Sony DV - transferring to PC

[Eastender]

My sister has a SONY DV camera (small cassette type), sorry I'm not sure of the model but I expect the answer will be the same for all.

She's never transferred images to a PC but would like to do that now. I once heard the USB link is too slow and a Fireewire link is needed.
So my questions...
Can she simply buy a cable, link and transfer as though it's another data storage device?

Does she do this using options in the camera's own menu?

Or does she need additional software? (According to the box she bought it in there was once a CDROM, but she's not sure where it is now).

What format is the video likely to be saved as?

Thanks for any help,
Robin.

[NooNoo]

Welcome to Windrivers Eastender

First thing you need is a computer with a firewire card or input on the motherboard.

USB link is not usually good enough quality - sony usb is usually for either using the camera as a webcam or retrieving still images from the memory card that many sony camcorders have.

There are a few good home video editing packages out there. My father likes Pinnacle, others like sony Vegas or Cyberlink PowerDirector or Ulead Video studio. XP and Vista include a basic capture and edit program called Movie Maker, the gold standard is Adobe Premier.

here is a review of the major players (http://video-editing-software-review.toptenreviews.com/)


Firewire cables can be very cheap to very expensive. I have never had a problem with any of the cheapies. Depending on your firewire input on the computer you need a cable like this:

http://g-ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/41JH349NWXL._AA280_.jpg

Some computers have the small input (for example, my laptop has) so you would need a cable like this:
http://www.atcomp.cz/katalog/297CF1200AEJ06/FUL1_CF1200aedxx_05_S.jpg

And the computer input looks like this
http://www.pierce.ctc.edu/LavaJava/learning/tutorials/imovie/fireback.jpg

Or this for the smaller type

http://pm.appstate.edu/~goodmanj/4810/equipment/ffire4.jpg

The format is captured in full quality AVI - requiring large amounts of disk space. After you have edited the home video, you usually get a choice of formats from emailable windows media files right up to full quality DVD.

Post again if you need further info.

[Eastender]

Thanks for the reply.
So I take it I can transfer the files with cable alone, no additional software needed. That's good news as I do have a firewire socket on my PC.

I do have some experience of Movie Maker and have recently got and started to use Cyberlink PowerDirector with my own camera. Both fairly simple but maybe I'll try Adobe Premier you mentioned.


I joined the forum particulalry to ask why my USB port has stopped working with flash memory and cameras, but still works for my printer. I noticed the pegged answer re. regedit so I'm hopping that will fix it but have yet to try it.

Thanks,
Robin

[NooNoo]

Glad to help :)