I waited for awhile before writing a review of this camcorder because I felt that it wouldn't be fair to use it once and then write a review based on that single experience. Instead, I've used the camera on a number of occasions since Easter. These included Easter egg hunts, birthday parties, pool parties, and general video work just to test it out. So far I've had no problems with the camera.
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br /It is very handy and its compact size makes it easy to haul around. Using the smaller discs has not been a problem so far. In fact, I haven't had any problems with playback, recording, editing, or picture quality. The only problem that I've noticed is that the mic works almost too good, catching the rustling of the wind in many of the videos I've shot. However, my old VHS camcorder did the same thing, even with a sound buffer attached to it.
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br /The only times that I've run into problems have been due to operator error. My wife forgot to finalize one of the discs and it did not work properly. However, after we talked about it and read through the manual, we pinpointed the problem and she hasn't had any trouble since. Operator error seems to be the primary culprit in most of the negative reviews that I've read here. I've been guilty of doing the same thing that many other people have done with this product. We toss the instructions to the wayside and decide that we can figure out how to operate the device on our own. This can sometimes be a costly mistake. Luckily, I haven't had to pay too much for what I've done with any of my toys....yet.
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br /This is a great camera for beginners to learn the ins-and-outs of DVD camcorders. Granted, it isn't very forgiving when you make a mistake, but more expensive (and more complicated) models are just as ruthless. Just read the manual and you shouldn't have any problems.

My brother asked me to help him pick the best camcorder for under $400. After doing extensive research and seeing how time-consuming it is (not to mention the hassle it can be) I decided to post part of my "research" in hopes of avoiding others the trouble.
br /About DVD-based camcorders:
br /-Tend to be the most expensive.
br /-Most use small 8cm DVDs that record 30 minutes only. Mini-DVs can record 60 and even 90.
br /-DVDs are not re-recordable, Mini-DVs are.
br /-DVDs are cheaper than Mini-DV tapes though.
br /-Can get DVD-Ram which are re-recordable but these are not common, so many players and computer drives are incompatible.
br /-Can get DVD-RW which are also re-recordable but the cameras that support those are the most expensive. A DVD-RW is more expensive than a normal DVD (but it is totally worth it). Some incompatibility issues exist but to a much lesser degree.
br /-DVD cameras record using video compression therefore the quality is not necessarily good, results vary according to the camera you choose but in general video compression causes decrease of image quality. Mini-DV is arguably better.
br /A DVD-based camera allows you to view your DVD directly on a player, whereas with Mini-DV you have to connect the camera to a TV or through something else like a VCR and use IT for playback which causes wear on the mechanism.
br /Editing is a hassle with both formats and unless you are still using VCRs, you are gonna have to use your computer, special software, Firewire cables, etc.
br /As far as features goes, you gotta look for what you will be needing, many cameras come with a lot of stuff that one ends up never using, so don't get suckered by does. But what I will provide here is some general info about the main brands that you are probably gonna be looking at:
br /Canon: tend to have noisy playback because the microphone picks up the sound made by the camera's mechanism as it records. Otherwise they have very good reviews.
br /Sony: this is overpriced crap. Look around at Sony product reviews and for most you'll find at least one person saying something like "I am surprised at how bad Sony's quality has gotten..." then look at the dates on those reviews and you'll see that this is not a random occurrence, it has been going on for years and yet people still believe that this is a good brand.
br /Negatives: a) Quality-wise, all but one of the current Mini-DV models have terrible reviews.
br / b) They use touch-screen technology for the controls which might sound cool to have and even might be cool to use, BUT fingers on an LCD screen are NOT a good idea.
br /Positives: a) Have the Night-Shot technology which basically is infrared technology which allows you to record with absolutely no light.
br /JVC: some models have had problems where the camera will show error messages and stop working for no apparent reasons. Do a basic google search for "JVC lens cap error" to find out more. Same noise problem as the Canon brand. Otherwise very good reviews all over.
br /Hitachi: it's the only brand with DVD-based technology that's any good that's under $400. In fact I don't think there's any other DVD-based camera under $400 period.
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br /No other brands are worth it. Sharp made good cameras, but are not making any right now. Panasonics surprisingly suck.
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br /Here's what I lookd at specifically:
br /DVD:
br /Hitachi: DZ-BX35A: The previous model has good reviews, but only supports DVD-Ram. This newer model will have the same price, has way better specs and will support DVD-RW.
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br /Mini-DV:
br /Sony DCR-HC36: just two reviews for this one, but they are both good. Has nightshot (the infrared thing), has a very good stabilization system. It's too expensive (not a very good value). All in all, the only reason why I would consider this is for the nightshot thing, the rest of the specs are on par with other less expensive cameras. It you do consider this one, then may I humbly suggest getting the Sony DCR-TRV280 which is a Digital8 format (whose main problem is that only Sony supports that format).
br /Canon:
br /The ZR line is very good. The older models are the ZR100, ZR200, ZR300 and ZR400. Out of those the best value would be the ZR400. The battery is long lasting, they have a good stabilization system, but the specs are a bit dated by now.
br /Then there are the new models that just came out/will be coming out soon: ZR500, ZR600, ZR700. They are cheaper than the older models and the specs are much better, the problem with this ones is that there are no reviews yet.
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br /JVC:
br /Same deal as with the Canons: there are two older models with good reviews: JVC GRD230 (very hard to find it nowadays) and JVC GRD270. Both however have very dated specs.
br /Then there are the new models: JVC GRD350, JVC GRD370, JVC GRD395. Again, there is no info about the quality yet, and considering how JVC has had some serious quality issues in the past, it is wise to wait (or get an extended service plan).
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br /So why, you must wonder, did I write this review under this Hitachi product: simple, because this camera has to be the best value I've seen in a long while. If I had to buy a camera today, this is the one I would pick, as it has amazing features and specs at a tremendously accesible price. Many people are probably gonna end up in this page looking at it, so again I wanna save you the trouble I had to go through to make a choice. However, as good as it looks on paper, the real test comes from actual usage, so hopefully in a short amount of time we are gonna start looking at some actual working reviews for it (at which time I'll probably delete this one). My rating BTW is based on price\features (value).

