Hard disk drive camcorders pain to edit?

[soccersquirt82]

I am debating whether I should get a Hard disk camcorder or a MiniDV. I love the fact that I could record so much more w a Hard disk, but backing up may be an issue.

What I really want to know is if the HDD camcorders are a pain to edit. I am currently using the new and old version of iMovie, depending what I'm in the mood for. I might upgrade to Final Cut Express. I've heard MiniDV's are the easiest to edit, and I have experience with them. But HDD sounds pretty good to . . .

And what hard disk drive camcorders are compatible?? I've looked everywhere for a list of compatible camcorders . . . Apple used to have one on its site, but it must have disappeared.

So, two questions: compatible camcorders? Hard disk drive camcorders hard to edit?

Tell me if this is in the wrong thread!

 

[spinnerlys]

iMovie '08: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1014
iMovie '09: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3290

HDD cameras capture footage using a codec, like .h264 or something similar to get more out of the GBs of storage.
As .h264 is a lossy format, it has to be re-encoded to something useful like the Apple Intermediated Codec (AIC, every frame is stored).

Have a look into the Digital Video forum of this site and also use MRoogle for plenty of topics on this forum.