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This camcorder offers what few HDD camcorders offer--a place to plug in an auxiliary microphone. This makes the Canon VIXIA HG20 AVCHD a perfect, versatile choice that provides the ability to record high quality sound to match the high definition picture.
It is quite small and portable. As far as picture quality, in MXP or Cine mode, the quality is excellent.The audio recording is only average, and may benefit from attaching the optional mic. I have used this camcorder for about 8 months now. It has no optical view, so the LCD must be monitored while in use, but it tilts 360 degrees.My main disappointment is the software supplied with the camcorder. Audio levels can be adjusted on the fly for live music situations, which is a nice feature. The zoom is adequate and may be set to fixed or variable modes. The software is very limited for anything other than playback, and I had to purchase third party software to burn discs, and they still will only play on a computer. Canon is no help, either.
The camcorder is absolutely great, the software is AWFUL. Don't buy this camcorder unless you're prepared to buy additional software
I've never used this camera first hand, but I've seen the results and heard about the simple set up process from the cameraman. Oh my gosh. The video is amazing, and for the audio I have not complaints. I was too awestruck by the video to really notice the audio quality in a nerdy way, but it was pretty darn high quality too.
I bought this camcorder about 2 months ago to use for a trip overseas. If anyone reading this review knows anything about converting these files, please leave a comment. The quality in both aspects are wonderful. Even worse, when I try to open the folder on my laptop, the laptop doesn't recognize the file name because they are mpl, cpi, mts and bdm files. Just did a test run on the free trial versio of this software and it worked as a wmv file. So now I have been hunting and hunting for a video converter that will handle these types of files but have had no luck. Between then and now, I have lost the software disc that came with it and can't edit the videos on the camera. Other than this one issue, this camcorder records great and takes high quality pictures.
Also, the original battery life leaves something to be desired so you would need to invest in a battery that has longer life. I'd rate this five stars if it just had the right editing software. I'm sort of bummed I spent six hundred dollars on this thing and I can't even download my videos.EDIT: I finally found the correct video editing software for this camcorder: Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum 9 seems to handle the strange files in this camer (cip, mts, bdm, mpl). So we'll see how it works as I do some more plaing around with it.
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