We love this camcorder! For us, convenience is absolutely key, as our goal is simply to record family memories (mostly of our children); not to edit or make feature films or even to have need to transfer from tape to DVD. Accordingly, we have no desire for anything particularly complicated, cumbersome, or expensive, and this low-end DVD model does the trick.
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br /First, it is the lowest price (by far) of all the DVD models we reviewed.
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br /Second, it is extremely small for maximum portability (very nearly as small as my 35mm camera). It is easy to use, and rather self-explanatory. In fact, we took it straight out of the box, and filmed our youngest son's first birthday party, and our girls' gymnastics recitals without so much as a glance to the manual. Then, of course, we inserted the mini-DVD into our DVD-player. Again, very easy to use. Quality of video was more than sufficient.
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br /For us, battery life was fine, as we had lot of start and stop filming. The battery lasted us through the birthday party and a 3-hour Gymfest (although, again, we stopped and started a lot). WE understand that the battery is supposed to last an hour or so on a constant run.
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br /A few words of note: If you want to put the DVD into your PC, make sure you have a DVD drive. In addition, the still picture function is not particularly good; of course, we bought this to record video. We have cameras for still pictures. Finally, there is no light on the camcorder; however, we tend not to video in the dark.
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br /If you are looking for high quality video and photo stills, this is likely not your camcorder. However, if you are looking for a relatively inexpensive; hassle-free; family moment camcorder, we can't recommend this model enough. And yes, for our purposes, we give it five stars.

This is a great begginer camcorder. I have tried most of the features and everything works as it was described.
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br /The only thing I didn't realize is that this doesn't connect to your computer via USB (or any connection). It is the lowest model so it doesn't have that option.

