Customer Reviews

Sony DCRPC9 MiniDV Handycam Camcorder

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this camcorder for it's size and video quality. I did a good deal of research on it through CNET.com and other sites that had both customer and expert reviews. I own a Fuji Finepix 4700 digital camera so I did not buy this camcorder for its digital still quality, but rather for it's video quality and I am thoroughly amazed. It's capability in all light conditions is astounding. Whether filming your children sleeping using the night-shot or super night-shot feature or outside at a picnic at high noon, this camcorder does it and does it well. It's slow motion feature when playing a tape back is amazing, and it automatically records the date and time you shoot your video, so no more fumbling for the date/time button while filming. In the reviews I read the three drawbacks to this camera I found to be only partially true in my case. Most reviews claimed that the zoom button was awkwardly placed so you had to use your pinky or ring finger on your right hand to use it. If you hold the camera according to the instruction book and like the third picture in the group of three snapshots on Amazon.com's site, this is not a problem and can be done with your right index finger. The touch screen menu was a problem for some reviewers but not for me. I think it is a great idea to be able to scroll through my menu on my lcd screen, because my framed shot is in the background and I can stay focused on that while setting my fade type or other digital effect. The third problem for reviewers was the image quality on stills. This I would have to agree with and for a all in one camera I would make the ...extra plunge and go with the Sony DCR-PC110. But again I have a digital camera so this was not a concern. The size of this camcorder is perfect and I can't wait till our next trip to Disneyland to take it on every ride and catch my children's faces, something I couldn't do with my hi-8 because of its cumbersome size. I do recommend getting only up to the NP-FM50 battery, if you go with the more powerful NP-FM70 or the NP-FM91, the battery sticks out too far on the side of the camera, this does not affect your grip or filming, but it does make finding a small case difficult and putting the camera in that case even tougher. So, if SIZE and VIDEO quality are your concerns, I can't see any camcorder beating this one. Now if Sony would just make a mini-van.

I originally did extensive research on the "vertical palm size" mini-DV camcorders and narrowed my decision down to the Sony DCR-PC9, the Canon Elura 20MC and the JVC GR-DVM75. Let me tell you that this was an extremely difficult evaluation because all three cameras have their strengths and weaknesses and there was no clear choice. The digital video technology found in all three of these compact cameras is absolutely amazing. I originally purchased the JVC but I had concern with the workmanship and the quality of the hardware - I had read several reviews where the owner eventually experienced problems and the cost to service the camera was extremely steep. I ended up buying the Canon Elura 20MC and did a side by side comparison against the JVC. Not being completely satisfied with either camera, I finally purchased the Sony camera as well. This ended up being an involved process but it was the only way to really evaluate the cameras.

Although you can make arguments that one camera had slightly sharper images or another one handled colors slightly better, overall all three cameras produced crisp, accurately colored images in outdoor sunlight settings. Under outdoor overcast conditions, the colors can be on the dull side but the video still was of decent quality. All three camcorders performed poorly under low light conditions. The low light video taping was indoors at night with single or double lamp lighting with light bulbs between 60 and 100 watts. The Cannon Elura produced the poorest quality video (even with the low light setting) - very dark and grainy and the quality was actually poorer than an 8mm analog camcorder. The Sony and JVC with standard auto-shutter settings produced about the same level of video quality which was less grainy but still on the dark side. The lower shutter speed settings on the JVC and Sony improves the image but the video becomes very choppy. As stated in other reviews, the Sony Night Shot (IR based) feature is impressive and works relatively well under "no light" conditions but creates the greenish monotone image. I am not sure how much video I will actually keep with the Night Shot but it is fun to use.

Sound quality is good on all 3 cameras but I do agree with the other reviewers who have commented on the problems associated with having the microphone located on the top of the camera. All the camcorders pick up some motor noise but the noise seemed to be more prevalent on the Canon. I also thought the sound was a little muffled on the Canon when compared to the other two camcorders. The Canon and JVC have wind screen options but I found them to be of limited value.

