I moved up from a MiniDV camcorder to this one because of the hard-drive recording. It was a *great* purchasing decision. My personal favorite features:
br /- Plug it into your computer, drag and drop the clips to your computer, rename them from .MOD to .MPG, and then author a DVD. NO CONVERSION NECESSARY! Records AC-3 audio.
br /- Easy manual control
br /- Intuitive navigation of the menu structure (MG21 has a 'stick' control while the MG20 did not)
br /- 16:9 recording! Fills up my HDTV.
br /- 32x OPTICAL zoom
br /- ~5 hours of recording time even in the highest quality setting
br /
br /Downsides:
br /- Quality out of the box is not so good, BUT with a few adjustments it is much better
br /
br /How I get good low-light/indoors video (do the following steps indoors with the camera in capture mode):
br /1) Disable the "Gain Up" feature (major contributor to the grainy low-light video)
br /2) Turn on "Manual" mode (via AUTO button)
br /3) Go to the manual control menu (down on the 'stick')
br /4) Set AE to '+2'
br /5) Highlight 'MWB' in the WB menu, point the camera at a sheet of paper (position the camera so the sheet of paper fills the view of the camera) and press and hold the middle of the 'stick' until 'MWB' stops blinking (about 5-10 seconds).
br /6) Set S.sp. to 1/60
br /7) Press down on the 'stick' to exit the manual control menu
br /
br /After doing this, my indoors video quality is MUCH better (no more noise/grainy video). The settings will be saved, even if the battery is removed or depleted; they will return even if you switch to AUTO mode then back to MANUAL.
br /
br /I am really happy with this camcorder.
br /
br /[...]

I chose JVC everio of course because of its ability to write video files on hard drive and then easily copy them to my PC ( don't forget to change .MOD extension to MPG to play it in any player. Also you may need MPEG-2 codec which you can find on internet). No tapes, disks, etc. Just calculate how much you will spend on these items of the past. I think they still exist just because of companies getting money for this on the regular basis. If you have a tape camera you are busted for all your life to feed producer of DV cassettes... But this is all just thoughts.
br /About the camera you can read a lot of reviews for other models which are almost exactly the same and get a lot of useful information. I just chose the cheapest model which is totally enough for my needs. Summary is that this camera is very convenient, battery life is less than 1 hour, video quality during the day is good, during the night is no quality at all and in low light you should play a little bit with the settings. I've read other reviews and just want to repeat this: try GAIN UP setting or follow this advise of one reviewer:
br /
br /I came of a way to improve its indoors performance
br /significantly, use "M" mode with white balance set to
br /"Cloudy" and shutter speed set to 1/50 (in extreme
br /conditions 1/30)
br /The camera store these settings, so you just need to
br /set these once and switch to "M" whenever shooting indoors.
br /
br /I think JVC should give more hints to people, not everyone can guess such things.
br /So 5 stars for the idea minus 1 star for battery, bad manual and average video quality.
br /

I recently purchased this product and have been very happy with the performance. It is very small and light and the recording quality is really good. I especially like the ability to record segments directly to the hard drive. It is very easy to delete the bad takes and just get the good stuff. The quality in dark places or at night is not very good (except for close-up subjects), but considering the size of the camera I am fine with limiting recording the well lit places.
br /
br /I would highly recommend this purchase, especially for getting good video of kids or friends.

I got this camera as a graduation gift, yet i had to pitch in 200 of my own, which was completely fine for me..
br /
br /I use this very often, and my band does touring and I record everything that goes on, and make videos out of the clips.
br /The hard disk drive is very helpful, because all I need to do is plug into a power source, and I can record out whole show!!!
br /
br /IT IS VERY IMPORTANT THO TO TURN DEMO MODE OFF BEFORE RECORDING WITH THE CAMERA ON A TRIPOD WHEN IT IS STILL, my camera kept shutting off during out last show, and our show tonight will record smoothly..
br /
br /I use this for documenting pretty much anything that happens, and I love it, cool features like "old reel-type film", black and white, strobe, sepia, and it shoots in 16X9 which is a cool feature to have, because I produce the videos in that format.
br /
br /I love this camera and would definately tell everybody to buy this camera for any use.
br /
br /the only negative thing is nightime recording isn't that great, so have an external light source... or don't record at night ;)

Love the camcorder and the fact that you never have to buy tapes or those stupid little 20-minute discs. The quality is great. And you can upgrade to a three-hour battery, so battery life isn't a concern. My only drawbacks: 1) camera can be very sensitive; I took it to the beach and jostled it around a little and the zoom and focus stopped working, and 2) using it with a program like Sony's Click to DVD software scrambles the clips, so when you edit before burning to DVD you have to go back, frame by frame, and rearrange the clips in the order you shot them in.

