JVC Everio GZ-MG130E > Reviews > JVC HD Camcorder

Author's product rating:   

Ease of use	Good
Recording quality	Excellent
Picture quality	Excellent
Sound quality	Excellent
Value for money	Excellent

Advantages:	Light, easy to use, good quality video and still, easy to transfer to/from computer
Disadvantages:	Does not come with a bag

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

I have bought this JVC camcorder over an year ago and I am completely satisfied with it.

JVC is a good brand name and their lenses are of top quality. The company pioneered the HD camcorders.This camcorder is very light and handy and easy to use. 20GB hard disk is more than enough to store all your photos and videos taken in one vacation.

This is a very user friendly device. The 4-way (up, down, left, right) menu selector switch allows you to browse through various settings (like brightness, aperture etc.).Apart from that, there are main mode selector (still or video) switches. All you need to do is to select the appropriate still/video mode and press the shutter. The LCD screen shows you what you are capturing. If you are not satisfied, you can delete it with the press of a button other wise save it in the 20GB hard disk!

HD camcorders have a lot of advantage over the tape based ones. You can directly copy your video and photos to your computer with the help of a USB cable (comes free with the camcorder). With most non-HD camcorders, you will need to buy/download specific software in order to upload your photos to your computer. This is not necessary with HD camcorders; you can directly upload to/from computer to camcorder with the USB cable. Just connect the camcorder to your PC/Laptop with the USB cable and transfer your picture/video files from the camcorder to the PC just as you transfer files from one folder to another. After the transfer, you can delete the old photos and videos from the camcorder hard disk and go on capturing new photos again; no need to buy/replace any tape. 20GB is a lot of space and so you do not need to transfer and "free up" the hard disk too frequently.

This is one of the cheapest HD camcorder, yet has got very good picture quality, optical zoom and a very good lens. The video quality is also very good. It captures the sound from a good distance while recording video. The full charged battery lasts for ~2 hours, if used continuously.
Overall, good value for money