Review on Panasonic SDR S26 SD Camcorder Blue by Eric Webb

Torn between the Canon FS200 and the Panasonic SDR S26, I bought the Panasonic after reading several reviews touting its excellent zoom and decent standard video quality. First, it's lightweight, small, and very easy to use. Easy navigation, breathtaking zoom - simply amazing. I couldn't believe how far I could see and how stable my view was without a tripod. In addition, this camcorder has excellent sound. The audio is clear with very good volume and a microphone with a good range. The file transfer went smoothly. I only installed the bundled software with WinXPPro on my laptop, but my desktop PC with WinXP SP3 (no bundled software) recognized the camera's flash card and transferred the .mod files with no problem. Interestingly, the laptop had no sound via Windows Media Player (fully updated), but Picasa played files just fine. The PC played files normally through Windows Media Player (using the Nvidia decoder) but no sound through Picasa. Minor issues that could be fixed with some research and tweaking. Now to the main thing: a terrible video. I've done many tests with different lighting and settings, and even with a tripod - to no avail. The video is very soft, blurry and very grainy indoors. My 1999 JVC camcorder that I recently dubbed from small mini VHS tapes looked much better. Even the video from my Canon camera is clearer. I knew it wouldn't be great to watch on a big HD LCD, but it was really bad on computers too. Outdoor video is better. So before returning it I bought a Canon FS200 and did some testing in the same light and with the same memory card and the Canon video was much better. I sent Panasonic back. If you need a standard definition camcorder for outdoor bird watching or anything that requires that kind of zoom, this camcorder is for you. We also need a camcorder for indoor events so this camcorder didn't work for us.