Panasonic HDC-HS9

For me the main advantage is the image quality, truly stunning on my 1080P plasma and a close second is the overall size of the unit, it can fit in your palm.

Nothing to do with the camera, but the cost of a spare battery is pricey.

This camcorder is extremely small, compact and easy to use. The Optical Image Stabilisation is very impressive, making the resulting movie much more watchable than some of the shaky home movies I've seen from other camcorders. The Face Detection system is so clever. As you record, up to 5 faces are shown with yellow boxes around them, showing you what the camcorder is trying to correct the focus and exposure for. The menu system is fairly self-explanatory and you only need to refer to the manual if you want to use the advanced functions of the camcorder. Battery life is very impressive, I guess as there aren't any moving parts (except for the zoom lens), less power is required than for HDD and tape camcorders.

The joystick used to navigate the menu is a little bit on the fiddly side and does take some getting used to.

good colour, good start up, image stabilisation nice, 3 sec pre record mode great for wildlife and sport filming

doesnt remember pre record on when LCD closed, not a Lux 0 model and bit rate much reduced in low light

Excellent picture and sound quality - amazing value at the price. AVCHD Editing still developing. Bundled software produces excellent quality but very limited editing options. No luck with Pinnacle or Sony Vegas, however, Cyberlink Power Director 7 Ultra looks promising - inputs highest definition video quickly from SDHC card and can output full resolution ADVHC to DVD or BlueRay Disks. Haven't fully tested how extensive editing might affect raw ADVHC quality, but looks very promising and works well on my AMD Athlon X2 4200+ system

LCD difficult to see when filming on sunny skiing trip.

Light weight. In good lighting conditions very good quality.

Very wrong position of zoom, menu buttons. mini-HDMI cable not included. To use mini-HDMI must remove battery. Bad photos. Low quality in low light.

The size and convenience of it is amazing. I've had several camcorders over the years and the progress of picture quality is astonishing. Image quality is great, an HD screen is a must to view footage at its best. I use an HD laptop.

The record on/off button doesn't come easily to hand. Camera may be a little too small or the wrong shape as it's difficult to hold it steady at times, but you can't have everything! It was a great buy and I'm very pleased. I understand extra batteries are only available from Panasonic and are not cheap. Pity not available at time of purchase.

very easy to use. only moving parts are the lens so less to wear and break. very compact in size. records 24p. best o.i.s for a camera of this size.

indoor shooting in dim light not the best. phots are so-so. AVCHD format not very easy to edit on the pc unless you convert to a different format.

size and performance. Ease of use

low light performance

very comfortable to hold whilst filming,lightweight.Good to be able to view thumbnails instead of having to view everything or search for what you want to see it's instantaneous.Puts you straight back to where you last filmed without gaps or overlap as i experienced with a previous mini-dv tape.Exactly what i wanted when downloading am able to put straight onto disc,pretty fast,excellent picture quality.

initially found the control stick difficult to manouvre around with as it is quite tiny,although i did read same in a review prior to purchasing,however after a little trial & error got used to it,but anyone with fat-fingers would struggle.

Same light weight and easy to transfer to computer.

Battery life, isn't long as you have to have the screen runnning, this reduces the batttery life.

Excellent quality. Small size makes it easy to take everywhere.

Start/stop recording button in a difficult place. Need 2 hands to operate.

Brilliant camera

Poor support with AppleMac computers. Especially non-intel models.

Lightweight & easy to use. Brilliant pictures including the stills.

Some kind of viewfinder wold be benificial as like other cameras it is difficult to see the panel in very bright sunlight.

It does all that is claimed as far as I am concerned. Instructions are clear.

No nonsense instant point and shoot. Intuitive help menu means you wont miss a shot. an 8Gb card seems to go on for ever even at the highest quality setting. Clear Hi res screen makes shooting possible in the brightest sunlight . All the usual manual buttons you could want i.e white balance,manual focus and there is even a filter ring thread on the end of the lens for creative users.

