Product Description

Sony Handycam HDR-SR5E is an ultra-compact stylishly designedAVCHD HDD Handycam with ClearVid CMOS Sensor x.v.Color and CarlZeiss Vario-Sonnar T lens.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #28364 in Consumer Electronics
• Brand: Sony
• Model: HDRSR5E.CEH
• Released on: 2007-06-12
• Dimensions: 1.01 pounds
• Display size: 2.7

Manufacturer's Description

HDR-SR5E

New AVCHD HDD Handycam models features 40GB HDD plus faster, smarter scene searches

• HDR-SR5E key features


• AVCHD 1080i recording
• Up to 15 hours HD recording on 40GB HDD
• Carl Zeiss Vario-Sonnar T* lens
• ClearVid CMOS Sensor
• x.v.Colour
• 10x Optical Zoom / 80x Digital Zoom
• New Search Functions
• 4.0 Megapixel Still Image Recording
• Dolby DigitalⓇ 5.1ch Surround Recording
• 2.7-inch Wide, Clear Photo LCD plus screen
• STAMINA up to 6 hours (with optional battery)

 

Beautiful styling meets amazing HD recording times with the smallest, lightest AVCHD hard disk Handycam models from Sony. Offering up to 15 hours of recording, this camcorder makes shooting your own High Definition pictures even easier and more rewarding.

No tape or discs
The ultra-compact, elegant and stylishly-designed HDR-SR5E offers 40GB disk capacity for up to 15 hours HD recording time (in LP mode). The shooting capacity is enabled by powerful AVCHD compression technology that allows long recording durations with excellent HD picture quality. As well as offering high compression efficiency, variable Bit Rate recording adjusts bit rates while shooting, balancing optimal picture quality with maximum storage efficiency for higher picture quality.

Picture Quality Mode	SR5E(40GB HDD)
AVC HD 15M (XP)	Approx. 5 h 20 min
AVC HD 9M (HQ)	Approx. 9 h 40 min
AVC HD 7M (SP)*	Approx. 11 h 50 min
AVC HD 5M (LP)	Approx. 15 h 10 min

*Default setting

High Definition recording directly onto the camcorder’s hard disk drive means there’s no need to carry any tapes or discs when you step out. Not having to change media in the middle of recording means you don’t miss any moment while shooting. This is complemented by HDD Smart Protection technology – so your precious memories are safeguarded, even in the event of unexpected bumps and jolts while you’re shooting.

Superb HD picture quality

 

 

 

 

 

 

Using the AVCHD format to capture HD 1080 images for incredible detail and vibrant colours. The ClearVid CMOS sensor with Enhanced Imaging Processor offers excellent dynamic range and reduced smear compared with conventional CCD sensors. Exceptional sensitivity with a minimum illumination of only 2 lux (Auto Slow Shutter “ON”) allows successful shooting in twilight or dimly-lit interiors.

Based on the new xvYCC international standard, x.v.Colour technology assures supremely life-like colour reproduction. Compared to conventional camcorders, x.v.Colour approximately doubles the range of colours that can be reproduced, very close to what the human eye can recognise. This ensures vivid, expressive tonal reproduction with greater detailing and clarity when viewed on the growing range of xvYCC compliant televisions and players including new Sony Blu-ray player BDP-S1.

The Carl Zeiss Vario-Sonnar T* lens features a 10x optical zoom range to bring distant images closer with superb clarity. Ensuring you get to view your world up close and never miss a tiny detail.

There’s a growing range of exciting possibilities for enjoying your HD pictures at home. The SR5E connects directly to any BRAVIA HD-ready television via a mini-HDMI cable (optional) for fantastic results in your living room. Alternatively, AVCHD discs can be burned using a PC for playback on PLAYSTATION®3 or an AVCHD-compatible Blu-ray player. 

New technology means faster scene searches
This HDR-SR5E makes it beautifully simple to find exactly the right scene in moments.

