JVC Everio GZ-MC200: An Hour of DVD with No Cassette!

Video Image Quality

The color is mostly accurate, despite a slight dominance of magenta. Image sharpness is fairly good.

Close-up video - 31 MB .

Detailed video - 108 MB .

In low light conditions, the Everio loses colors in a room lit only by a candle (an illumination of 6 lux), but the image shows very little noise, which is impressive.

The major shortcoming we noticed with this unit was the ineffective digital image stabilizer. At 10x zoom the image shook so much we wondered if the stabilizer was actually on! Judge for yourself:

Stabilizer video - 148 MB .

One advantage of the Everio is the way it indexes video clips on the Microdrive. Since each sequence you shoot is a separate MPEG file, you can screen them instantly from the nine thumbnails shown on the LCD display. DVD camcorders also offer this function.