I've had this camcorder for about a month now. The upside is beautiful clear video reproduction with an extremely powerful zoom. You do need a bit of light with the camcorder. I am considering getting a small accessory light to use at night. Do not take pictures into the sun. Pictures come out grainy.
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br /The downside is this memory card they suggest using to save snapshots as pictures. So far I havent gotten a really clear one. I have a Kodak LS443 digital camera and the pictures are very clear from that. Hitachi 35A pictures are fuzzy. But I bought it for the DVD camcorder... and I really like it.
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br /It also features stereo microphones built in. If you go for a more expensive model there are mic inputs for better sound.
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br /I have no experience with these digital camcorders and I did not want to buy a high end model. I purchased one that had good reviews and will most likely be taking videos with this for a long time.
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br /Get the Hitachi bag, I got the smaller cheaper bag and all the equipment doesnt fit. I have not been able to find 8cm RW discs in stores, just DVD-R discs. New technology is always like that. RW discs are erasable. -R discs are not.
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br /Finalizing a disc is necessary before playing it in a DVD player or computer. It is easy to do and takes just moments.
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br /I have not yet transferred files to my computer as I do not have a mini USB cable. It does not come with the camera. You are supplied with the camera and strap, cleaning cloth, NTSC cable to play the videos over TV, a charger and DC connector, and a battery which last about a half an hour. They do not even give you a blank disc. You need to buy another $100 worth of stuff to really get going. THe camera is 399, but that is only where the cost starts. I bought a Hitachi case and 2 hour battery, and about 12 DVD-R discs now.
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br /Amazon has a special right now. Between April 30 and July 8 you get 12 Maxell DVD-R discs and two albums just for buying the unit. I purchased my camera on April 10th and sent an email asking to have the rebate apply to my purchase. I hope they make an exception. I do not like rebates, I would rather have them sell me the thing for $[...]if thats what it is worth.
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br /All in all a good camera.
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br /saxman

I am not impressed with picture quality as the picture quality is not as detailed/clear as the mini-dv camera I had been using simply because this is a compressed MPEG format verses the AVI on the mini-DV cameras. The advertising boasts of the abity to shoot video in the 16.9 wide screen format but you do not find out untill later that this option is only available in the 30 minute record mode and not the 60 minute mode. Then there is the issue that you can only finalize a disk and do repair file recovery ONLY while the camera is operating on AC. I had planned on shooting a dvd out in the field where there is no AC and being able to complete a disc without finding an AC outlet before completing the task. The standard battery that comes with the camera that I bought is good for about 30 minutes of normal recording and is a drawback, so get the larger amperage battery if you want to use the camera for the 60 minute low resolution record mode.
br / The low light abilities of the camera is fair for the price but not much to write home about. I enjoy the fact that you can buy/use a double sided ram disk and get 2 hours of recording of low resolution of recording even though you have to remove and flip the disk over. I have noticed the lens fogs up quite easily when moving the camera from a cooler temp to a warmer one as in from an airconditioned room to outside on a hot day. The camera has no manual finalization mode so it goes through the finalization process everytime you load or unload a disc which I find annoying when wanting to review various discs.
br / Of course the 1200 digital zoom is useless but the 25x optical is clarity is rather impressive and the zoom function works smoothly. Althought the still pics are average I enjoy the fact that you do not have seperate modes for pictures and video capture and pics can be snapped with the dedicated button while recording video. The capabilty to uses various disk formats is great and is one of the strongest features I believe otherwise there are relatively few bells and whistles and I am left wanting all those that this camera does not come equipped with so I have opted to pay another $75.00 or $100.oo dollars for a higher featured camera.
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br /Robert

Everything described for this camcorder was well-explained in detail. There wasn't a thing I was displeased with when I received the product. I've used it several times, and I am very satisfied with this choice. It's a must-buy for those seeking an affordable, but very modernized camcorder.

