Sony DCR-HC45 Handycam Mini Dv Camcorder with 2.5” LCD screen

January 4, 2008 | By Doug In Digital Camcorder |

Sony DCR-HC45 Handycam Mini Dv Camcorder with 2.5” LCD screen
MINIDV CARL ZEISS 2.5 LCD INA 40X OPT. ZM 2000X DIG. ZM NS

Customer Review: Compact and good value
A great little standard definition dv camcorder which fits comfortably in the palm of the hand and produces good quality footage for general home&family use.

The supplied software from Sony will only allow capture to PC via Firewire/iLink which means you have purchase an extra cable because its not included in the box. However you can capture video to PC via USB (cable included), just turn on the USB Streaming option through the onboard menu (set off by default) and then use a suitable third party program which can detect it (I suggest Virtualdub, its free and fully featured).

I definitely recommend this camcorder to anyone on a sub ?200 budget - from my own research, I could not find another model that could beat it for value in this price bracket.

Customer Review: Sony Software does not support USB Streaming
The Picture Motion Browser software that comes with this doesn’t have tool to download video using USB streaming. The only option that comes with it is iLink . So, if your PC doesn’t have iLink then this handycam is useless. Even the iLink cable is not supplied by Sony.

I was really surprised to see that USB streaming is not supported. Sony used to supply Picture Package software previously, which had USB streaming and it was really good and now their latest handycams with latest software doesn’t have this feature.

So don’t go this if you rely on only USB2.

Amazon Price: ?41.13
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Used Price: ?249.99
Customer Review: Good for the money
Got this camcorder today and I have been impressed with its performance so far. Picture is far superior to my old Sony handicam 8mm. The size is excellent, like all HDD camcorders, but the best thing is the price, ?250 for a HDD camcorder! The only thing I can identify as a negative point is that the lens cap is not part of the camcorder body, instead it is tethered to the camcorder and needs to be fitted each time it is not in use. An integral lens cap would be much better, but I think JVC have identified this on their newer versions. All in all excellent value for money, Sony and Panasonic cannot touch this on price.
Customer Review: great cam
This is my first camera so can’t really compare, this is a tiny camera, looks great and feels solid. The recording time is really good and the quality is great, really easy to use and there are loads of features to mess around with, only downside is the connection to Mac, i have a Apple iBook, and it can be quite annoying trying to export movies into iMovie/iDvd, it can be done, just takes a bit of messing around… would highly reccomend camera though.
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