Not surprisingly, the digital stills from all 3 cameras were extremely poor. Even with the XGA resolution and built-in flash, the JVC stills were only marginally better than that of the other cameras. The best field stills (captured from video) came from the Canon and then the JVC. If you want to produce "print quality" digital stills, my recommendation is to purchase a separate dedicated digital camera instead of spending extra money on a higher CCD count.

You can read about specific features and functions in other reviews for the 3 camcorders but here is a summary of my side by side comparison:

For the Canon Elura 20MC
Pros: Quality Video, Progressive Scan, extended Recording Modes, good ergonomics and design, well constructed, the smallest of the 3 camcorders, manual exposure and shutter speed settings
Cons: Poor low light quality, short battery life, too small for large hands, microphone picks up the most motor noise of the 3 cameras, poor stills, no software, requires a shoe for external microphone and head phone, no USB support

For the Sony DCR-PC9
Pros: Quality Video, NightShot, the most features/functions of the 3 cameras, battery life was about 30% better than the other camcorders, lens ring for manual focus
Cons: Construction feels cheap, Poor Ergonomics, poor stills, cumbersome menu system, uses Sony's proprietary memory stick, limited remote controller functions

For the JVC GR-DVM75
Pros: Quality Video, High Band Processor emulates progressive scan, Built In Flash, well designed remote controller, good number of features/settings
Cons: Construction feels cheap, Poor stills, short battery life, poor viewfinder resolution, requires a shoe for USB connection,

Here are a couple of general observations for purchasing a camcorder. Most sales people only know the specs of each camera but have limited (if any) "actual use" experience outside the store. The image quality on the LCD screen is not a good indicator of the actual quality of the recorded video - you really need to view the video image on a TV screen. Finally, you cannot fully assess the quality of a camcorder within the confines of a store.

Because I am planning to do quite a bit of indoor video taping I decided to keep the Sony. I really hated to give up the Canon progressive scan. I originally thought I would keep the Canon (see my review under Elura 20MC) but the poor quality video in low light eventually prompted me to evaluate the Sony. The bottom line is that each camcorder is an excellent product and the best camera for you is dependent on your needs. If you are on a budget, the JVC offers the best overall value, performance, features for your money. Although I only had limited, the hardware quality of the JVC seems to be on par with the Sony. If you are primarily video taping under good lighting conditions and want to capture stills from video, then I would recommend the Cannon. The Elura was also the most compact, most comfortable and best designed. If you need a camera with many digital effects, options and special functions and are video taping in low light/night conditions then I would purchase the Sony. Good luck!

After long and painstaking research, I settled on this camera. But try to find any comparisons, and you turn up very little. So here's my few words of thought.

The JVC GRD-VP3u is the next best contender in this price range. It wins for size and still images, but not much else.

The Canons did not have the resolution in the viewfinder or LCD panel quite like the Sony (best) or JVC. They also had a cheaper feel when hefted. The feature set was not bad, but overall I couldn't get the comfort level with them as with the other two.

The Panasonics also came across lacking. Great feature sets, but the size, build, picture quality, viewfinder and LCD resolution, and style didn't work for me. The prices were good, but little else.

I quit comparing much else. It really came down to the PC9 and the DVP3u. Now, the JVC boasts a few features that would have taken the cake, but they didn't seem to work very well. NightAlive didn't seem to make a significant difference, if barely noticeable. It certainly didn't work well enough in low light to overcome the advantage of Sony's NightShot, even with the lacking color in NightShot mode.

Sony further beefed up NightShot with a Super mode that produces a choppy picture. However, it provided an exceptionally good image in total darkness -- whatever that may be worth to those who can get over the choppy picture.

The Sony touchscreen is a real winner in my book. It made the system very intuitive and easy to use. One criticism is that in the menu mode some of the abbreviations were a little too cryptic at first. However, this touchscreen system gets high marks for being well designed, functional even during recording, and easy to use.

Both the Sony and JVC are light and small. This has made use a desire and more common than my older camcorder. I consider both brands good quality builds, but Sony seems to be the better brand for overall equipment features, quality and performance.

I prefer JVC's lens cap (a sliding panel) to the cap that covers the Sony lens. It is a minor nuisance to have a cap dangling around while using the camera.

