Sony Unveils Its First Complete Professional HDV System

[Suhit Gupta]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://news.sel.sony.com/pressrelease/5327' target='_blank'>http://news.sel.sony.com/pressrelease/5327</a><br /><br /></div><i>"Sony is expanding its line of professional video options with the introduction of a complete high-definition video production system. The new HVR-Z1U camcorder and HVR-M10U VTR form the core of an entry-level HD acquisition and playback solution, designed to provide video professionals with a flexible and affordable migration from standard definition infrastructures to the rapidly expanding world of HD. The HVR-Z1U HDV 1080 camcorder can record HDV, DVCAM and DV images at 60i, 50i, 30, 25 or 24 frames per second, in either SD or HD. The new camcorder uses three Super HAD™, 1/3-inch, 16:9 native CCDs. Combined with a 12X Optical Zoom Carl Zeiss Vario-Sonnar® T* Lens and Sony's new 14 bit A/D with Digital Extended Processor (DXP), the HVR-Z1U's advanced design allows more light to reach each pixel in the imager, improving the signal-to-noise ratio and sensitivity."</i><br /><br /><img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/images/newsonydvstuff.jpg" /><br /><br />They both look like very nice products. Very much out of my affordability range, but very nice nonetheless. The HVR-Z1U and the HVR-M10U are planned to be available in February, for about $4,900 and $3,700, respectively.

[Philip Colmer]

The biggest hurdle I see for these products at the moment is the lack of consumer-level products for high-definition.

We don't yet have a means, other than TV broadcasts, for getting hi-def pictures into a TV set. Anyone other than a TV company (or some relative thereof) is going to have to down-scale the output to standard-def.

Still, that would at least hi-def capture and archiving until the hi-def products come out and then you could re-release everything, but I think that, for now, it is toys for the rich people :-)

--Philip

[Suhit Gupta]

The biggest hurdle I see for these products at the moment is the lack of consumer-level products for high-definition.
I completely agree with you here. There are more and more TVs being released that are HD or HD-ready but clearly not enough; a trip down to your local Best Buy will prove this as over 60% of the TVs (probably a lot more) are regular TVs. And as long as there aren't very many consumer products, products such as the ones released by Sony above will continue to be expensive.

Suhit