‘Visual Index’ divides all your footage into a series of convenient chapters, corresponding with each press of the Record Start button. Thumbnail images are automatically created for each chapter and displayed on the camcorder’s touch screen for handy reference.

It’s complemented by smart new indexing features that make it even quicker to track down your favourite memories after a day’s shooting.
‘Film Roll Index’ automatically creates scene index points at user-selectable intervals from 3 seconds to 5 minutes within each recorded chapter. All that’s required is a single press of the ‘Film Roll’ button on the camcorder’s body. The right scene can then be tracked down quickly on the camcorder’s touch-screen. Film Roll Index searches can also be performed on a PC using supplied Picture Motion Browser software.

For the first time ever on a camcorder, ‘Face Index’ uses new Face Detection Technology to simplify searches for ‘people pictures’ within a scene of continuously shot footage – like your child in a school play. The SR5E automatically identifies scenes from your footage containing faces. Faces appear as thumbnail images, making it fun and easy to browse scenes featuring your child or other people – just make your selection by pressing the touch screen and the clip plays immediately.
NB: Faces may not be detected depending on recording conditions

Bundled Picture Motion Browser software also permits ‘Highlight’ Searches to track down brightly-lit, colourful scenes with voices. It’s ideal for finding those shots from the beach, poolside or concerts and other special events.

For ever greater flexibility, scenes can be searched by shooting date using the ‘Date Index’ function.

Despite its superb picture quality and advanced new features, this new Handycam is also beautifully simple to use. Clear, simple function navigation on the touchscreen is complemented by direct buttons for playback.

Convenient disc burning and back-up
It’s easy to keep all your memories archived to enjoy again and again. Once the camcorder’s hard disk is filled up, there’s a choice of methods for transferring your precious video footage to a PC or onto DVD for safekeeping.

The bundled Handycam Station features ‘One Touch Disc Burn’ – just press a button to transfer your shots from Handycam to a connected PC for fuss-free creation of AVCHD format DVDs.

Shots can also be stored safely to your computer’s hard drive using ‘Easy PC Back-up’. This intelligently detects and transfers only new files that have not previously been saved for faster back-ups.

Once footage has been imported to your PC using the supplied Picture Motion Browser software, it’s easy to edit your own movies with an increasing choice of AVCHD-compatible editing packages.

Enjoy simplicity and usability with STAMINA

Shots can be viewed instantly on the superb 2.7-inch Clear Photo LCD plus screen. This teams excellent brightness, contrast and faithful colour reproduction with the simplicity and usability of controlling camcorder functions via touch screen. Despite the advanced imaging and playback capabilities, the Handycam is brilliantly simple to use thanks to clear, intuitive menus and helpful on-screen explanation of functions. There’s also an ‘Easy Handycam’ mode that adjusts all settings for foolproof everyday use.

Advanced Sony STAMINA power management allows up to 6 hours of uninterrupted shooting time between charges with optional battery NP-FH100.

5.1 Channel Surround

To make your home movies as realistic as possible the 5.1 surround microphone is now built-in. So you can input a surround sound, sound track into your home movies directly, giving you a real sense of being there again in the moment you’ve captured.

 

Optional Accessories
From high-grade lenses, microphones and high-power batteries to tripods and stylish carry cases – there’s a full range of official accessories to help you get even more from your Handycam®.

To fully enjoy the High Definition experience, two new HDMI connecting cables are also introduced. Both VMC-15MHD and VMC-30MHD are featuring new mini HDMI terminal that matches perfectly your Handycam (Type C - Type A). Terminals are gold-finished for perfect connectivity. Cables are 1.5 and 3.0 meters in length respectively.

 

Box Contents

AC Adaptor

AV Cable

Rechargeable Battery Pack NP-FH60

Handycam Station

USB Cable

USB Driver

Editing Software Picture Motion Browser

Wireless Remote Commander RMT-835

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Customer Reviews

Superb HD Camcorder from Sony
I'd been looking into purchasing a HD (High Definition) camcorder in order to take away on holiday and capture all of those memorable moments in stunning HD. I heavily researched the few HD models which are currently on the market and took an interest in Sony's new HDD (Hard Disk Drive) camcorders which were released in June/July of 2007.

