New to AVCHD with canon hf100

Get a Mac?

Getting a Mac will not help you out at all in this case as this flavor of mpeg-4 is nearly impossible to natively play back reliably on any computer or OS. I have a souped up Vista machine and 3 different Macs including a MBP and the PC actually handles it better than Mac. Mac support for these files is almost non-existent. If the Canon software doesn't work, the only way you can view them on your PC is to transcode them into an intermediate format. That takes too much time and effort in my mind. I ended buying a PS3 with a card reader in the front and they play back perfectly. I either play my videos through the card reader or stream them through my network using Null River's Medialink application. Either way works great but I wish there was an easier way to just watch them on my computers.

And yes, Vegas will read these files but you will get very slow playback until you transcode to a different format. FCP will also see them fine and will transcode them into ProRes for you to edit.

Well, there are a lot of different flavors of HD but with AVCHD there is just no way right now to edit this stuff w/o transcoding to an intermediate codec, whether it is Prores, cineform, etc. You can try but it is really a pain in the arse. So, yes, when you transcode you are no longer dealing with the original but in my opinion the results of transcoding to ProRes and/or Cineform have been negligible and in some situations have actually improved the quality.

SchneiderMan said:

i just got Sony Vegas Pro 8 (about $500+) they say its the top of the line, and that it can edit AVCHD
im going to install it now, anyone here using this?

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I'm not trying to be a smart ass or anything but you do know that your on a mac enthusiast forum right? I'm willing to bet that 99% of us here only use a flavor of Final Cut or iMovie. You could try DVinfo.net for more info on working with AVCHD and Sony Vegas.

SchneiderMan said:

ever thought of bootcamp?

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Well of course it's possible but honestly what's the purpose of buying a Mac, then running windows to edit video? Why wouldn't you just stick with a PC? The logic behind a choice like this doesn't make any sense unless someone was in the production industry and had to work in Windows because that's what the company uses but lived in OSX at home. I'm not trying to bash you in any way, it's just that I'm sure you would find better info on a different forum more specific to Windows based editing software. Since you are here at MacRumors though, id suggest you return Sony Vegas and invest in Final Cut.....

Just get a mini-DV camera and be happy. No need to bother with this non-editable DVD/HD/card type cameras.

Like I already said, Vegas will edit it and FCP will edit it as well. With Vegas you can drag the file natively into the timeline but it will drop a lot of frames on playback if you try to edit natively. FCP will not allow you to natively put the files into the timeline - you have to do a log and transfer and it will convert it to ProRes. Whatever you choose you will be happier in the long run converting to a different format before editing. These NLE's are very different from each other but both are fantastic options for editing.