Customer Reviews

RCA CC9360 MiniDV Compact Digital Camcorder

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This little wonder shines like 100,000 new pennies. (that's a thousand dollars for the mathematically challenged). Besides being a true 'palmcorder' this lightweight phenom delivers all the digital bells & whistles of equipment 3 times it's 399.00 street price.

The 400X digital zoom may seem a little eccentric, but getting on the line of scrimmage when you're in the nosebleed section is now a possibility. Miss the play? Get down and dirty with the offensive line and relive the action up close and personal. The digital image stabilization is a technilogical feat of magic.

The firewire hookup is truly the most outstanding feature. Using the CC9360 and Sony's EZ Editor is truly 'plug & play' digital video editing. Controlling the camera right from the PC is an amazing feature. Grab your scenes, lay down some music, put it all back together and voila! you're a movie producer.

For the advanced user i.e. Adobe Premiere etc., you will be happy to know that this camera is fully supported and performs flawlessly. Creating a professional, studio quality finished product is fun and easy with the RCA CC9360.

My current project is making a MTV 'pop-up video' style music video from karaoke night!

This fun and affordable DV Camcorder gets a whopping 5 star endorsement out of 5 possible. Good job RCA!

This is my first video camera. I guess I don't have anything to compare it to, but so far I am quite impressed. I'll make this review simple by making a pros/cons list:

PROS:

- Very small, easily fits in one hand
- Price! It cost about as much as a decent 8mm camera
- Solidly built
- Controls are easy to use
- On screen menus actually make sense, unlike most electronics.
- Good quality Zoom
- Tons of nice editing features and transitions/fades
- Built in light for indoor filming

- High quality 680,000 pixel sensor, most other low price cameras have about 450,000 pixel sensors.
- Comparable in features to many cameras that cost twice as much

CONS:

- No Auxilary Video/Audio inputs. Not a big deal for the majority of home filmers.
- Tape loading is kinda weird in my opinion.
- Shoulder strap is situated in a strange place. It makes the camera hang uncomfortably.

All in all, the negative things are few compared to the postives, especially at this price! Why would you even consider an analog when you can get this digital camcorder for about the same price.

First 2 tapes came out fine, from there on I constantly receive the "Insert Head Cleaner" message no matter what I do to clean the heads! Turning the camera off and on again will clear the error message but now only 50% of footage is viewable. Wish I was within 90 day warranty period still!

This camcorder is incredible! It is far more than I had expected; considering the price was so low. I love the special effects options while taping, and the digital still photos are of excellent quality. I highly recommend this product.

The RCA CC9360 is a really great camera. I just got mine and I am very impressed. It is packed with tons of features perfect for the amature user. You can use the qutomatic settings, or manually set things like focus, exposure, or white balance, for that perfect shot. The camera is smaller than I thought it would be, and it is very lightweight too. The video light is very bright, and it is nice to have stereo microphones. It has a very durable feel. The power switch works perfectly. I highly recommend this camera for anyone looking for a high quality low priced, digital camcorder.

I purchased my CC9360 near the end of January, 2002. Since then, I have travelled half way around the world with it by my side nearly every moment. I've filled more than ten hours of tape and played those tapes back numerous times without any problems. The "Clean Heads" message came up once. I immediately popped in the head cleaning tape (purchased separately) and was back in business within seconds! I have used several brands of tape (cheap, internet "finds") without problems. I use many of the various transitions, fades, etc. I appreciate the "blank search" that finds the end of the recorded part of a partially used cassette (this is my first digital camcorder; maybe that is a common feature.?) The only negative I can think of is that I do sometimes hear the whine of the motor when playing back quiet scenes. Seems like a small nit, to me. I also purchased a hi cap lithium battery (1700mah) and external charger, so I always have one battery as a backup.I have not configured my PC with a firewire card yet, but that should be next!

