Canon HR10 review

Our favourite HD camcorder, Canon's HV20, uses MiniDV tapes.

This means that to edit the footage, you'll have to copy it in real time to a PC, which can be time consuming. What's more, playing video from the camcorder to a HD television requires winding the tape to the correct segment. This feels old-fashioned, so we were pleased to see that the new HR10 records to DVDs.

Standard-definition (SD) DVD camcorders have been popular in the past couple of years. Video is recorded to 8cm DVDs, which you can put straight into your PC's DVD drive, then drag and drop the video files from it. Better still, you can play the discs on most standard DVD players.

However, the HD video from the HR10 requires a player that's compatible with advanced video codec high definition (AVCHD). Blu-ray players such as the PlayStation 3 can play this format, but they cost around £300. This probably rules out shooting some quick footage and playing it back immediately at a friend's house. Each DVD holds only 15 minutes of video at the highest quality setting, so you'll need a lot of them to shoot long movies.

In other ways, however, the HR10 is very similar to the HV20. It uses the same lens, and behind it is an identical 2.96-megapixel CMOS sensor. Like the HV20, it also supports progressive-scan recording, which gives a more cinematic feel to your video.

Despite these similarities, the end result isn't identical, as different video compression formats are used. The HV20 uses the MPEG2-based HDV format with a maximum bit rate of 25Mbit/s. The HR10 uses the more efficient H.264 based AVCHD format, though only at a maximum of 12Mbit/s, and this can cause problems.

Image quality is great if you're shooting landscapes from a tripod. However, the lower bit rate means that busy scenes and quick camera motions introduce compression issues that reduce the amount of detail in the final video. This means it can't match the image quality of the HV20 across a wide range of subjects.

The HR10 does have superior build quality. While the HV20 feels a little cheap in places, the HR10 is more sturdy and compact. It fits well in your hand and the controls are all thoughtfully positioned. The battery lasted for well over an hour and a half.

The HR10 is a well-designed camcorder that shoots good-quality HD video in most situations. If you are looking for convenience and already own a Blu-ray player, it could be ideal. Despite the inconveniences of tape, though, we prefer the HV20 because of the generally higher quality of its resulting video.