We purchased this camcorder because we have our first child on the way and it has far exceeded our expectations to date. First off, it is incredibly small and easy to carry and hold. The hard disk recording media is the way to go for us and eliminates the need to purchase yet another type of disc or tape. For the way we use it, this unit delivers quality video and good sound. The default settings are not the best in low light situations, but menu adjustments can be made to improve low light recording results. Like many others suggest, buy a longer duration battery as the one that is included just doeasn't last long enough and requires constant charging. Overall we are very pleased with our purchase of this camcorder and the results it has given.

This is a great product. I love the design, size, hard drive (no tapes!), 32X optical zoom, added convenience of an SD card, as well as excellent video quality. The format that it records videos on can be easily changed by changing the extension of the file. Downloads to PC without issues and easy to setup and watch recorded videos on TV. Now the Auto settings are not the best for indoor/low light conditions so try using it under Manual recording mode setting the AE to +3, the WB to Halogen, and the Shutter Speed (S.Sp) to 1/60 or in extreme conditions to 1/30. These settings worked really well for me and I am really happy with it. Also disbale the "Gain Up" feature which is makes video quality bad. I recommend to get a 5-hour spare battery is only like $25-35 online and worth every penny. I have not used the software that came with it though.

This is my first digital camera ever, and I've got to say I could not think of anything better. The idea of not having to buy tapes or disks to record on was one of my main reasons for purchasing it. Think of it this way: 3 digital tapes usually costs like $20+ and imagine how many tapes you could go through in the span of a few years. With this camera you just transfer it straight from the camera to your computer... no tapes involved!
br /
br /It's a good idea to buy this camera. Yeah it's a little more expensive than a lot of other cameras, but you will save money by not having to purchase tapes!
br /

We had the standard video camera for years. Problem is you wind up with all these small tapes. My husband would work on putting them on the computer and making disks but that took way too long. My brother-in-law bought a mini disk but that requires expensive disks and each one has to be finalized before you can watch them. All of these issues are solved with this video camera. It tapes beautifully and you can watch them back on the camera with SOUND!! This is great if you want to see if you got what you think you did.
br /
br /Also, every time you start and stop taping it makes a file - this makes editing much easier as it is generally sectioned well.
br /
br /Finally, when you want to download you just plug it into the computer and it is easily transferred. Editing is very easy with the included Nero software. If you want to do advanced editing you may want something more but the enclosed software works fine for my family purposes.
br /
br /We bought this one due to concerns about function in low light with the other cameras. This is still somewhat of a concern in this camera as the quality of the film is not as crisp indoors as out. But, the quality is just as good as in my old tape based system.
br /
br /I highly recommend this hard disk based video camera.
br /
br /

I have had this camcorder for a few weeks now. After reading some reviews on here I was scared, but I have to say that this camera works fine for me.
br /
br / I have taken video indoors in low light situations and the quality looks fine on my TV (32"), it is definitly comparable to other cameras in this price range. Outdoors the quality has been great. I have also had no trouble with shaking in my video up to a 20x zoom, anything beyond that and you definitly notice the slightest vibration.
br /This camera also makes it very easy to edit video which is a great feature.
br /The battery lasts for about an hour, but I bought the extended battery (3hr) and it lasts at least 2.5 hours which is plenty for most situations. It does stick out a little further but this is already one of the smallest video cameras so it does not make that much of a difference.
br /
br /If you want professional looking video then look at a higher price range, but if you are in the market for a lightweight, easy to use camcorder, that can take almost 5 hrs of video on the highest quality with NO TAPES then I would definitly reccommend the Everio. I am very happy with mine.

From the other reviews, you'd get a sense that the lighting is a disaster and the conversion from .mod to .mpeg is also a huge drain on time, but fortunately neither turned out to be true.
br /
br /I just bought this camera and after following the instructions on that first helpful review, the lighting was just fine and by simply renaming the file from .mod to .mpg you can open them all very easy. The only drawback is that the videos are jumpy until you fully download them to your computer (which stinks considering that the files can easily be over 100MB).
br /
br /The GUI (or user interface on the menus) is also incredibly easy to use, maybe to the point that a monkey could do it. It's like having a little computer right on the camera -- it makes thumbnails for all your videos and picture for easy management and playback.
br /
br /I highly recommend this camera, but I only give it 4 stars for the few out-of-box things that need to be done.

