Review on Panasonic HDC-SD80R HD Camcorder (Red) - SD Card technology (Discontinued model) by Chase Steele

Bought halfway around the world about a month ago. Don't worry too much about the warranty and returns because the price is so good and it's Panasonic, right? Not from some nameless off-the-shelf manufacturer. I bought it for $189 when it was listed for $199 (I guess Revain lowered the price to encourage me to buy it) and now it's $319.99. The camcorder is small, about the size of the palm of your hand, and feels very light. This is important if you need to hold it for long periods of time when recording certain scenes. Unlike my previous camcorder, which required a mini CD-R, this one works with SD cards (although they should be class 4 or higher), which are readily available and inexpensive. The only downside is that it doesn't come with a case, so I take it out of the box wrapped in bubble wrap. The built-in lens shutter is a nice touch. I can say goodbye to the lens caps that were so common on camcorders and frankly the last century. I recorded a 45 minute video of myself giving a lecture which was the main reason I bought this camera and it came out great on both video and audio. Battery drain was only 1 bar from the 3 bars I started with and the file size was around 2.3GB (2nd highest camera resolution set). I'm sure that scenes with a lot of movement will use more battery power and memory usage will be higher. But that's my guess. My only criticism isn't the camera, it's the software that comes with it. I was able to import still images but not videos. Incidentally, there is nothing to say about the resolution of the photo and the color reproduction. Maybe I didn't read all the instructions in the manual, but who reads manuals these days? So I did it the old fashioned way. Windows examined the SD card and copied the video file to my computer. Overall very happy with this product so far.