What Camcorder feature do I need to record movies to my HD?

[bek]

I am new to DVD Authoring, but enjoying it a lot. Now I want a camcorder to record movies to my hard drive. I'm not picky about the format, although I suspect AVI will be a common format.

What features do I need in a camcorder to be able to do this? I have no interest in recording videos to VHS. I plan to burn them to a DVD or keep them on my hard drive.

I've never had a camcorder, so it's all new to me. Hope someone out there can help. (Any specific camcorder suggestions are welcome as well.)

Thanks,
Brian

[spidey]

Depending on the cameras outputs would dictate how and in what format you'd input (capture)

A digital camcorder would most likely use a firewire or USB input to input a DV avi. Whereas a standard camcorder, using analog tape, you'd need to capture it via, S-Video or Composites

See under the Capture section to the left for mthods, but again, it will be dependent upon your camera's output as to what you'll need to input it both hardware and software - wise.

[cplevel42]

I have a digital camcorder and the quality is much better than my old analog one, so I would recomend digital.

Get a model that outputs through Firewire "IEEE 1394". You will need a firewire card for your PC or a motherboard with it.

I would recomend a fairly fast CPU maybe 2.0 ghz or faster. Also a fairly big HD like 60 gig or bigger. Try a 7200 RPM with ATA 133.

I use Preimeire to capture and edit with transitions. TMPEGnc to convert to MPEG2, and Ulead DVD workshop to add chapters, menus. You can burn straight from DVD workshop as well.

[MrKGB]

bek,
Buy DV camcorder, if you want it cheap check canon ZR60 for about $400.
Your machine is good for video.
You will need an extra harddrive at least 80GB and firewire card.
You should try to find firewire card with cable and Ulead Video Studio 6.0 on www.pricewatch.com

[hoyboy]

If you want to be able to record from a vhs source directly to your computer, then you will ned a digital camcorder with an Analogue to Digital Passthrough feature. This allows you to connect your vcr up to the camera, and then send that information to the computer through the firewire cable. I have a D8 sony camcorder with this feature and it has been very handy. I would look at th new sony dcrtrv22 Minidv camcorder. It seems like a really nice little camera