I don't think the camera is worth the 400 dollars, but it is a decent HARD DRIVE camera nonetheless. One of the major drawbacks is that you need great light sources to have an excelent shot. In addition, the proprietary .mod extension files only play on the given software. Be ready to know how to produce the clips and turn them into a playable mpeg or mpeg2 files if you want to share these files with family and friends. The major advantage is not having to buy all kinds of tapes. This is simply a camera for the the Dad or the soccer Mom who want to have movies of their kids. I would say that if you really want quality pictures, save your hard earned 400 dollars and hold out for an pricier HD camcorder.

This is my first camcorder. I purchased it because of my new-born son. The reasons that I chose this one are the 32x optical zoom and hard drive storage. The pixel is not bad,680000,like most other camcorders. It is very small and convenient. About the videos, I do not know how good it is compared to others, such as miniDV. But I am not satisfied with it. Like other reviewers said it is very bad for indoor videos. I tried different set-ups, it improved a bit, but still not good. If you choose night mode, videos actually get worse. The only way to solve this problem is to turn on all of the lights in your room and make a very bright scene(if you have enough lights). The day videos are just fine. I used auto mode. But, sometimes, it is not that "auto". If you shot at the early afternoon, the videos become very bright. I think you should use manual mode to get the good videos if you are kind of familar with camcorders.
br /
br /I like the software. I easily installed in my computer and used it right away. You can edit your videos and make a short movie.
br /In summary, it is a ordinary camcorder for beginners.

I like the quality of the camera in ample light. The problem I have is low light video. You can't see anything, and the low light settings make everyone look like they're moving through a strobe light. There is a review below that tells you how to fix it, but it doesn't help the darkness of the picture. It might as well be a $400 tape recorder.

I bought this camera and loved the IDEA of being able to drop the images directly to my laptop. The process works great, the interface is cool... but the images stink on ice. In daylight the camera has a problem with shadow detail. Inside, the camera cannot see anything unless the room lights are bright. There is a lot of digital artifacting in all of the images too.
br /
br /The advertisement says "DVD Quality Video". Baloney, the quality is somewhere between VHS and the movies you can take with your digital still camera.

I got this camera about a year ago mainly to film myself throwing discus.. anyways it had worked really well for doing that (discus), but when i used to make a film for a class at school, it was on a rolling tripod and i was rolling it down the hall filming and the tripod got kicked, and now i have to replace the hard drive. Not that JVC should replace it, but it is a point to think of when getting this camera. You would never have that problem with DV or SD. Otherwise it is a great camera for non professional video like families or students.

I was very disapointed with the Quality and performance of this recorder. Low light settings render poor picture quality. Standard battery life one hour! Even at the highest picture quality it does less than expected for the price. Please don't waste your time and money on this model.

We have had this unit for a year now and are pretty disappointed for the money we paid. We upgraded to this JVC hd model from a Panasonic minidv that was great. First indoors the camcorders light is nearly useless at more than three feet. The video picture qualty is terrible unless you turn the frame rate down. I think basicaly this is a good unit for the bright outdoors. The camera is well thought out functionally has great controlls. The software that came with it is somewhat usefull but not good or up to par for the cost. I sold our 5 year old panasonic for a 100 bucs and I really miss it.

I bought this camcorder on Friday 12/15/2006 from Best Buy. I toyed around with it in the store and it seemed like a great idea. I brought it home to shoot my sons 3rd birthday and when we turned the lights off and lit the sparklers for the cake this camcorder struggled to even stay in focus, let a lone get a decent shot of the action. I was willing to chalk this up to the low lighting conditions.
br /My next shoot was a x-mas recital for my other boy. The lighting was pretty good at this event and the recording quality was still pretty poor. My next shoot was back at my house. I had six canlights and a fan with 2 bulbs on at the same time. This was not enough light to shoot without the gain up feature. The gain up feature causes the images to have a greyish washed out cast. I ended up returning this camera on the following Monday.
br /
br /If you are going to use this cam in only outdoor sunny conditions or in a brightly lit Best Buy, DON'T GET IT.

I agree with the many other users who have experienced the "Condensation, Operation Paused" defect on their JVC GR-xxxx. Despite numerous others reporting this problem, JVC says its not a recognized problem. I would disagree - it is a recognized problem, but its your problem, not theirs.

I've had this camera for about 2 years now, and I've been very pleased with it overall. There are a few things that I've learned to live with however.
br /
br /Using it outdoors, it shoots beautifully. The picture is crystal clear. The same goes for indoors, in well-lit situations. But in low light situations, the picture is grainy and quite dark. You can futz with the manual settings to try and compensate for it, but the picture simply won't be as great as you would like it to be.
br /
br /Another nitpick is that the files are proprietary, and only works with the editing software that comes with the camera. I'll never understand why companies will do that sort of thing. There is a work-around out there that will allow you to convert the files into more common mpeg files, but I'll let you look for that yourself.
br /
br /Aside from those issues, it's a very fine HDD camera.