I had originally purchased a different camcorder with the tapes but they didnt seem to work as I wanted so I took it back and got his unit! It plays right in my dvd player which is SO simple! The cam itself is simple to use and the 1 touch button for pictures is GREAT and the quality is wonderful! I took a pic from about 200 feet away with the zoom and it looks clear and beautiful! I do like that you can get either a 30 or 60 minute disk. Ive made movies for my parents of their grandson and they just put the disk in their dvd player and it plays! Talk about SIMPLE! So get it! You wont be unhappy.

During the summer of 2007 I checked with a good consumer magazine and saw this camera fairly well recommended. Then I visited this site and read more reviews. After purchasing the camera I have found the reviews I read were very accurate. It is easy to use, a nice size, has great zoom capability and I feel it is worth the price.
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br /One observation I made was the same as what I remember from the review - that is that the microphone is very sensitive. I plan to keep that in mind and use it to our advantage when I video my son playing piano.
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br /Another note is that the still pictures are not that good but since that is not what we bought the camera for that is of little importance.
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br /It has an amazing zoom lens! The down side of that is when zoomed in on a subject it is very difficult to hold the camera steady.
br /I've noted that the auto-focus is quite sensitive as well and changes the focus if any little thing comes into the picture.
br /To that end I highly recommend using a tripod while videoing important things. If you don't have a tripod available then try to find a fence post, bench back, car hood, anything that is stable to rest the camera on.
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br /I am looking forward to using the camera for videos for years to come!

My husband and I purchased this camcorder after doing a lot of research. We thought the price was great! So far it has done the job for us. We have 3 kids so it gets a lot of use here. We also took it to Disney and it worked out great because it is so small so taking it on rides or into shows was not a problem at all. We love it and would reccomend it.
br /Also it was not hard to get it going. All you have to do is make sure you read the directions.

This Camcorder is the best. Multi functional. Just not included nigth vision. But the price is very good.

I bought this camera after doing some online research. The price was attractive for the features offered, and online reviews consistently mentioned the camcorder's superior picture quality. The first DV-R I recorded looked great, but a distracting hum became apparent halfway through the disc. I called Hitachi's customer service line, and they asked which brand of disc I used. When I mentioned Sony, I was told to try Maxell, the brand Hitachi recommends. I was also told the Sony disc might have been defective. I bought Maxell discs and went back to record again. This time, the hum was worse. It wasn't consistent, but intermittent. A second call to Hitachi was made. I was now told to bring it in for servicing, even though the camera was brand new. I complied. You guessed it. After getting the camera back from the authorized repair shop, the hum was still there. A third call to Hitachi was made. I was told to return the camera to the repair shop so they could correct the problem. The repair shop isn't exactly down the block, so bringing the camera back, and then picking it up again would have consumed time, expense, and aggravation. At this point, I had lost complete faith in both the camcorder, Hitachi's customer service, and their authorized repair shop. Please.... STEER CLEAR OF THIS CAMCORDER. Though picture quality is fine, you will be driven crazy by horrible noise on your recordings. Based on my experience with this awful camera and Hitachi's customer service, I will NEVER purchase one of their produicts again.

I can't believe this camera has been so highly-rated. This camera wasted lots of my time recording important events and then was unable to reliably "finalize" my discs for display on my DVD players. I recorded 5 brand-new discs at an event last night, everything seemed fine, and then later that night two of the five discs failed to finalize and gave messages about the discs being corrupted or unreadable. The only options were to fix the problems by re-formatting the discs and permanently losing contents of two of the discs. (That's a 40% rate of loss!) I used the recommended Maxell DVD-RW discs to avoid exactly this sort of problem and still got very poor results. In advance of a big vacation in two weeks I'm going out to shop for another camera tonight. DON'T BUY THIS CAMERA unless you TEST THOROUGHLY in advance of your vacation or special event. I may have a lemon, but this could be the current state of Hitachi quality and performance. It may also be a problem inherent in recording to mini-DVDs. All I know is that I am very frustrated after following all directions and instructions carefully. I lost some important video memories when I used this camera and I'm not letting it happen on my big vacation in two weeks.