Not a big fan of joy stick operated menu functions but it would appear that most new camcorders have opted for this design. No hot shoe or built in video lamp facility. Digital photo's could have been of higher pixel quality but the pictures are of a reasonable standard and I bought it for the camcorder and not as a camera. Standard battery life impressive for its size but never enough.Spare batteries expensive and difficult to obtain probably as it is a new model so I will give it time before I buy another.

Small, easy to use, good quality pictures and video.

Not sure how easy it will be to get the format so it can be copied onto DVDs and played in DVD players. Pinnacle software supplied has to be purchased before use.

Because of it's light weight,a little difficult to get used to,otherwise everything is good.

Supplied battery could be 260 instead of the 130. These are expensive to buy.

lightweight and compact. I use this to capture kitesurfing moments at the beach when I go out. I have the choice of capturing video in HD or stills with ease. It also has the facility to take 72 stills in a speed burst action

may have to spend extra on buying suitable software for editing and uploading

Accessories ( Batteries ) are expensive at the moment - Expect they will drop eventually

this is the most amazing camcorder i have used ever- it is easy to use, versatile and absolute amazing quality. a true gem at an excellent price

the navigating feature is a bit piddly to use but not the end of the world, touch screen would have been alot better

picture quality

controls for navigating menus on the camera small and difficult to operate

Pic quality, sdhc cards,

low light indoors not brill!

Light weight and compact plus excellent picture quality

Its a great product. It does everything I wanted. I specifically wanted a camera to operate well in low level light for filming the kids at home, and this does so terrifically. There is some graininess but that can't be helped. It can record in very low light. The piucture on my Samsung hi def TV is fantastic. The colours are so rich. I am extremely happy with this purchase. It's sooo light and small. I bought 2 8Gb HCSD cards, which along with the included 4Gb card gives me a good 5 hours worth of recording time. I paid for quality and got it. Highly recommended.

Zoom can be improved and it will be overtime. The recorded video AVCHD format doesn't play in any media players apart from the bundled Panasonic player. But that will change, and the files can be easily converted to MPEG2. I convert but also keep the originals for when I get a AVCHD compatible bluray player. Oh, I also have to get a new camcorder bag as my old one is just too big for this one.

very easy to carry takes up no room,very good quality all round,

no eyepiece so could be a problem in bright sunlight

ease of use and picture quality.

Battery life not enough if you have a 16GB card installed

Ease of use, top of the range with picture clarity and colour, so easy to carry with you at all times.

availability and cost of batteries,with such a short life.

So small you can carry it in your pocket everywhere. Far better pics than any mobile phone. In fact the HD picture is so good I used it as a 3rd Camera at a recent proffesional wedding I filmed. Plenty of different functions to keep you happy, Face Detection, Ground Detection, 700 x Zoom, Stabilizer, Low Light capability. Best of all for me I set everything manually.

Trying to edit the AVCHD files. AS I edit professionaly I have most softwareat my disposal, but for a personthe street it might not be so easy. On saying that there is more & more software becoming available that will alow easy editing.. Theres also the function to edit in Camera anyway. 500% better than buying a mini dvd camcorder.

It is very small and so handy to use and carry.

Haven't found any yet.

Excellent picture quality - light and easy to carry and use. Writes directly to SD card so no moving parts in the recording section.

None found - yet

image quality is superb

spare battery VERY expensive

*the size *the weight *the picture quality *the zomm *the integration of still and video

good image quality and light weight

No good subsequent processing software available for the PC; hopefully this will change in future as the format becomes more widely used.

simply superb

Compatibility with Apple Mac!

Reasonably easy to use.

The supplied software is rubbish, unusable, unfriendly. It should be supplied with a simple software solution that allows editing of VCHD files.

Size, weight and compatability with the sony PS3, SDHC card plugs into an adapter and then into PS3 for instant playback of video in HD. HD video is very good.

