Canon DC230

Sony has been a clear winner in this space for a long time. And truly speaking there is little initiative save for some half-assed scramble to somehow make it in the same space. Here we have the Canon DC230 Camcorder that is quite similar to most in this space, but comes with its fair share of drawbacks. Let me show you how.

Design
The DC230 is a bit on the heavy side weighing 405g, however, the body is like a regular MiniDV camcorder with dimensions of 54 x 90 x 128 mm. Yet it's quite comfortable to simply slip your palms through the strap, and the carry it around. What I like is that all the functional buttons are easily accessible with your right hand thumb. This includes the On/Off slider that also changes modes, the navigational thumbstick that also acts like the Set button, and other functional buttons.

The screen swivels (like other camcorders) and has play/stop and forward/rewind buttons at the bottom. The screen is a 2.7-inch wide screen LCD displaying up to 123,000 pixels. The absence of a touch-screen feature puts me off, since mostly all camcorders in this category come with one. You will need to work with the thumbstick, function buttons etc. to get to anywhere. This just doesn’t work for me.

The camcorder, does however, have an internal sliding lens cover. This works better than the external one. The speakers are situated right below the cover, with stereo output. A small compartment beside the screen houses the Memory slot and AV out jack.