I got this DVD camera last week as a gift. I tried it for one week and I returned it. There are several reasons:
br /1) The specs might sound good on paper, but not a reality.
br / Picture quality is horrible, both indoors and outdoors. My
br / house is sunny and bright indoors. I took video of my children during the day and it was grainy. I tried it outdoors and it wasn't a sharp picture at all.
br /2) The DVD-RW discs in general loose their quality overtime, and infact may become completly unreadable after 2 years! So, if your planning on saving your children's childhood memories don't buy DVD, use miniDV instead. Just do a search on the computer and you'll find this to be true.
br /3) The hitachi's batteries last about 30 - 45 min! That's it! The video is also 30 min only!
br /4) This particular hitachi does not have the capability of hooking up to your computer.

We're very happy with the video quality of this camcorder. However, there are a couple of rather large design flaws:
br /1. There is no auto shut off when the camera is powered on but not in use. To make matters worse, the power button is easily turned on accidentally. Consequently, we very often excitedly reach for our recorder only to find that the battery is dead. This happens so much that we've taken to removing the battery when the camera isn't in use.
br /2. Ok - I can't be the only person who forgets to remove the lens cap. How hard would it be to prevent recording until the lens cap is removed? As it is, I've got quite a few minutes of "black cats at midnight" footage.
br /3. Power is required to eject the DVD. So, when your battery is dead because the poorly designed power button turned on an drained it, not only can you no longer record video, you can't even watch what you have already recorded!

I purchased this Hitachi DZ-BX35A DVD Camcorder at a clearance price on the spur-of-the-moment one day prior to my departure to Egypt for a 2 week Holiday. The clearance price was $149 and I figured the worst case was that I'd get some video images from our trip and I'd learn a bit about camcorders and be better educated for a future purchase when the prices drop for the HD flash memory models. Despite the quick purchase decision, I did attempt a bit of background research on DVD camcorders and this Hitachi model in particular. Because we would not have access to a computer during our travels, the DVD models seemed a good bet as I could take along a supply of discs and do the transfers later on return home. On checking reviews of this model at some of the online camcorder sites I saw several reviewers who totally panned this model giving it very low ratings across all aspects of its performance. This almost disuaded me from buying but then I noticed one comment on one of the reviews noting that the reviewers were comparing this to $500-800 models. He noted that he was a beginner and was happy so far. The $149 price was too much to resist so I went back and bought the Hitachi and 6 DVD+RW discs the day prior to my departure. I could not find the highly rated Maxell disks and bought Sony instead. They have worked fine. They play on my computer DVD player as well as on my home theatre DVD player.
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br /So with that prelude, how has it worked? I am totally satisfied so far (but recognize this is my first experiecne recording any kind of video). I suspect some of my quibbles are common to many camcorders - for example, the 100x zoom is great (even astonishing) but you have to learn to control the speed of the zoom and a tripod or some camera support is almost essential at the longer focal lengths. In the bright sun wearing sunglasses, I found the view finder virtually impossible to use; the LCD display was usable but very hard to see any detail. The focus seems to lag a bit sometimes while panning on objects at different distances. Battery life seemed adequate and the ability to run the camera in the hotel off the DC cord was helpful for reviewing the prior day's shooting, formatting disks, etc. The AC adapeter worked fine on either 110 or 220V. Again, speaking as a beginner with nothing else to compare it to the image quality seems fine for a 640x480 resolution and played on my 42" plasma with adequate resolution. Some of clips I shot seemed to be a bit off on the color rendition and some in the Egyptian desert sun were kind of wahsed out (but then again it was incredibly bright out there).
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br /My only complaint at this point is with the power switch - its too easy to accidentally turn on or off. There is supposedly a lock button but on my model it does not seem to work. This is mainly worrisome regarding the time it take the camera to write the images just shot onto the disk.
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br /Some minor stuff: the menus seem a bit awkward to use and the still photo option records only to an SD card at only 1.3 megapixzels but this is not unique to Hitachi models. Overall, I am delighted with this camera so far and have found a an excellent learning experience.

