term storage.

As a bonus, I have a Sony Vaio laptop, which is meant for digital video. So the memory stick can transfer stills directly from the camera to the laptop. Plus, the IR unit is supposed to stream video, though I haven't read or tried it. Plus Plus Plus, you can stream video via USB, which the Panasonic requires a not included firewire to do. The strangest thing is this camera is bulky, but the remote is the size of a credit card, whereas my Panasonic is tiny, but the remote is comparatively large.