Sony DCR-SR40 30GB Hard Disk Drive Handycam with 20x Optical Zoom

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Product Details

• Item Weight: 4 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B000GT47I6
• Item model number: SNY-DCRSR40
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,958 in Camera & Photo (See Bestsellers in Camera & Photo)

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  Camera & Photo > Camcorders > Hard Disk Drive

• Date first available at Amazon.com: October 2, 2001

Product Description

Manufacturer Description

The DCR-SR40 contains a 30GB hard disk drive to store all of your high-quality stills and videos. With 20x optical/800x digital zoom and a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar lens, everything will be as clear as you remember it. With DVDirect recorder compatibility and pre-packaged software lets you easily transfer, edit, and share everything you've captured.

DCR-SR40 Highlights

Recording Time (30GB)

• HQ (9Mbps): 7 hours, 20 minutes
• SP (6Mbps): 10 hours, 50 minutes
• LP (3Mbps): 20 hours, 50 minutes

1/6-inch Advanced HAD CCD imager, 680K pixels gross 1/6-inch Advanced HAD (Hole Accumulation Diode) CCD with 340K (effective) pixels provides stunning detail and clarity with exceptional video (up to 50 lines of horizontal resolution) and still image performance.

20x optical/800x digital zoom The optical zoom helps to bring the action close up from far away. In addition, the digital zoom interpolation means that extreme digital zooming is clearer, with less distortion than previous types of digital zooms.

High-quality Zeiss optics ensure you'll get the most from the SR40's 20x optical zoom feature

Professional-quality Carl Zeiss Vario- Tessar lens Carl Zeiss lenses have an advanced optical multi-layer coating for increased contrast. This results in vivid image brilliance, true-to- life color saturation and perfect renditions of subtle tones.

2.5-inch touch-panel SwivelScreen LCD display (123K pixels) The 2.5-inch LCD screen provides excellent viewing clarity. The high resolution 123K-pixel LCD screen rotates up to 270 degrees for multiple viewing angles providing sharp, detailed images for monitoring or playback.

Digital still memory mode Capture still images up to 640 x 480 resolution, directly onto the internal 30 GB hard disk drive for easy transfer to PCs for emailing and printing via the computer.

Super SteadyShot picture stabilization system An advanced version of Sony's SteadyShot system that controls an even higher range of shake and vibration frequencies, to achieve an even higher level of smoothness without degradation of video like some other image stabilization systems.

On-screen zoom and record buttons For additional control of the camcorder, the DCR-SR40 features zoom and record buttons on the frame of the LCD screen. This allows the user more flexibility when holding the camcorder, especially in overhead or low angle shots.

One-touch DVD burn Easily burn a DVD copy of your footage using the supplied software. Simply connect your DCR-SR40 to your PC via the Handycam Station and supplied USB cable and press the One Touch DVD Burn button.

Easily transfer video and still images to your PC through the Handycam Station

Handycam Station Simply placing the camcorder on the supplied Handycam Station cradle provides quick connections to a TV for viewing or a PC for editing and sharing, all while charging the battery so your camcorder is always ready to go.

USB 2.0 interface USB 2.0 interface provides an easy way to connect your hard-disk Handycam camcorder to the computer for fast transfer of video and still images to your computer for editing. The camcorder can also be used as an external storage device, convenient for archiving, storing and trasporting your videos and still images.

DVDirect compatibility The DVDirect system allows for easy transfer of both video and still images to a stand-alone DVD Burner via USB 2.0.

Easy PC backup Easily back up your footage to your PC using the supplied software. The footage will be stored on your PC's hard drive for archiving purposesand viewing at a later time; the footage is stored by date allowing for quick access. In addition, only new footage is transferred to your PC each time you backup your footage.

Super NightShot Plus Infrared System With Sony's Super NightShot Infrared System you can capture natual looking video, even when shooting in low light. Record subjects up to 20 feet away using the built-in infrared system, but without the overall monochrome color common with earlier low-light recording systems.

Manual focus Allows the user to manually adjust the focus of the camcorder using the touch panel. Manual focusing also allows the user to control the focus in difficult situations where either the environment or the subject does not allow the camcorder's auto focus to perform optimally, such as when shooting through a window or in a crowded environment.

Program AE (Auto Exposure) modes Program AE modes make recording easy even when filming in challenging situations. Choose from Beach & Ski, Landscape, Portrait, Sports Lesson, Spotlight and Sunset and Moon.

