Hi all,

I know nothing about camcorders, but I'm in need of a budget one, only about $400. It will mainly be used for traveling, so mostly an all-purpose camcorder. I also don't know much about formats. Whatever is most convenient is fine.

I understand there will be limitations. HD isn't happening of course. I would like as good picture quality as possible, with as good lowlight performance as possible.

What are my options at this price range?

I'd go with a Canon Mini-DV (tape), simply because a fairly low end ZR50 served me very well from 2001-2007. Small, robust, hi zoom level, easy to use etc. I'm sure other brands have strong products also in this price range, your main choice will be medium (hard-drive which requires a computer to plug into when 8 hours or so IIRC is taken, and can possibly crash/break losing data, or DVD which as I understand will be more expensive and possibly not as stable long term as a tape) and form factor.
Camcorderinfo.com will have lots of info you can use to decide.
I'd also recommend buying from a store as opposed to internet, as it's much easier to return it for service if something goes wrong.

cheers
Kurt

For about $430 you can get the Panasonic PV-GS320 miniDV camcorder. It has very good picture quality because it is a 3CCD camcorder (the least expensive one I know of). The 3CCD imager has a separate CCD for reds, greens and blues, this also helps it's low light performance. It also has a 10X optical zoom and takes 3MP photos to a memory card. Very good PQ for the money if you don't mind shooting to miniDV.