Do not buy unless you want to waste time recording and then lose everything you record.
br /I have lost my daughters birthday party, a trip to a fair and some other priceless moments, because of disc errors. Halfway through recording I get messages saying the disc is corrupt and needs to format. Meaning 'erase everything that I have filmed up to that point". This has happened multiple times. In fact i have yet to make it through the finalizing process on a single CD. The last straw was a trip to Thailand and cambodia. I carried the camera with me everywhere and filmed everything, again getting multiple error messages. When I did finally get through 1 entire CD of filming without getting an error, only to get home and lose everything. I tried to finalize the CD. It got to a minute left of finalizing and came up with a different error message but of course it wanted to format to solve the problem. The whole solution to any problem on this camera is to format. Again, this erases everything. I have wasted 30-40 hours of taping without a single bit of footage. I am back to mini dv. dont buy! Trust me the first time you lose a priceless moments you will be sick to your stomach.

The camera is ok but sometimes it just is not worth the technology because the disks have had errors while recording and after recording (two different types of formats). At least with the 8mm we used to use we knew what we had. I sure wish I had an 8 mm instead.

i should have listened to the other reviewers and not cared for the really low price. now i lost my son's first birthday party what a POS.
br /stay far far away don't take it for FREE

was unable to fully use single use disk, after using camera a few minutes was unable to restart to use it again, maybe I should have stayed with a JVC??

I was told it connected to a computer and I find out later it doesn't. Time for the trash

Price was not our main concern, our many concern was trying to find a camcorder that shot in 16:9 ratio for our widescreen TV. We have a 50" and when we played back our old Hi8 camcorder on the new tv, the picture wasn't very clear because the old HI8 camcorders shot in 4:9 ratio (less picture pre inch) so it was being stretch out over a 16:9 wide screen tv so it wasn't the best picture, we needed a new widescreen camcorder to go with our new widescreen tv. When I saw the Hitachi DVD can be film in 16:9 ratio that is why I bough it, price had nothing to do with it.
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br /1st off it was not easy to use, I had to read the manual many times!! I had to look up how to play back the disc after I was done filming, the camera does not have a Play back BUTTON after reading the manual I found out you had to hit the navigation button to get to menu then to the play back option. Also I used a DVD-rw and when I was done filming I put the disc into my brand new 2006 DVD player and it would not work. After reading the manual then I learned that with DVD-rw you have to finalize the video before you can put it into your DVD player; by hitting menu, option, finalize a lot of steps before you can actually put it in your DVD player. If you use the DVD+rw you do not have to do all those step and can put it right from the camera into your DVD player but you'll never know that unless you read the manual!!! I got so frustrated with having to pull the manual out so many times.
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br /2nd the picture quality on a widescreen is not that great, I bought the most expensive DVD disc the store had, I set it to High quality recording and when I played it back on my widescreen TV the picture was hazy, when the kids moved they were blurred. The quality was the same as my old 2002 HI8 camcorder. If your buying this for the 16:9 ratio to go with a widescreen tv don't, I saw no difference when I shot in 16:9 ratio it was the same as 4:9!!! I return the camera the next day
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br /This Review it meant for people with widescreen TV's ONLY, if you have a regular tv then the quality will probbaly be excellent and a good camera for the price, but it doesn't work well with widescreen tv's you'd be better off going with a HD camcorder.

The night shoot is not there.
br /ZRs are much better in value and better. They had good review on previous models. I do not understand why some reviewer prefer this one than the Canon-- the reason being Canon Zr lines have no reviews out yet, but this one has practically no reviews at all except his own.
br /5 Stars for this camcorder is ridiculous.