Additional Features

• Picture effects
• Fader effects
• Battery information
• Easy Handycam button
• InfoLithium battery with AccuPower
• Meter system
• Tele Macro function
• Multi-language menu
• Supplied ImageMixer software

What's in the Box

Power adapter/in-camera charger (AC-L15), rechargeable InfoLithium battery (NPFP50), Handycam Station, A/V cable, lens cap, ImageMixer for hard disk drive, application software, drivers and handbook, USB cable

Note: Additional software required for use with Apple computers.

Product Description

Watch your home movies come to life like never before with the DCR-SR40 30GB Hard Disk Drive (HDD) Handycam. Record hours of high-quality digital video and stills directly to hard drive. The DCR-SR40 contains a 30GB Hard Disk Drive to store all of your high-quality stills and videos. With 20x Optical/800x Digital Zoom and a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar Lens, everything will be as clear as you remember it. With DVDirect recorder compatibility and pre-packaged software, you can easily transfer, edit, burn and share everything you've captured with your family, colleagues and friends.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

275 of 292 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good camcorder if you are not serious about editing your footage, October 6, 2006

By	Ganesh Kumar Eswaran "Ganesh Kumar" (Bangalore, India) - See all my reviews

This camcorder does capture good video. But the main drawback is that it records in MPEG2 format (DVD quality). Initially its nice and easy to capture video and watch it on your computer by downloading the files using the USB 2.0 connection. It gives you instant gratification. But after capturing 4 or 5 hours of video, you will notice that your videos aren't so great as you expect it to be. Its not the fault with your camcorder. Its because all of us shoot extra footage, unwanted scenes, shakes, etc which we want to edit. You may want to add a title or two, add transitions, add backgroud music, combine your photos with the video, etc. Basically you may want to edit your footage. Its here when you find the major drawback of this camcorder. The MPEG2 quality video is not good for editing. The video quality is so compressed that you won't have sufficient bandwidth to edit the video.

MPEG2 is a LOSSY compression technique used to compress large video files into smaller files that can be fit into a 4 GB or 8 GB DVD. Since the camcorder compresses the video and then writes to the hard disk, the source file that you download to your computer is already compressed and has lost much of its data during the compression. If you edit this already compressed file, you lose more data during the process thus resulting in poorer video quality.

When you edit these videos, add some transitions or special effects, increase/decrease brigthness or noise, etc, the newly edited video loses further clarity and thus makes your video look ugly and pixelated.

In summary please don't buy this camcorder if you are serious about your videos and would like to edit them. But if you are not bothered about editing and want to watch your unedited footage forever, then go for it.

That said, if you still think you want to go for this camcorder, please read the review on its other features:

1. Super NightShot Infrared System: Not a useful feature. Its amazining to initially see how this camcorder is able to "see" using infrared light. But the moment you shoot your subject using infrared light, you never want to shoot again as they will appear like devils when shot using this infrared light. Remember infrared footage appears almost black-and-white and not color. And the subject's eyes really look like devil.

2. 2.5-inch wide SwivelScreen LCD display with touch panel capabilities: Sony convenietly "forgot" to mention that this screen is NOT widescreen. Most of the camcorders now-a-days come with widescreen LCD. Its a good feature if you always want to shoot in widescreen. In fact I would suggest you to shoot in widescreen only as all future TVs and current LCD/Plasma TVs are widescreen. You can future proof your video by shooting widescreen. This camcorder DOES support widescreen video but the LCD is NOT widescreen. So when you shoot widescreen, you see black bands on the top and bottom.

3. Digital still photos: Please don't rely on this feature. The best photos from this camcorder as as good as the worst photos from any popular digital camera. Technology has still not matured to the point where a camcorder can shoot as good as a digital camera and vice versa.

4. 20x optical/120x digital zoom: Optical zoom is very good. You can handle upto 10X optical zoom without a tripod. Any more zoom requires the use of a tripod. I was able to zoom in and read a car tag from the top of Sears tower, Chicago. I love the zoom feature in this camcorder. Don't use the digital zoom feature. Turn it off. As mentioned above, MPEG2 compression already makes the video bad in quality. The digital zoom further makes it worst.

5. Professional-quality Carl Zeiss lens: Yes its good. The image quality is truly great. No doubt about it.

6. Super SteadyShot picture stabilization system: Good enough to avoid small vibrations caused when going on a ship for example. But not good enough for the shakes encountered when walking with the camcorder. Don't expect to get great footage in such conditions. For great footage, you must still rely on a steady hand or a tripod.