PHOTOS......do not buy this iitem if you want good photos...buy a good panasonic digital camera.

The selling point for me was the HD picture quality but I soon realised that one of the major plus points was the extended battery life. Having the 60GB hard drive proved to be value for money instead of buying the HDCSD9 which is memory card only. The extra money spent on the hard drive was well worth it, giving you far more freedom with this product. With a two week holiday where filming was constant, the extra capacity of the hard drive was far more suitable that if I had had the memory card, or even extra cards.

Having had to really think hard about any bad points the one thing that I would have liked to be different on this camera was the position of the ZOOM control, possibly to have been controlled by your thumb and not finger.

light, well made, came with 4gb card, simple to use and edit after recording - which hepls save memory space when you go away and cannot download footage straight away. the intelligent assitance system is helpful. the image is clear and sharp, even with difficult subject image - trees, leaves, birds and lots of movement, still very sharp. Also the image stability even at 10x zoom was good.

whilst well made, a bit disappointed that it's a plastic type case, given my other panasonic products I expected it to be more metal, like my old pana' camcorder. Access to the controls is a pain when palying back, the joystic is a little awkward, you cant alter settings whilst recording without disturbing the view, but there has to be some compromise to the size benefit, just wish they made the joystick easier to use and placed it on the back.

Very impressed with the quality of the image. Easy to copy the files onto PC, edit and burn them to DVD once you've played with the software for a few minutes it's fairly intuitive. Camera feels well made and is very light weight.

I'm struggling to think of any bad points, but if pushed I'd say that the sound pick-up outdoors is not great, it may be that I've not set it up right, but it's a bit quiter than I'd like and misses some sounds.

Good balance between still and video images - basic operations easy to use.

Image stabilisation not too good on video Very little editing software commercially available - and pricy! Trial package far too short to get to know and to use effectively.

Weight and picture quality

Perhaps the life of the battery

Light weight, good quality, easy to use.

The LCD scratches really easily and it didn't work with Windows XP media centre.

Very easy to use

easy to work and the battery lasts

not a very good image at nigth

Is as advertised

none that I can think of

Stills Quality could be better - don't plan on using this as a replacement for your Digital SLR, but video quality is excellent.

Small, compact and easy to use

Poor image quality in low light situations

Picture Quality

No HDMI cable to link to camera directly to the TV

Very small & easy to carry SUPERB PICTURES WHEN VIEWED THROUGH HD TELLY.CAN'T REALLY FAULT IT

NONE

Great picture quality, very easy to navigate, would highly recommend

Battery Life could be better

Compact and easy to use. Excellent picture quality in high quality mode and even the still pictures are good when viewed on a large screen TV.

The joy-stick button can be fiddly to operate when trying to navigate round the menu options. Would have been nice to have the mini HDMI cable included.

Compact and capable

Battery not great

image quality, ease of use, good size, reasonable price compared to market

Very easy to handle, good battery life, picture quality in daytime is excellent.

User interface quite poor. Need for large capacity SDHC Cards pushes cost of package up.

shame it did not come with a carry case

joy stick (menu) button can be fiddly to use

Easy to use. Automatic prompts to get best photo results.

Cannot think of any at the moment.

There are many good things about this product particular it ease of use and its functionality. A great buy.

Havent found any.

small & compact

very easy to get wrong setting

image quality - image stabiliser is great, wide functionality, compact and light

flimsey plastic covers over connectors, however Panasonic are not the only ones who add this sort of low quality build into their products, I have the same issue with my Nikon D40.

very easy to use and very convenient layout so minimum effort required while in use. Great picture quality. I like the way you can plug it into the TV and everyone can watch on the big screen both during and after use. So compact and light. Everyone is impressed by it.

I haven't read all of the very thick instruction booklet yet so perhaps there is a way of improving on image quality while filming indoors with poor light conditions but if you just switch it on and film you can't see much in dim light.