new ranges of HD camcorders from big names are at last making HD Home filming a mainstream passtime. For example the HDR-HC3E from Sony has a 2 megapixel sensor for 1080i High-Def Video (HDV). Its miniDV tape format can store up to an hour of film.

HD or not, camcorders are starting to come with a wide range of storage media. The traditional tape formats are still very reliable but not as high-tech as writable DVD, hard disk drive or compact flash. Some of these new formats are convenient less reliable. For example a writable DVD has the advantage that it can be taken out the camera and played directly on the DVD player, but only the more expensive disks such as those from Sony work well and it is not so easy to transform DVD recordings to other more freindly formats. Hard disk drive in the camcorder is the latest contender with the capacity of small stroage devices reaching very usable levels. It is particularly easy to transfer from an HD drive based camcorder to a PC for viewing, editing and storage, but the main problem with HDD is its robustness. Cancorders can get a bit knocked about if you take them on your travels and hard-drives prefer to sit still otherwise the head is likely to crash the disk.

The storage format that is set to take over is of course the same compact flash memory technology that is available in almost every digital camera. It is robust and convenient. the only limitation is the amount of data that compact flash can store which is barely sufficient for standard definition video, let alone HD. As flash technology improves and becomes cheaper, we can expect to see more and more HD camcorders using it.