Panasonic HDC-SD1

usability, portability, image quality, price, design

size

100% of the reviews on Amazon.co.uk give this product a positive rating.

usability, image quality, price, portability, size

reliability

88% of the reviews on Amazon.com give this product a positive rating.

Captures and stores video of exceptional quality, 5.1 channel audio

Compression format means you can't edit video yet, limited included software

The HDC-SD1 is a fantastic cutting edge piece of technology that finally does away with the need for tapes. It's small and light, delightfully easy to use and most of all takes superb high definition images. The AVCHD codec means that few editing...

Excellent video quality ; HDMI and component ports

No video editing app supports its capture format ; Included software is rough and limited

The video from this HD camcorder looks great, but few video-editing applications will let you edit its output.

Great picture performance in highest HD setting ; Easy to use quickly ; Dolby 5.0 channel surround sound

No SD mode or viewfinder

Brilliant performance, great handling - and even with all those features, it's still really easy to use

Small, light, easy to use. Super-sharp res, kickin' image stabilization

Low-light a tad grainy; slightly bluish video with auto white balance

And to think, 40 minutes of crisp, clean video fits onto that tiny 4GB SDHC flash memory card at the camera’s highest quality setting. The best news of all is the rock-bottom street price—we’ve seen this bauble selling for just north of $800. Remarkable.

Generally high-quality video and decent stills; nice manual feature set.

Sluggish autofocus; poor automatic white balance; uncomfortable design with some poor feature implementations.

A solid SD-based camcorder, the Panasonic HDC-SD1 nevertheless suffers from a few performance issues and an annoying design.

The Panasonic is perhaps a little ahead of its time, and is currently quite hard to find in the UK. However, the technology works brilliantly and, as soon as there's some decent software available that'll allow you to make use of its fantastic...

Vivid footage in HD ; Slim form factor

Hard to hold steady due to slim form factor ; Record button quite a stretch

The zoom mic function adjusts the levels of HDC-SD1's five microphones depending on the optical zoom level to focus on the voice of your subject. If, however, you're zooming in on streetscapes and monuments, we recommend that you turn this feature off...