I want to buy a Sony DCR-DVD camcorder. There are several models, and I cannot decide. In terms of price, DCR-DVD92 is the one within my budget, but I don't know how bad its under 1 MPixel resolution really is. I imagine that stills will be very bad, but I don't need it for stills anyway. Is "500 lines of effective resolution" regular or very poor? What does it mean? Is the image going to be obviously foggy, or acceptable for home use? On the other hand, the ones that are more expensive (203 and 403), have lower optical zoom, and higher CCD resolutions. I don't know why it is so, but it confuses me. Is the optical zoom irrelevant? (These two also have USB, but I can live without it). I don't need a 'stellar' camcorder, but I would really like the picture to be decent. Do you think that DCR-DVD92 can provide that for me? Should I dig deeper in the pocket and buy one of the other two? If I do so, is the 203 worth it, or should I go straight for the 403?... Please help me somehow, becaue I'm really lost!
Optical zoom is awesome. The more the better. Digital zoom is what's irrelevant. It's actually quite worthless. If you ever film an event where you're more than 60' or so away, you'll be happy you went with a camera that had the higher optical zoom.
