Strengths: High quality pictures (1080i). Good portability. Long battery life. High Zoom.

Weaknesses: Proprietary AVCHD video format. No strap included.

Summary: Vedio quality is extremely good. I connected it to my 42" Sony Bravia HDTV as well as a 24" HP PC monitor. Pictures appear spectacular on both. Widescreen pictures captured while shooting HD video also appear quite decent. White balance and color-saturation both auto adjusts well. I found the image-stabilization to be performing well too. Overall - I would recommend this product to any amateur.

Strengths: Good recording time; image quality

Weaknesses: Proprietary Video file format

Summary: I bought it for my parents. It's compact, nice designed, and just what they need. The image quality and optical image stabilization function is great. Highly recommended!

Strengths: Very good zoom and picture quality. Large memory capacity.

Weaknesses: No case or carrying strap included. Price is pretty steep.

Summary: As expected of Sony, this is a very good camcorder with great zoom and excellent picture quality. It's also a plus that it has 40GB of memory so you won't have to keep using a memory stick. The only negative thing is that there was no case or carrying strap included. You would think that the would've at least supplied a fitted case for the price. But aside from that, nothing negative so far when it comes to performance.

Strengths: 15x zoom, hard-disk storage, lowest cost, superior image clarity/auto-focus, expandability options, face recognition technology, remaining battery time in minutes

Weaknesses: a little larger in size than its direct competitor - Panasonic HDC-SD9, smaller HDD (compared to 60GB)

Summary: I looked for a hi-def camera in the low price range (lowest!) since it did not make much sense to invest much in it, as with any latest technology, in a couple of years there will be much better choices. Main differentiating factors were: 1) image quality at max. zoom level 2) optical image stabilization (at max. zoom) 3) storage space 4) battery time I looked at Panasonic (owner of two Panasonic cameras in the past), Canon, JVC. All of them looking cool, bells and whistles, but inferior in what should matter most in a camcorder: image quality (resolution,brightness,color) AND battery time. This camera seems to outperform all rivals in this price range. The main temptation was to go with Panasonic's HDC-SD9 - which is build smaller and has all the nice features of this one too, EXCEPT that it showed some problems with its auto-focus at max. zoom levels (only 10x vs. 15x). When zooming quickly at a distant object the auto-focus had to adjust several times up/down until locking up and then, similarly if you re-focus on another object. It seemed that the system was confused if with multiple-object scenes where the objects were at a significantly different distance (a lamp pole or insignificant object closer to the main object in the distance). Also the white-balance and color saturation seem to adjust a few seconds after change in the scene compared to very good steady lock by Sony's camcorder. This was my final "yes" for the Sony's product.

Strengths: Good recording time (about 5 hours), dual mode so that you can use 8GB memory sticks, image stabilization, and HD!

Weaknesses: Could be better battery life, no included case, image gets grainy in low light situations

Summary: Overall, this is a great HD camcorder! It has a very good record time (unlike the DVD-R versions that only let you record about 20 minutes in the best quality HD). Decent zoom and image stabilization. Great quality video...but there aren't many available video editors out there for AVCHD format HD video (try Ulead's Videostudio 11.5 plus). Otherwise, this is a great camera!

Strengths: Small, so far easy to use, all the features I need.

Weaknesses: None so far.

Summary: I just got it today, and the set up was easy, the manual so far is very straight forward. It looks like great quality, and looks like it is going to be everything I could need in a camcorder.

Strengths: Video and Image Quality, Image Stability while zooming and panning, color realism, Ease of Handling

Weaknesses: Proprietary Video file format

Summary: This model from SONY is perhaps the first in its class (HD) to provide image stabilization better than HDR-SR5 (SONY) which lacks the much needed Optical image stabilization. The HDD capacity of 40 GB Should be adequate to store recently recorded videos and eventually transfer them to a larger dedicated External HDD / DVD rather than paying a higher price for more storage capacity on a mobile device like this. Would recommend this one for anyone looking at a great price to features combination and not necessarily the top of the line features.