Sanyo Xacti VPC-C5

How does a camcorder that's roughly the same size and weight as a 20GB iPod sound? It sounds pretty good, right? How cool would a camcorder that small be if the video was barely VHS quality? What if connecting it to a PC or TV was a pain in the butt and you had to transfer all of your footage onto a computer or DVD before you could use it again? These are all questions raised by the third-generation SD memory card camcorder from Sanyo, the Xacti VPC-C5.

Basic operations couldn't be simpler on this 5.1-ounce wonder. Swing up the two-inch LCD screen and the unit immediately enters Record/Pause mode; there's no tape or DVD cue/alignment time delay. There are only six buttons on the rear spine: Still Photo Record, Video Record, Zoom, Record/Play, Menu, and a navigation joystick. All of them are thumb-controllable.

Pushing the Video Record button begins the recording process, pushing again pauses it. Pressing the Still button halfway down changes the VPC-C5 into still mode, and pushing it all the way snaps the picture. Nice.

Video and stills are recorded onto an SD memory card. The included 128MB card holds only five minutes of high-quality video or 49 5.1-megapixel stills. This means that for the VPC-C5 to be really useful, you're going to have to spring for at least a 512MB card, which will hold a more reasonable 21 minutes of top-quality MPEG-4 video, but adds around $40 to the price. A 1GB card, which will yield 42 minutes of video, costs about $75.

It's all downhill from here. MiniDV tapes and three-inch DVD-R discs are cheap enough, so when you're done shooting you can toss said tape or DVD into a shoebox and forget about it for ten years. You don't want to spend money on a new SD card every time you want to shoot new footage, which means that you're going to have to transfer your footage onto your PC's hard drive.

Sanyo doesn't make this transferring process easy. The tiny VPC-C5 has no standard connecting jacks, only one external proprietary jack to which you attach either the included connection/charging dock or the included one-inch square adapter. Unless you're Felix Unger or Monica Geller, you will lose the tiny adapter.

The dock and the adapter in turn each have proprietary jacks for connecting included USB, A/V, and power cables. Neither of these external solutions are as convenient as having connecting jacks on the unit itself, as is the case with all tape and DVD camcorders. Your best bet is to simply eject the SD card and insert it into a notebook's memory card slot (or a PC Card or USB memory card adapter).

The VPC-C5's biggest weakness is its video quality. Footage is 640 x 480 pixels, and looks like a DVD-to-VHS dub. Outdoor footage appeared highly contrasted, with fuzzy details, especially when panning. Edges are indistinct, often shrouded in digital auras. Zooming exacerbates these problems and adds an increasing level of graininess the more you zoom, especially when you move beyond the insufficient 5X optical to the even more pathetic 12X digital zoom.

Indoor footage is even worse. In moderate light, color and detail is lost in shadow unless you're right in front of the lens. In low light, you get nothing but indistinct blobs moving vaguely in the dark. One positive note: Still images taken by the VPC-C5 are as bright and sharp as those from any mid-level five-megapixel digital camera.

When you consider that the VPC-C5 costs nearly twice that of a high-resolution MiniDV camcorder (still the video quality champion) and is priced on par with most DVD camcorders, it's hard to justify the premium you would pay for this device's portability. The Sanyo Xacti VPC-C5 is light on its feet and starts fast, but unless you're only sharing videos over the Web or e-mail we don't recommend it.