I got the recorder first and liked it, but had already wanted a flash camcorder so looked out for an SV-AV100. I bought the first one that came up, which happened to be in US and my cousin kindly set it to UK, so it is NTSC standard

The TV automatically adjusts and both our HDD/video recorders can also play and record NTSC, so I guess that most do anyway. Of course the AV100 is also matched to the Panasonic recorder, which copies MPEG2 videos and JPEG stills straight from the AV100's SD card

I have fooled around before with converters and editors, connected camcorders to the TV with wires all over the room, and copied movie clips off various cameras onto DVD with poor results, but now nothing could be simpler!

The recorder has neat editing and copying facilities for anything on the hard drive, and it plays on TV like any other recording. The AV100's 'Programs' become recordings with the 'scenes' as chapters, which can then be further broken down or moved around within playlists before storage or transfer to DVD. Quality is markedly better than a medium range Sony tape based camcorder I used recently to copy some old tapes, and the sound and 10x zoom while shooting are excellent, so I am well pleased

I guess there has been some criticism of the 'closed system' approach which requires both types of Panasonic product - but now they have both been superseded and the price is so reasonable, the combination makes perfect sense

But is it cheating?