Sony have released three HD models which record to HDD in the new AVCHD (Advanced Video Codec High Definition) format: the HDR-SR5E, HDR-SR7E and HDR-SR8E. The HDR-SR5E is the cheapest of the three.

I purchased the HDR-SR5E a few weeks ago, shortly after the release date, based on my research and my own personal requirements. At the time (and even now) there were very few reviews on this model, which is mainly why I am writing this, for the benefit of others!

Upon receipt of the camcorder, my first impression was 'WOW!'. I had seen in a Sony Store a few days before-hand and so wasn't too shocked at the size, but others could be. The device is fairly small, considering its capabilities, but feels strong and is of the typical high build quality from Sony.

All of the required cables etc were included in the box, along with a Handycam Docking Station and remote control. Be aware though, that the HDMI (High Definition Multimedia Interface) cable needed for a HDMI connection is not bundled with the device. However, the camcorder can be connected to a HDTV using the supplied component cables.

I put the camcorder to test on a recent trip to Norway, capturing approximately one hour of footage at high quality (HD-XP). To my surprise, I used just under 7GB of the 40GB hard drive and did not even have to charge the supplied battery during the trip (takes approx. 2hr 20 min to charge). The touchscreen LCD is a joy to work with and the camcorder itself is easy to hold when filming for long periods of time.

Now for the real stuff...picture quality. In my opinion, the picture quality produced by this camcorder is superb. When viewed on a HDTV, footage is sharp and clear, and colours are strikingly accurate. The focus of the camera is accurate exposure adjusts automatically to produce some stunning shots. The camcorder has 10x optical zoom which is excellent, especially for capturing those shots a little bit further away. Moreover, the camcorder records in Dolby Digital 5.1 sound, which is extremely good quality.

Footage can be uploaded to a computer for editing and playback using the supplied USB cable. However, be aware! This new AVCHD format requires quite a lot of processing for playback alone, never mind editing. If your computer is more than 18 months old, I wouldn't recommend trying to edit such footage. The supplied Picture Motion Browser software will play the footage but editing options are limited. The software will, however, allow you to burn the AVCHD footage to DVD for playback in a PlayStation 3 or convert the footage to MPEG-2 for standard DVD players. Obviously, this loses the HD quality, but having tested this option myself, I can confirm that the quality is still relatively good. At present, support for the .m2ts format (which the camcorder records in) is also limited. However, if you have a Sony VAIO computer released from 2006 onwards, you should have no problem importing the .m2ts files into Adobe Premiere Elements for editing, as the VAIO Edit Components software (v6.2) provides AVCHD support.

Differences between this cheaper model and the other two models (SR7E and SR8E) are, in my opinion, very little. As far as I am aware, both the SR7E and SR8E offer a viewfinder, larger hard drives (60GB and 100GB respectively) and the inclusion of 'Super SteadyShot' as opposed to just 'SteadyShot' which IS included in the SR5E. Unless you have an extremely shakey hand, I can't see there being much difference with the addition of Super SteadyShot. Obviously the larger hard disk drives and viewfinder do support the higher prices of these two models, but the SR5E is much cheaper and still offers approx. 5 hours and 20 minutes of high quality HD recording to its 40GB HDD.

Overall, this is an all-round winner. I would definately recommend this camcorder to anyone who is looking for a new model to capture memories in HD. Build quality is very good, both picture and sound quality are superb, and the unit is very easy to use. All of which you would expect from a Sony product.

As a final note.....a suitable bag for this camcorder is the LCS-VA20 which I purchased from Amazon. I would also recommend a larger battery, such as the NPF-H70, to compliment the supplied battery, should you be going on a longer trip with the camcorder.

Superb in every way
This is another superb camera from Sony. As soon as you take it out the box you know it's something special just by the way it feels, looks and sits in the palm of your hand. The build quality is superb, on many cameras you'd just get a normal resolution LCD screen to watch while you record but Sony have even installed a 2.7" HD screen. The docking station makes it easy to backup or transfer files and everything feels sturdy and made to last.