As I type this my RCA Camcorder is in transit to Amazon.Com. I received my camcorder on Feb. 4 of this year thru UPS, and was impressed at how well the box stood up to the journey! Amazon itself did a great job in packing my unit, so it was a big surprise when nothing worked right with this camcorder.
After taking the unit out of its box I pluged it into the wall socket to start to charge the battery, yet could not get the blinking light to come on. ( blinking lights = unit is charging ) After pluging and unpluging many, many, many times I finally got it to charge! "YippY" Now many hours later I unpluged my unit and tried to get it open and insert a tape but NOTHING happens, so I read the manual again and still NOTHING happens! In my frustration I started turning the round, on/off/record button back and forth and "Walla" the secret door for the tape opened. ( the round button is flimsy and hard to turn, and to be blunt Cheap, if you ever used a Sony camcorders on/off button you could see that the quality is night and day between the two units ) So from the start the unit is not working correctly, and this just multiplied as the time with my camcorder grew.
Now I am going to shoot some video with my new camcorder but the Gremlins again return and I cannot get the unit to stay on. Thinking this maybe a battery problem I go out and get a new ... battery and still no luck, so I call the 800 number for RCA and the tech person says send it back to us! I have had this camera just over one day and it is already broke, so in being soo " Teeeeeeeee D " off I work on trying to figure out a way for this camcorder too work. In about an hour I find out that if I slide the battery back and forth and keep the power switch on Play, I can get the unit to power up.
I am now taking video both indoors and out and also using some of the digital features on the camcorder, so far so good. After an hour of taping I playback my tape and see that the video is good yet the sound of the motor turning the tape can be heard very clearly in the background, and even trying to put the, Digital Wind Buffer on did not help. So my tape looks good but sounds awful, not the best matchup for a camcorder, but when the next tape went in, it was the videos turn to fail.
About 10 minutes into my second hour of taping a message flashed accross my viewfinder stating that my heads need cleaning, but in thinking I had time to spare, and that these were brand new high quality tapes I did not stop recording. After I finished taping I played it back over my TV, and in 10 minutes into my video the image came apart on the screen. I found out that the Warning I got to clean the heads off is really the camcorders way of saying, Stop Now, for all that you are recording while that message is on is ruined. Thinking the tapes had something to do with it I used them in another camcorder at a friends home, in the same weather as me and no head cleaning was needed or called for.
With the Winter Olympics getting closer, ( as I was going out to Salt Lake City ) I just cut my losses and bought a Sony Camcorder at a local camera shop, and went on to get some great video of the games. Even though the price was much more than online, the piece of mind that I would have a camera that worked was well worth the price.
Too sum up; the RCA 9360 was a piece of junk from the start, and just got worse as the days went on, but like the old saying goes, " you get what you pay for. "
As for Amazon, the problems I had with RCA really have nothing to do with them as they did not make the unit, but there return policy is why I bought it from Amazon and when the return goes through on my Credit Card, why I will use them again.

Just got this camcorder 2 days ago and it was just the right size for the price. It is not as small as the Canon ZR models but smaller than the Sharp VL-WD450U and the Panasonic PV-DV201. It is the best and smallest camcorder I have seen in this price range. It does not come with a remote, but you can use a RCA universal remote. The pictures and the clarity of the video are great. As for the cons, it sucks that it does not come with the firewire card and cable or video editing software. All in all a great deal, the firewire accessories can be purchased... This camcorder has my full endorsement.

FYI, the 9360 is identical to the 9370, except the 9370 has a battery charger. google search for "cc9370 rca manual".
or try amazon
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00004Z583/104-4032710-9364765?v=glance
The manual is right there.
Thanks, Amazon...
tim touve
By the way, I also got a similar Panasonic camcorder for about the same price. The Panasonic is nice, and easy to operate, but the RCA has a movie light, which makes the RCA much more flexible.

I am in need of a user manual for my rca mini dv model #cc9360. I can't seem to locate one online anywhere!