Panasonic VDR-M53 DVD Camcorder w/24x Optical Zoom

I just bought this camcorder and am not a good reader of manuals. I had it recording in a matter of minutes. You do have to format the mini dvds, but that is easy to find in the manual. The quality of the recording looked great on my computer screen. I bought office depot mini dvds and they worked fine, for the great price. This Panasonic is great and recording straight to mini dvds is a wonderful idea. I would have given it a 5 star rating, but the finalizing of the mini dvd took a while and you have to plug it in, you can't do this using the battery. Also I was warned, that if you use the dvd-ram instead of the dvd-r, they will not work on all players and they prefer to work on Panasonic equipment. This is why I opted for the non re-writable mini dvd-r from office depot. I also bought the PNY SD card from them and the card reader, all very affordable and easy to use.

It does not have any USB connectivity. There is no way to hook this up to your computer except through the TV type of hookups. Other than that it works great.

You need a software to convert the DVD to something els to be able to edit it on your computer though (to edit movie and make copies)

I like that it write direct to DVD so if you don't want to edit it, there is no need to bother with the computer.

Be aware it only works with certain types of DVD's. Won't work with DVD-RW. Has to be DVD-r and only a certain typre of RAM disk.

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If you buy this camera, remember to buy also additional DVD copy software (IntelVideo Copy around $70), plus only Panasonic DVD-Ram mini DVD disks (also expensive). Also, after my experience, if you erase one DVD-ram disc at least twice, on the third use the movie will have many video or audio problems. Not knowing this problem, I ruined my friend's baby shower video. Panasonic customer service is not helpful at all. A representative was even surprised that my camera does not have USB cable!!! Other then that let's say, once you cannot return this camera to the store, because I opened it and used it, you can still enjoy lightness of the camera. One more thing: you need to purchase the light also; this camera does not have built-in light you will need it. ... So, how much does the camera cost after all???

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Has good features, but the biggest downsides are it does not have a USB port and it uses DVD-RAM discs (re-writable) which do not work on most of the DVD players.

Note that it does not use DVD-RW discs that come with most notebooks and desktop computers and allow re-writing.

So there seems to be virtually no way to transfer your videos to your computer, other than buying a DVD Multi drive that can read DVD-RAM discs.

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I bought this camera because of consumer reports great reviews. But I'm bound and determined to get my images onto my PC. I purchased a DVD-RAM compatible drive for my PC and still can't get it to recongnize either DVD-RAM or DVD-R disks. Do I need special software? And if so what? Roxio DVD builder is not doing the trick.

Other than that, the camera works great, images and sound are clear, and camera is easy to opperate. If you figure out a new cell phone, you can figure out this.