JVC punts dual-format camcorders

World's first capable of AVCHD and MPEG 2

By James Sherwood, 16th June 2008

JVC has unveiled three new HD camcorders, two of which the company claims are the world’s first camcorders capable of recording in both AVCHD and MPEG 2 formats.

JVC's GZ-HD30 (above) and GZ-HD40 use both AVCHD and MPEG-2 compression

The GZ-HD30 and GZ-HD40 dual-format camcorders can both compress video into AVCHD, which could be handy if you need lots of space for storing the various takes that go to make up your mini blockbuster. But, then again, if you’re looking for a consumer camcorder with “superior editing and post-production” qualities, then both will also support MPEG 2.

Both shooters also boast 1920 x 1080, "full HD" resolution recording, although the 80GB internal hard disk drive on the GZ-HD30 is put to shame by the 120GB one on the rival GZ-HD40. Each has a 2.8in LCD display.

Both models sport large capacity HDDs and 2.8in LCD displays

The third camcorder, the GZ-HD10, is clearly the entry-level model of the trio. It only supports AVCHD; has a lower, 1440 x 1080 resolution; and an average-capacity 40GB hard drive. The camcorder's LCD display is also smaller, at 2.7in.

JVC’s included a Micro SD memory card slot onto each camcorder, in addition to USB 2.0 and HDMI interfaces. The GZ-HD40 has the added benefit of a docking station that incorporates Firewire 400 and USB 2.0.

All three models will be available in the US in August, with the GZ-HD40 priced at $1300 (£650/€840), the GZ-HD30 at $1000 (£500/€640) and the GZ-HD10 set to cost $800 (£400/€520). A UK price or release date hasn’t been seen yet.

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Posted Tuesday 17th June 2008 22:11 GMT

Anonymous Coward

Video codec tradeoffs

Walter, MPEG2 is a compression standard, it's resolution independent ie can be used for SD,HD, whatever you want. DV will certainly provide better quality ( and be easier to edit)but you pay the price in bitrate, Standard DV = 25Mb/s whereas high quality SD MPEG2 perhaps 7 or 8. MPEG2 will easier to edit than AVC / H264 but if you're not worried about editing the AVC coding will produce good quality video at even lower bitrates, perhaps as low as 2Mb/s

dependinging on picture content. Notice a pattern here ?

Posted Tuesday 17th June 2008 10:51 GMT

Walter McCann

Odd

Does this make any sense? MPEG2 is not HD so you have HD camcorder but you record in SD? Why not just get a SD camera and be done with it.

Also, they say for superior editing using MPEG2 - everyone with half a brain knows that one of the big problems with recording in MPEG2 is that it is not superior (DV was/is superior) as it is a lossy format and you have to be careful where you splice your scene otherwise it can look a mess.

Anyway this is typical marketing, make something that is worse and then on the next generation say "oh we have now made it so terrible that the previous encarnation is better!!!". What a load of Crap.

Now if only I could get my Xbox 360 to stream AVCHD then I would be happy (ish)

Posted Tuesday 17th June 2008 10:51 GMT

Rich