So after 10 years of filming my kids and vacations, my sony camcorder is becoming more and more problematic and I need to buy a new one but after reading review upon review, I can't really figure out what to do. My current camcorder records to 8mm tape and we plug that directly into our DVD player and burn the tapes to DVDs and that works great.

Everyone is recommending HD camcorders but I've read they can be sensitive to movement and bouncing / bumping around in a travel bag (ie vacation). Flash drives and memory cards, I hear compress the video creating the worst picture quality.

Mini dvds, seem to be a pain.

I like the mini-dvs for backup and quality of picture but that seems to be dead / dying technology.

I don't need HD quality and I don't need the ability to make great videos on my computer. My main goal is to store memories of the kids and family vacations and gatherings.

Can anyone offer any real insight on the benefit of flash, hd or mini-dv technology and / or recommend a good camcorder in the $400 range.

Depending on the price range the Canon Vixia series look to be pretty sweet.

Pretty hard to choose I must say, quite a few options out there.

I think what CNET says is usually the best bet for me. http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-camcorders/?filter=100021_10...

Brian

http://www.amazon.com/Flip-UltraHD-Camcorder-Minutes-Black/d...
That's what I just started using. Simple and works great.

I just went through this and bought a sony hd with a hard drive. It will record 15 hours in full hd and 30 hours if I back down the quality a little. The Hard drive technology has been in the cameras for 9 years now so they have it dialed in. You could do without the Hi def and save some money. Every video segment is a digital video file so you can drag and drop to make discs. I haven't felt my way all the way through the technology and buttons but its working great so far.

I have a Canon Vixia, like brplatz. And I don't like it, so I gave it to my son to record soccer games of my granddaughter. 15 hours of recordings 10 zoom, and a hard drive that if bumped will freeze up and stop recording. The red lite means stop and the green lite means record? The camera was for windows 32 and I have windows 64, you will spend another $150.00 to get the videos into the computer.
I now have one that records on a SD card that makes life a lot better, I am happy with a simple camcorder that can record in HD with no extras, the software can do the rest.

@bigkid - so what camera do youhave now that uses a SD card? Is it a Vixia as well?

It is a Panasonic HDC-TM300, like the model, hate the price.
The best thing I could say is go and try them out at the stores and ask questions. Tell them what you want and put the thing in your hand and see how it operates, then get online and find a good deal.