The video quality is just unbelievable, it is the highest quality you could imagine and looks even better than £2,000 TV studio cameras - no joking. Due to the x.v system the colours are lifelike, sharp and very bright. There's no ghosting, blurring or shaking at all thanks to the super steady shot, it's hard to see how this kind of quality could ever be improved upon. I filmed a cat walking on a fence which was a good 50 metres away, I had it on full zoom filming through a glass window and even then it was so clear you could see every whisker on his face. I have used it on a 40" and a 19" TV, it looks stunning on both. Thanks to super nightshot It's equally as good in total darkness for all those of you who do ghost hunts or film nightlife, you can see up to 20 metres away and the quality remains as stunning and clear as if it were day. With up to 28 hours of "film" in standard definition and 5 hours at the top quality I doubt you'll ever run out of room and it's so much easier than carrying round spare tapes with you everywhere you go.

There're lots of super features like the "old film" effect where you can make it look as though you're recording on an old black and white camera from the 1930's. There's steadyshot to get rid of shaking caused by your hand. You can use the camcorder as a normal digital camera too and get 9999 pictures on the hard drive and there's memory stick slot you can use too. The camera even has a flash, you can take them while still recording videos and the photos are as good as on a still camera thanks to the 4 megapixels. You can record in 5.1 surround sound which can really add a new dimension to your films and if all this sounds too much for you then just hit the "easy" button and the camera makes all the decisions for you! There's a cool slow motion feature so you can record live action at about half the speed, great fun!The list of features goes on and on.

Editing is a slight problem although it is getting easier as time goes by. In High definition mode it records in a new format called AVCHD (Advanced Video Codec High Definition). AVCHD is not very editing friendly, it won't load into about 90% of editing programs such as windows movie maker so I thoroughly recommend buying Sony Vegas 8 platinum for about £50 at the same time as this camera so you can edit footage. You'll need a powerful PC to edit HD footage (minimum 3.0 GHZ with 512mb ram and a 256mb graphics card) and even with that it takes 30 hours to publish a 1 hour film in 1080i. You could always just film in normal resolution though and you can easily edit that straight into any program.

Overall this is a top-notch camera.There are higher spec models in the range such as the SR7 and SR8 but they just have bigger hard drives and a very slightly better lens so this seems the pick of the bunch for me. I tried several hard drive high definition cameras before i bought this including JVC and Aiptek but this Sony model just blows everything else out the water.

Great Camcorder BUT one massive issue!!
Hi, firstly let me say that i totally agree with the other comments posted, yes this is a wonderful camcorder with the magnificent film quality , sound quality and build quality and the added bonus of a 40gb hard drive to store all your footage on - no need for tapes , dvd e.t.c. BUT... and this is one very big BUT (which i cant believe any of the other people which have reviewed this camcorder have not commented on) when you are recording , when the footage is being wrote to your hard drive (which is every 9 seconds) it makes 2 some times 3 little popping kind of noises (every 9 seconds) and it picks this up on the recording so when you have finished shooting and you playback you can hear this. Its not much of a issue if you are outside or if you are somewere where its noisy because you wont hardly notice this. but if you are like me and sometimes will be recording in more quieter enviroments it is terrbile. which is a massive shame because this is a fantastic camcorder. Massive design fault though in my oppinion putting the mic right next to the hard drive. I have now taken this camcorder back and replaced it with the Sony HDR-CX6EK (memory card) rather than hard drive. This is a much better camcorder. No silly popping noises. So to finish.. all in all yes the Sony HDR-S5E is a great little camcorder with some fantastic features its just a shame its been let down by a massive design fault! If you dont want silly 'popping noises' (caused by the hard drive) every 9 seconds in your filming then i would stay clear of this camcorder. I would advise the other people who have reviewed this camcorder to place there camcorder in a quiet room and put it on record or 1 minute or so then play it back, you will then know what im talking about! thanks.