I've been looking at high-definition camcorders and I think I have my choice narrowed down to the Canon Vixia HF S11 (or HF 21) and the Sanyo VPC-HD2000 (which has a mic input, unlike the VPC-FH1).

The Sanyo seems to have the edge just looking at the specs, because it records true 1080p 60, while the Canons do 1080i and then convert to progressive 24 or 40. But I was wondering (1) how much of a difference this makes in reality, and (2) whether any other important factors make one camera or the other a better choice. I have heard that the Sanyo records less data per frame at 1080p 60 due to the greater number of frames, so the picture quality at that setting may not be as good as one would expect. Could the Canon at 1080i converted to 1080p 30, actually be better than the Sanyo at 1080p native?

Also, I am not concerned about the apparently poor image stabilization on the Sanyo; my main concern is high-definition video quality.

Thanks...

I cannot comment on the Canon since I have not used one but you can check out my experience with the HD2000 in my Blog and sample videos in Vimeo here (http://www.vimeo.com/6050800)under my name. I do not see much difference between the 30p and 60p resolution in the HD2000 for normal videos and I usually use the 30p since it is easier to handle by other media players and editing softwares.

I notice your Vimeo videos stutter and jerk while playing, instead of playing smoothly. I assume that problem comes from the upload to Vimeo, and the actual Sanyo video, played directly on your HDTV, is smooth -- right?

Thanks.

Yes, that's correct; the videos play smoothly on the HD2000 itself or on HDTV except for the shakiness at times due to unsteady hands.

Maybe you could try YouTube; I've seen some good HD videos there and the playback seems nice and smooth.

I have uploaded some videos in YouTube like the one below. This one was taken with a tripod but still not very smoth while panning since the tripod itself was not a very good one. Not sure if this looks better than the one uploaded at Vimeo. Anyway, cannot really blame them since in both cases I uploaded directly from the raw 1920x1080 (30p) and not rendered to 1280x720 as preferred by both Vimeo and Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-bGbdB1m6s