7. On-screen zoom and record buttons: Not an useful feature. The camcorder tends to shake more when you use these zoom buttons on the LCD because the LCD is always projecting outside when shooting video. Hence you shake the camcorder more when you touch the LCD than when you touch the camcorder's body.

8. USB 2.0 interface: Good interface. Fast enough to download 30 GB in 1.5 hours. Firewire interface would have been great. But USB 2.0 is also good enough

9. Image Mixer Software: Very useless software. The free Picasa software from Google is far better in organizning your videos and pictures than the software that comes with this camera. Forget about this software.

10. InfoLithium battery with AccuPower meter system: Great battery life. I could shoot for upto 1 hour 20 minutes with one battery. Remember we always don't shoot continously in everyday life. We turn the camcorder on and off repeatedly when shooting. This battery last for 1 hour 20 minutes during normal shooting as explained above. If you shoot continously you may get longer battery life.

11. NOTE: This camcorder does NOT have an Active Interface shoe. Other Sony camcorders do have this feature. This allows you to add other Sony accessories, for example, extra flood light. If you are not planning to add any accessory, then don't worry about the absence of this feature.

12. DVDDirect compatibility: This feature allows you to directly burn your video and photos to DVD. I don't think this is a very useful feature. Its always better to download to computer, and burn only the good files and photos to DVD instead of burning all of them.

Overall summary. Buy this camcorder only if you are not serious about editing the videos. Its a good buy for point-and-shoot-and-view pleasure only. In my opinion, a mini-DV camcorder (DCRHC42 for example) is still a better bet than a DVD or hard drive based model. The only inconvenience in a mini-DV model is that you have to be a bit techy to download video to computer. If you are ok with that, the mini-DV still provides good value for money as its far cheaper than DVD or hard-drive models.

40 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Start, October 1, 2006

By	Justin Rossetti (Salt lake City, UT, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

It's interesting how people will give this a really crappy review based upon one feature, or upon the fact that they didn't RTFM before making a purchase (or at least make an educated purchase).

This is a very easy camera to use. Start up time is very quick, and how can you beat the silent operation of a hard drive based camcorder? The touch screen is also very easy to use, but I can easily see how it can annoy some people, especially those who don't like fingerprints on screens.

Nightshot mode, as always, is an added bonus, but this camcorder could have better benefited by an accessory shoe - though nightshot is fun in low light situations, you suffer from a lack of full color range. An accessory shoe could allow the use of a light, which would add more useability to this unit.

Connectivity is also good. I was able to mount the drive in both Windows and Linux with ease. Videos are stored as MPEG-2, which is pretty universal, just drop them into your video editor of choice. The included software is little more than basic, allowing you to backup your movies, or quickly create simple DVDs. Those with a desire to make quality DVDs will find other software packages better suited to their needs, such as Cyberlink's PowerProducer.

Focus is very good in normal situations, but suffers noticeably in lower light, as does auto exposure settings. Though the camcorder does have manual settings, forget about setting it up for lower-light (higher aperatures). The settings just don't go in that direction.

Video, in all three record modes, is saved in 720x480 resolution, and there's a handy button right on the main menu that allows you to switch between 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios. However, image quality isn't as sharp as that in most high-end MiniDV camcorders. Much detail is resolved, but it lacks the sharpness required to make very sharp movies. There's also very little noticeable degradation in image quality switching between HQ and SP modes, though LP mode has a very noticeable change in detail and color noise in lower light.

Overall, this is a very good and very useable camcorder. However, like all HDD camcorders, a certain level of organization is required, or you might find yourself looking to record some good memories, only to find the hard drive is full and you're nowhere near your computer to free up some space.

In all, though, it's a great entry-level hard disk drive camcorder for people who want to make videos to upload to the net, or the casual camcorder user. This is also very well suited for vacationing, where baggage space is critical!

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great little Camera - with two small things I have issues with, December 11, 2006

By	P. Edinger - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I bought this for my wife who teaches music and occasionally needs a camcorder to record the musical events. I filmed in low light from the back of the room with only spotlights on the cast of the musical and both my wife and I were pleasantly surprised with the quality of the output. However; several things I did not notice prior to purchase which are not show stoppers but would have influenced my decision about this camera: No USB connection on the camera. You have to put it into the docking station for the USB transfer of files to your computer. And the only other thing is that if you are running the camera off the power cord plugged into the wall - it will not charge the battery. You can switch the camera off and the battery will start charging - this again is not a show stopper but somewhat of a hassle for me.

I really like the camera but these two small things distract me from an excellent rating.