Sony to announce a AVCHD camcorder on Wednesday
By Matt Burns 
posted Jul 17th 2006 8:24PM
posted Jul 17th 2006 8:24PM
Sometimes we forget that there are so many codecs to record high-def with, but AVCHD is something real new as it was just announced back in May. This is a format developed by, you ready for this, Sony and Panasonic to be used in consumer level high-def camcorders. The format can record onto 8cm DVDs in the MPEG4 AVC/H.264 compression system which will give you a whopping 20 minutes of recording space. It seems that DVguru found out through CDFreaks that Sony is going to release a camcorder that takes advantage of this as soon as Wednesday. So who wants to buy into another Sony format right off the bat? Anyone...
This is also for HDD and solid state memory camcorders ...and most likely BD camcorders when they become comercially feasible. The following companies have signed on:
Adobe Systems Incorporated
CANON INC.
CyberLink Corporation
InterVideo, Inc.
Nero AG
PIONEER CORPORATION
SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO.,LTD.
SHARP CORPORATION
Sonic Solutions
Ulead Systems, Inc.
...so, no need to be snarky HD Beat.
http://www.avchd-info.org/press/20060713.html
Its on Mini DVD and its H264 (AVC) Compliant. This should mean you can bung the DVD straight into a PC copy the files over and get editing. The 20 min limit is a bit rubbish but all in all a pat on the back for sony. Mind you I'm sure they will find a way to make the format non standard H264 which will render it useless.
Ah well
HDD have been known to be to loud and can actually be heard by the mic that is why only JVC has used it. I am surprised though they didn't use flash disc's maybe it's to much data per second or something but selling a camera with 2gig's of data on it and then the option to expand vs selling a camera with 1.4gig disc's would be kind of nice but memory disc's are reusable thus they don't make as much money in the long run.
McWodda oh so that's why Sony uses a 30GB HDD in
http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start?ProductSKU=DCRSR100&Dept=cameras&CategoryName=dcc_DICamcorders_HardDiskHandycamCamcorders
Count me in on the HDD based AVCHD camcorder. 30GB will give me up to 8 hours of recording. Beats 20 minkutes by a mile.