MiniDv or Digital 8

[patsym1]

I was recently looking at a collection of Digital Camcorders and noticed some had the MiniDv logo on them and others Digital 8, I was wondering whats the main difference between them if any ?




Regards: Patsym1

[Greg12]

I believe it's the size of the tape.

I know that MiniDV uses a small cassete will Digital 8 uses a tape like the standard 8 and High 8 tapes.


I have not used Mini-DV personality, I have a D8 camera.

I like it because it's backwards compatible with my 8 and High 8 tapes.

[PhArAoH]

Same here. The main reason (apart from passthrough feature) I bought Sony D8 camcorder is because I have a huge collection of old 8mm tapes.

[patsym1]

Thanks for the quick reply guys, but basically I was wondering if there was a differance in quality or are the both the same?.


Regards: Patsym1

[TheSeven7hSon]

If you havn't already done so, you should check out DV.com.

http://www.dv.com/community/forums.jhtml?sid=1

There's a section there about cameras. I just checked it out and they're offline till Monday.

Seven

[Rich927]

I'm not sure, but I think MiniDV(using firewire) is 500 lines of resolution. and High 8(using SVideo) is 400 lines of resolution. If it is an Firewire output, resolution is 500 LOR. If it is an SVideo output, resolution is 400 LOR. If it is an Analog A/V output, resolution is 240 LOR. Hope this helps.

[luzgin]

I bought digital camcoder recently and before that I did some research about digital8 and miniDV formats.
Digital8 - Sony invented and supported this format - they use standard 8mm tapes and record video in digital format instead of analog.
All digital8 camcoders could play both 8mm tapes recorded in digital format and old analog.
MiniDV tapes are ~1.5 times smaller and also use digital format.
The quality of digital8 and miniDV is the same.
The only advantage miniDV camcoders are more compact comparing to digital8.
Finaly I bought miniDV Sony PC9 camcoder for it's small size.
But before that I bought Sony IP5 microMV camcoder - it's the smallest camcoder available with tapes which are 70% size of miniDV tapes.
I returned it next day after test drive. The zoom is so small - you hardly can use it - but it's nothing comparing to the bug Sony made:
At the end of each clip there is a freeze frame for a fraction of a second.
Looks terrible.
So if you want smaller size - go with miniDV. If size doesn't matter you could save money buying digital8.

[Greg12]

alot of D8 cameras have firewire


OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Get a camera with A/V input n u will have the best capture device in the world.