The video quality of the Sony is fabulous. It produces wonderful video, even better in dark than I expected. As everyone says, bright light produces the *best* video, but don't let that suggest that the video is bad in lower light.

The Sony connects easily to the computer and actually transfers pics and video clips from the memory card very quickly via USB. While USB is a relatively fast bus, many devices cannot provide the throughput, in and of themselves. However, the Sony does well.

I have not tried a Firewire transfer yet, but I expect this to be handled just as well by Sony and JVC alike.

In summary, I believe that the few features on the JVC that are seemingly better than on the Sony do not perform well enough on their own, nor overcome in total the features of the Sony camera.

Good-luck.

I have been using this camera for a month now and have a few remarks which maybe helpful to you.

1. Size !!!! This thing is so tiny ! and does not look like a regular camcorder. People do not pay attention to it at all which allows you to capture great scenes ! Once I had two film cameras. One was really good but heavy and expensive. Another much cheaper. So ! 90% of my best shots I took with the cheaper camera. Of course you can buy a camcorder with much better quality of the picture for 3-5 grands but will you take it with you everywhere ?

2. Touch screen. I don't bother about onscreen menu. As for me old style wheel is absolutely good. But there is one thing - spotmeter. You just touch most interesting point on the screen and exposure adjusts better then you would (OK, I would) do it manually !

3. Image quality - good. But colors could be better. I beheld that there is some lack of green, more then need of red. Blue is perfect ! But that can be seen only in comparison with high end camcorders.

3. Viewfinder. The wickest part of the camcorder. I must say I almost returned it back to the store - because got tired pulling it out and pushing back. Why Sony didn't allow to change the viewfinder focus so it would be possible to use it for a short moments without pulling out ? Using of swivel screen could solve the problem but it eats the battery too fast. Another thing that when you put the camera on a tripod you cannot turn the viewfinder up, which is not very convenient.

Otherwise very good camera and definitely worth buying. If you planning taking video for yourself you will not find a better choice. But please ! DON'T BUY IT FROM ROYAL CAMERA. Go to the store with good repuitation despite the price seems to be higher there.

Best of the miniDV camcorder around. After searching for about a month, comparing more than 15 minidv camcorders. Even actually bought one. I'd have to say that this is the best one that we found.

At first, we bought a JVC GR-DVM90U because after. This camcorder has so many features, lightweight, and thinner than other digicams.

But after we've bought it, we found that it's image quality is very poor in low light condition. Though it has many features in it (such as AE program with 12 digital effects and 17 scene transitions), we never use any of it. Moreover, the image stabilization also not as good as we expected.

As for the digital camera capability, we don't really use it because we have a FUJI digital camera. And the quality of the camcorder's snapshot won't match the quality of the digital camera.

Since we're not really satisfied with our JVC, we tried to look around and end up with 2 choices. Canon Elura 2 or Sonny DCR-PC9. The review of Canon Elura 2 is better than our JVC, but we can't find a review for Sony DCR-PC9 because the product is new. But we know that Sony has a respectable quality, so we take our chances and bought this camera.

The moment it arrived and we hold this camcorder in our hands, we're sure that this is a great camcorder. The camcorder is less the size of the palm. It has the best image quality and the touchscreen is nice to use. The amazing part is that it performs really well in low light condition. You can even use it in total darkness with it's Nightshot feature. Really cool. The image stabilization is also really good.

The only flaw that we found is that the AUTO setting for the light is not really good. If you're using this camcorder indoor, you might want to switch it to the INDOOR option instead of leaving it at AUTO.

Battery life is okay. With around 2 hours of recording (much better than the JVC with only 1 hour of battery life).

So far, in our opinion this is the best digital camcorder around for the money.

I was in the market for a small, high-quality MiniDV camcorder, and the PC-9's specs looked perfect. I have had mine for a month now, and I am very happy with it. Although it is slightly larger than some of the JVC's and Canon's Elura II, it is still very small. Also, unlike JVC and Canon camcorders, the PC-9 feels extremely solid and robust. The construction is top-notch, and you don't feel worried about breaking it, despite its small size. One note of caution, however: be careful not to leave the camcorder in a bag with a lot of stuff crowding it, as the lens cap is prone to coming off. This shouldn't be a problem if it's in a nice padded case, but I carried mine in a bag with other equipment and several times was alarmed to find the lens unprotected.

