AVCHD what...? High Def Cameras with limited software support

The Marketing campaign was working.

When we were on the search for a video camera it had to be high definition. Well, with our flat panel display and an HD Tivo box at home, how could you go back to 'normal' video when you could have high def...

The choice between Hard Disk, DVD/CD, cassette and flash was quickly decided towards hard disk.

But then there was the 5 letter acronymn AVCHD, with that sticker



glued to these high definition video cameras...

We spent some time on the web and finally decided to go with the Canon HG10 after reading the reviews in our mixed PC/Apple household knowing that we wouldn't be able to download the AVCHD video onto the older Apple.

We were all the more surprised when we saw the lack of good software and utilities. Especially converting the high def files to .avi proves to be something which I still haven't been able to accomplish even with studying a bunch of user forum sites...

In summary AVCHD cameras are still for the techies and not a plug and play solution for the general public.

Let's hope that this lack of ease of use software support is getting resolved soon.