Hi folks, i want to buy a DV Camcorder from US, because the prices are much lower then in Europe. But I am wondering would it be possible to use it here (for the 110 volts i tihnk it would be no problem to buy a converter). Basically, what I need is to be able to connect it to a TV and to a Video Recoder. I saw that there was a thread like this, but it was already closed. I actually wouldn't like to use another expensive tool to do this conversion. Is there a way to do it using a PC (for example like capturing it to a DivX(AVI), and then play it through TVOut... or there is again the NTSC Problem) Many thanks in advance, Vladimir
DV's beauty compared to analog methods is that you can transfer the video digitally (just like copying data from CD or from the Internet) to your harddrive. Normally what you need is a FireWire port in your computer (depends of course on DV model, but this is the case normally) -- if you don't have one, buy a FireWire card, they're relatively cheap. Then simply plug FW cable from DV to your PC and copy the files from the tape -- no quality loss or anything during the transfer. DV clips tend to take slightly more HDD space than average lossy AVIs, but they're actually MPEG-2 encoded clips normally. Then you can try to change the framerate if you want to, or allow your TV out to try to do this -- results should be OK, even though not perfect due the fps difference between NTSC and PAL. I have much harder time with my equip I moved from NYC to London and took my _analog_ Hi8 camcorder from the US with me. Luckily I bought the universal VCR from US as well which can _record_ in all formats (costs around $700 - $2000, depends on model). Voltage converters should be easy to find or you can even go to your local brand dealer (if you buy some big name, like Sony, Sharp, etc it's easier) in your own country and purchase 230V AC/DC adapter for it, so you don't have to use converters at all.