The PC-9 has a 680K pixel CCD, which is more than is needed for 525 lines of horizontal resolution. Be wary, however, of other cameras with a 480K pixel CCD, because even though the DV format only uses 525 lines, a single CCD doesn't actually record as many discrete pixels as its pixel count claims (thus the advantage of a 3 CCD camera, which the PC-9 is not). Unfortunately, many people are looking for an end-all solution for video and still photography. There is nothing for a reasonable price that accomplishes this goal. While still digital cameras are 3 or 4 megapixels, with this camcorder, you are stuck at .68 megapixels - not too impressive. Yes, they are acceptable for small internet jpegs, but forget about looking at them on a nice monitor, and don't even think about printing them. I mention the poor quality of stills not because the PC-9 is any worse than its competitors, but simply because paying extra to have a Memory Stick slot for stills is an utter waste of money (and space, to some extent). Still, the PC-9's fantastic video quality, small size, excellent build, and easy-to-use controls and navigation make it a great buy for anyone looking for quality, affordability, and style.

While I was slightly disappointed opening the box ( I expected a metal case - it's plastic and scratches easily - magazine pictures put me off) a month of use has overcome this initial disappointment. While I would agree with the previous reviews re the flimsy cover for the USB and video connection ports (appalling), the overall performance has been great. The small size is a real boon, you can fit it in the pocket of your (loose) chino's with relative ease (sans battery - maybe that's why we have two pockets?). Other reviewers have had problems with the handling and button position but I found both intuitive and convenient (medium cadet golf glove i.e. pretty small hands). I bought the camcorder for the slow motion reply primarily for my golf swing (great, the slowmo, not the swing) general performance (family vacasion) has also been exemplary. I also bought both a quick charger (necessary if you value the covers), a 32 MB memory stick (not really necessary 32 MB is 200 an odd pictures) and a 10 hour battery (Require at least a 2 hour real life). In summary I love the handling, the touch screen, the size, the MPEGs (rough but fun), the stills ( good enough for e:mail and playback on a pc not to print) and the slowmo. I hate the connection covers and the fact that in 12 months it's going to look rough. Hope this helps.

The DCR-PC9 is an excellent choice for people who like to take videos while travelling and prefer carrying a very light weight camera. I was undecided between this model and the DCR-pc110. But after checking the size of this camera I decided to go with it. The video is of exellent quality. The only sacrifice for the size was the resolution of the still pictures. I think it was a good choice and I am very happy with it. I recommend buying an extra memory stick and battery

I have been using the PC9 for about a month and have used it on a trip to Ireland and recorded onto 5 cassettes then edited it on a Mac G4. The firewire connection worked flawlessly and no software was reqiured, same for usb, the drivers were built into the Mac. Picture quality is very good, particularly in even lighting conditions (cloudy, diffused). The sound quality is good but the mic. pickup is in a stupid place. The best option would be to buy and additional forward facing mic with a wind shield. The camera is easy to use automatically but is perfect for manual operation, the spot meter is great, I found the flip out screen to be hard to see in sunlight but that can be adjusted in the many options in the camera setup menus. The Carl Zeiass lens is very good but some vignetting is visible at maximum optical zoom in certain conditions, watch out for it. The handling is very good once you get used to it and I am now very adept at single handed operation of the camera. The stabiliser isn't fantastic and for pro results a small tripod or steadicam makes a huge difference. It is easily achievable to make broadcast quality video with this tiny camera.

I never expected this camera to be so small. Till the last moment I was in two minds between this and the Canon Optura Pi. But once this was delivered, all apprehensions were allayed. It is very small and sleek and is very versatile. The IEEE1394 link helps one to transfer movies to the pc, though a 2 minute movie could use upto 250mb in the pc. The controls are a bit awkward but after a couple of uses one gets used to it. One thing Sony should provide with this is a shoulder strap. The touch screen menu is a winner all the way.