After reading CNET’s review of Panasonic’s VDR-M70, I started to question the wisdom of actually buying a DVD camcorder. Besides the fact that you have to finalize them before they are even viewable, there are other drawbacks too. On the plus side though, the media is relatively durable when compared to the VHS counterparts.

DVD camcorders such as Panasonic’s VDR-M70 are great until you realize that mini DVD-R/RAM discs are still very expensive and that you can’t just pull the discs out of the camera and stick them into your set-top DVD player. They need to be finalized first, and that puts an end to any more recording on that disc.If you add a computer between the two and use it to import, edit, and create DVDs, then you transform the VDR-M70 into nearly the most perfect of all recording devices, with media that has at least a 10-year shelf life and won’t stretch, break, or degrade your video on the 1st or the 10,000th rewrite.