DVD camcorder versus mini-DV versus hard drive etc

[mjl]

I want to get a new camcorder and am deciding what type. I know that DVD's contain mpeg video, and I know that mpeg video is compressed. I get the impression that mini-dv tapes are avi and are not as compressed?? Does this mean that a mini-dv camcorder is going to have higher quality than a camcorder that records directly to DVD, all other things being equal? I have read alot on the CAPTURE forum about capturing my old analog videotapes and digitizing them onto a DVD. But for future video recordings, am I going to have higher quality with dvd or mini-dvd... And what about camcorders that record right to a hard drive? What are the pros and cons of the different types? If a mini-dv is eventually fire-wired onto a dvd anyway, is it a wash in the end? Thanks

[PMorton]

Final quality depends on a lot of factors. If you plan to do any editing you are probably better off with miniDV. Mpeg is a great output format, but not very edit-friendly.

[edDV]

I want to get a new camcorder and am deciding what type. I know that DVD's contain mpeg video, and I know that mpeg video is compressed. I get the impression that mini-dv tapes are avi and are not as compressed?? Does this mean that a mini-dv camcorder is going to have higher quality than a camcorder that records directly to DVD, all other things being equal? I have read alot on the CAPTURE forum about capturing my old analog videotapes and digitizing them onto a DVD. But for future video recordings, am I going to have higher quality with dvd or mini-dvd... And what about camcorders that record right to a hard drive? What are the pros and cons of the different types? If a mini-dv is eventually fire-wired onto a dvd anyway, is it a wash in the end? Thanks

MiniDV (25Mb/s +audio) is substantally higher quality than direct DVD camcorder recording (~4Mb/s).

A better quality DVD will result from higher quality camcorder capture.

Hard Drive (and Blu-Ray XDCAM) are currently using DV format same as MiniDV and Digital8.

HDV uses MPeg2 capture but at the same bitrate as DV. Panasonic takes it up from there with P2 FlashRam cards to DVCProHD but recording time is very short.

[mjl]

Thank you for the reply... I have a followup question. So, if I buy a mini-dv camcorder, and now have mini-dv tapes and want to preserve them, and I use a firewire to make a digital copy onto my computer, and then encode them onto a DVD, will I lose the superior quality of the DV? (If I just store the video on the original mini-dv tapes, it appears to me that that will not be very permanent, as tapes degrade over the years. Or is it simply a practical matter that in ortder to store video, which takes up large file sizes, you muust either use tape, or have huge (impractical) amounts of hard drive space?? Finally, could you take the mini-dv and save the video as an uncompressed file on a dvd, and if so, how much video would fit on a dvd???

[gadgetguy]

You can save the DV-AVI files to DVDs as data and will preserve the full quality. You can fit about 20 minutes on a single layer DVD. It won't be playable in a standalone player, but works for storage, and it's easy to copy the files back to HDD when you want to edit. I have done this alot, but I also keep the original tape.

[mjl]

Thanks gadgetguy! That sounds like the best way to go. Now I need to know about how to choose a mini-dvd camcorder, but I will start a new thread for that. Thanks again.

[pchan]

Mini DV camcprder recorder in DV format. AVI is just a container that can contain DV or Divx format. DV is much less compressed than DVD. In terms on quality, DV will always be better than DVD. But for playback reason, it's alway necessary to convert to DVD. Compare to hard disk based comcorder, mini-DV will have better video quality. Generally, tape will be more reliable than hard disk. DVD video cam disc can playback directly on DVD player. In a nutshell, DVD disc or hard disk camcorders are more convenient for playback as no need to encode and can be easily transfer to DVD disc. The trade off is the video quality may not be as good as mini-DV. Most of the time, you can't tell the difference.

[edDV]

Thanks gadgetguy! That sounds like the best way to go. Now I need to know about how to choose a mini-dvd camcorder, but I will start a new thread for that. Thanks again.

MiniDV tape is cheap these days (~$3/hr.) and it is faster to dub back to tape, but 20 min to DVDR is an alternative.

Within 2-3 years, larger DVDR formats will be available (e.g. 25GB per side for Blu-Ray, 100GB for double layer double side). At that time, the DV tapes can be copied directly for backup.