When I was looking for a new camcorder I read several reviews. When I opened the box, I was amazed at how small and light this camera is. I can even take it on a hike as it doesn't add much weight. It's a bit small for my hands but my wife loves it. I like it when movies are written to the card. My laptop has an SD card reader built in, so I don't have to transfer files from the camera via USB. I can just copy them straight from the card. However, I found that I need an AC3 codec filter for Windows Media Player to listen to movies. I had to search the forums to find this gem. Once I have the AC3 filter, nothing needs to be done to watch movies. I haven't tried editing movies yet, but I wasn't impressed with the transfer software when I tried it. I will most likely delete it. I also tried taking photos with it and I wasn't impressed with the images. I will use my regular digital camera for all standard images. But the camera image is excellent. A definite improvement over my 6 year old camcorder which is 4 times larger and requires FireWire to transfer movies to the hard drive. For a cheap camcorder, I would take this.