64 MAXIMUMPC HOLIDAY 2007
PANASONIC HDC-SX5
Record on disc or flash card—
your choiceHere’s the most versatile camcorder of
the bunch, letting you record 28 minutes
of its best-quality video per 3-inch DVD.
If you don’t feel like dealing with discs,
you can cram 80 minutes of HD footage
on an 8GB SDHC fl ash memory card
instead. If you do record to a DVD, you
can pop that disc into a compatible Blu-
ray player (our Sony BDP S-300 played
the disc perfectly) or play the disc back
directly from the camera. But the DVD
format has its drawbacks—it’s slow to
read when you turn on the camera, tak-
ing seven seconds from a cold start.
And once you’re done shooting, unless
you’re using DVD-RAM, you’ll need to
fi nalize the disk before you can read any
of the fi les on the computer or play them
back, which takes about fi ve minutes for
each minute of footage shot.
We like the three-second preroll
function that records the previous threeseconds before you push the record
button when you’re using an SDHC
fl ash memory card. In bright light, this
sucker cranked out images with aston-
ishing clarity, splashing well-saturated
colors all over the screen with nary a
motion artifact. However, some high-
contrast shots proved a challenge for
the SX5, blowing out the whites while
keeping the darkest objects in the
frame hidden in obscurity. In medium-
intensity lighting, such as indoors on a
cloudy day, some mottling was visible
in darker areas. These weaknesses
aside, the overall quality of the SX5’s
video was outstanding.That bulge on the side gives you a love
handle to grab onto.The SX5 feels great in the hand, with all
controls nestled in the proper place. If only
that selector knob were easier to operate.That bulge on the side gives you a loveHD CAMCORDERS
FINALLY ARRIVE
8
PANASONIC HDC-SX5
$900, http://www.panasonic.comSONY HANDYCAM
HDR-SR7 HARD
DRIVE CAMCORDERQuality build, stylish looks,
slight flawsThis Handycam felt rock solid and
provided the best optical image
stabilization. Its stop/start button is
in the perfect place, but the zoom
control is positioned right where your
middle fi nger rests—bad idea. We
like the “easy” mode, which, with the
push of a button, takes care of expo-
sure and focus for most situations.
The SR7’s stop button seemed
to be on a half-second delay, result-
ing in swish pans at the end of a few
shots—an annoyance we got used
to after a while. Another annoyance
is the cam’s use of a hard-to-find
mini HDMI connector instead of the
full-size HDMI port found on the
other camcorders.
Getting past that, the camcord-er’s performance with our video test
shots was strong, with brightly lit
situations displaying lifelike color and
tack-sharp resolution. It did well with
low and medium room light, too, and
showed us the best contrast ratio of
this roundup. Points of candlelight
in our low-light test revealed a warm
glow, rather than the noticeable
streaking we encountered with the
Panasonic and JVC camcorders.
Except for a few slight motion arti-
facts that seem common to AVCHD,
we liked its video quality a lot.The HDR-SR7 includes a convenient docking
station.A touch screen, as opposed to the joystick all
the other cams sport, makes navigation tedious
and can leave your screen a greasy mess.The HDR-SR7 includes a convenient docking8
SONY HDR-SR7
$1,400, http://www.sonystyle.comSPECS
1080i
AVCHD (MPEG-4 H.264)/60GB hard
drive, Memory Stick PRO
Duo fl ash memory card/13Mbps
One 1/2.9 (6.3mm) ClearVid CMOS
F/1.8-2.9, 10x optical zoom
3” x 3.25” x 5.75”/21oz
2.7” touch panel (211K pixels),
tilting viewfi nderVIDEO SIGNAL
RECORDING
FORMAT/MEDIUM/
HIGHEST DATA RATE
IMAGE SENSOR
LENS^
SIZE/WEIGHT
W/BATTERY
VIEWSCREENVIDEO SIGNAL
RECORDING
FORMAT/MEDIUM/
HIGHEST DATA RATE
IMAGE SENSOR
LENSSIZE/WEIGHT
W/BATTERY
VIEWSCREENSPECS
1080i
AVCHD (MPEG-4 H.264)/
3” drive or SD/SDHC fl ash
memory card/13Mbps
Three 1/6” CCDs
Leica Dicomar, f/1.8,
10x optical zoom
3.3” x 3.7” x 6”/19.05oz
2.7” (300K pixels),
retracting viewfi nder