This camera does what I want; allows me to take quality footage of my daughter as she continues to grow. I don't record film footage in a cave, so I have no complaints about the low light conditions. If what you're looking to do is capture precious moments as keepsakes, then this ought to meet the need.
br /Pros:
br /*Hard drive storage, so no disks to tote
br /*Small bodied, light weight
br /*Easy connection to TV or other media for playback
br /*Controls are fairly easy to navigate
br /Cons:
br /*Battery life is short; buy a spare or two, as well as a separate charger (shop online for bargains)
br /

I actually read all of the reviews posted here about this camera before I bought it. I noticed that there were some serious issues right out of the box with the "Low Light" quality. Then I noticed that the "Fix" offered by one of my fellow reviewers didn't do anything... in fact made it so that I can't see ANYTHING at all because it's so dark. (The "Gain Up" being turned off made it so that I couldn't see across a small room with all the lights on.) THEN I noticed that, when I put the video right on to my computer from the camera, even though I had it set to the highest quality setting, the quality of the image was still significantly below what I expected.
br /
br /Bottom line is that I am returning it tomorrow, and going back to MiniDV.

When I take pictures with the camcorder , the pictures are not clear at all.Anyone has that problem too, or is it just my camcorder like this? Thought about to bring it back again,but I love the HardDisk and the 32 zoom.Is small and fits perfect in my hand and easy to operate.

I purchased this a few months ago, and am not very happy with it. Operationally and functionally it works fine. However, I'm not at all happy with the quality of the videos/pictures. I had a small digital I bought for $125 and the video quality is the same. Also, even after making the adjustments and settings recommended for low-light and indoor photography, it is not very good. And then, you have to reset for outdoors, then reset for indoors, etc. If it involved one or two adjustments, it would be fine but it's a lot of hassle for poor quality you end up with. Also, this just may be me, but it's so light when you use zoom it's very hard to hold it steady and the image then gets blurred like it's out of focus. For a $500 range camera, I would look at something else.

a good DV camcorder! the reason i did not rate it as 5 stars is i don't like its light function. The light is a little bit weak.

I purchased this with great expectations and figured a hard drive camcorder was the way to go. I did a lot of research and decided on this JVC model. It is reasonably easy to use, i will give it that, but this performs really bad in in low light conditions and I doing a lot of recording indoors as my wife and i just had a baby boy! I followed all the instructions to improve quality and tips on the net etc, helped a litte but picture still looked really bad grainy etc, I also a lot of problems with the focus too. I found all the adjusting was a royal pain and still i was having problems. Do not waste your money on any hard drive camcorders, as the technology still has a long way to go. At this point I am still using my old tape panasonic camcorder and converting the recording to DVD. Believe it or not, the picture and recording on my old Panasonic is way better and what you would expect from a camcorder, and its lets be honest, ITS ALL ABOUT THE PICTURE AND RECORDING QUALITY or why bother? Bottom line, if you want a camcorder that records like a bad video clip on the net, this is for you!

its a great camera except burning the DVD procedure is hard. It was hard for me to Edit and burn the DVD. Its good for those people who have great knowledge of Photo/Movie editing software. indoor recording is not that great eigher. great for Outdoor recording.

A friend of mine bought a mini-DVD camcorder. I went over to her house and immediately was dismayed at the sight of her juggling mini-DVD cases like pokers chips on her desk. I don't have that problem. I didn't have the heart to tell her what a mistake she made. My camcorder is a hard drive. I hit the button to record, upload and delete. I can suggest JVC Everio GZMG21 20GB HDD Digital Media Camcorder [and the great 32x zoom capacity] for other reasons -- but listening to her bemoan the need to buy even more mini-DVD's after owning her camcorder for only two weeks really made me have no regrets on buying this one. Nuff said, eh?

This is just plain cool!
br /
br /This camcorder is so worth the money! And the software it comes with is just so user friendly!!!
br /
br /I have no complaints about this device, cheap, reliable, and so easy to use!

Does anyone know if you can get rid of the on-screen display of the video mode, battery, and picture quality icons during video play back? This is very anoying when trying to review a video.

We got this camera on sale . . . now I know why. The software is slowly ruining our Gateway. It removed a decoder feature we had connected to one program and now we can't get it back w/o calling a hardware specialist.
br /
br /The video is grainy. Shooting in doors is terrible. We have an old camera that works better than this.