Hitachi's DZ-MV230E is completely different to any other camcorder: it records onto common or garden DVD discs rather than tape. This has several advantages.

First, there's no need to wind a tape to find the right spot when you play back the footage you've shot - you get instant access to the part you need. Second, the quality of your recordings will not degrade over time: come back to tape-based camcorder recordings in 10 years' time and you will be surprised how poor the cherished memories look.

Finally, at the end of the process you should be able to pop the disc out and play it on any home DVD player. Hitachi's previous DVD camcorder lacked this last killer feature.

The camera records onto 8cm DVD-Ram or DVD-R discs using the same mpeg2 format found on DVD movies you buy in the shops. DVD-R discs offer the greatest compatibility with DVD players, but if you shoot directly onto them, you can't edit the footage.

It's best to use a DVD-Ram disc to record your shots, as it's the only rewritable format the camcorder supports. You can transfer the footage to your PC for editing, then burn the finished movie back to a DVD-R disc in the camera for safekeeping. For that, you'll need the PC editing kit. Ask for a DZ-WINPC3(W) and expect to pay around £100.

As DVD-Ram discs are rewritable, you'll probably only ever need to buy a couple. The discs have two writable sides, with each holding 30 minutes of footage (you have to turn the disc over yourself). After a shooting session, you can use the camera's disc navigator to watch your footage.

Scenes appear as thumbnails and you can combine them, add fades, divide them into two parts and change the order in which they appear.

Alternatively, the PC kit includes a copy of Ulead DVD Movie Factory SE. This is a basic video-editing and DVD-authoring package, and is easy to use once you're acclimatised to some of its quirks.

It captures footage from the camera via USB1, which is a bit slow for such a task, particularly when compared to Firewire or USB2. The final product can then be transferred back to the camcorder, or converted to a number of different formats such as Video CD, mpeg1 and Windows Media.

The PC kit also includes copies of Power DVD XP for DVD playback and Ulead Photo Explorer 7 Lite for basic image editing, more of which later.

We tried our finalised DVD-R disc in a home DVD player, Pioneer's DV-444, and it began to play straight away. Ulead's software lets you add a title page and chapters, so the finished product appears quite professional.

If you stick to DVD-Ram discs, the camcorder also acts as a competent still camera. Each side of the disc can hold up to 999 photos if there's nothing else on there. The 1.16megapixel CCD may sound no great shakes, but it's enough for 8.5 x 6.4in prints if you stick to a resolution of 150 dots per inch.

The camcorder can also be used as an external storage device and is better than an external CD-RW because you can fit 1.4GB of data on each side of a DVD-Ram disc.

There are compromises to be made, but we think they are acceptable. The camera is bulkier and heavier than the sexy models that have been released recently. Plus, the mpeg2 format isn't quite as good to our eyes as MiniDV tape: if you move the camera quickly you occasionally get artefacts in the corners of your pictures.

Video editing isn't generally the easiest thing you can do with your PC, but Hitachi's system is one of the easiest we've come across. The ability to burn DVD-R discs is great - they won't play on every DVD player, but failures will be the exception rather than the rule.

Buying this camcorder and PC editing kit means you can send a professional-looking, high-quality DVD disc to your family that they'll probably be able to play in their home player - great fun.

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DETAILS
Price: £1,000 (£851 ex VAT)

Contact: Hitachi 01628 643 000

www.hitachidigitalmedia.com