Canon Vixia HG21 – Same As HF11 But With Hard Disk
Sum and Substance:
Thumbs Up:
Huge 120 GB hard drive, attractive looks, good video quality, eye level view finder.
Thumbs Down:
None in particular.
Inside the Trunk:
Infrared remote, included accessories – Stereo video cable, USB cable, Component cable, Wireless controller, Compact power adapter, Battery pack, USB cable, A/V cable, Component video cable.
The Whiz Kid Speaks:
HG21 has a 200 x digital zoom, 3.3 mega pixels, has 1/3.2 CMOS optical sensor, minimum shutter speed is ½ second and maximum shutter speed is 1/2000 second. Shooting programs include snow, sunset, spotlight, sports mode, beach, fireworks, night mode, portrait mode. The camcorder has 2.7 inch TFT LCD display.
White balance presets include shade, daylight, tungsten light, cloudy, fluorescent and Fluorescent light (warm white).
Exposure modes are Aperture-priority, Shutter-priority, Automatic, Program, Manual.
Camcorder Sensor Resolution is 3.3 mega pixels, Camcorder Effective Video Resolution is 2.07 mega pixels, photographs are stored in JPEG format, the options for resolutions are JPEG 640 x 480, JPEG 848 x 480, JPEG 1440 x 1080, JPEG 1920 x 1080, JPEG 2048 x 1536
Zoom lens is – 4.8 mm – 57 mm – F/1.8-3.0, it has a 4.8 mm – 57 mm focal length and lens aperture is F/1.8-3.0, has 12x optical zoom, minimum focal length is 4.8 mm and maximum focal length is 57mm
Additional features on the camcorder are Dolby Digital AC-3 (2 channel) recording, Takes photos while movie recording, RGB primary color filter, Backlight compensation, USB 2.0 compatibility, Progressive scanning, Accessories hot shoe, PictBridge support, Histogram display, Direct print
Connectors include HDMI, headphones, USB, microphone, component video output, composite video/audio output. There is also a slot for SD memory card.
The camcorder is powered by li-ion rechargeable battery and the camcorder comes with a one year warranty.
Razzle Dazzle:
Canon Vixia HG21 looks quite similar to Vixia HF11 but the 2 have different internals. HG21 is three inches high, 3.1 inches wide, 5.4 inches deep and weighs about 17.6 ounces. The buttons are slightly altered in this device but both of the devices look more or less the same.
Inside Dope:
HG21 is another simple to use HD camcorder from Canon. It is just like HF11 from the same manufacturer however the HG21 records to internal memory and the earlier model records on hard drive. If you don’t mind the weight and a shorter battery life then get a hard drive based camcorder or else go for flash drive based ones. Flash drives are now preferred all over but they come at a higher price.
So apart from the storage medium is there anything else different in this product? Will this make a good buy? The answer is yes. HG21 has a 120 GB hard drive and HF11 model had a 32 GB internal flash memory. We were glad with the 11 hours rated battery life for the camcorder. HG21 also has a view finder which is now becoming rare.
The controls are all located on bezel of the LCD which can be a bit difficult to use, especially the five way joystick button. The screen is 2.7 inch big which is neither smaller nor bigger as compared to most camcorders in this range.
The camcorder records at maximum of 24 MBPS and the minimum is 5 MBPS. The latter will hold about 45 hours, fifteen minutes’ clips. In all there are five options for quality which we thought was a bit too much. The camcorder is capable of recording full HD and the maximum resolution is 1920X1080 or 1080p.
We typically find a 10x lens in such camcorders but we were glad to find a 12x zoom in this product. The features in this camcorder are quite similar to what you see in prosumer units of Canon. For video, the features include aperture- and shutter-priority exposure modes, video light, options for 3 fixed/1 variable zoom speed, wind-screen filter and Instant AF. You can also capture videos at 24 or 30 fps and 60i. For photographs there are options like flash, metering, burst and exposure bracketing.
The performance of this device is great the focus is quick in both bright and dim conditions. Videos look nicely saturated, exposed and sharp. There is a lot of noise from low light videos but it is not uncommon. When viewed on a big HDTV, the 24MBS and 17 MBPS videos look quite similar. Photographs quality is good too. The microphone records audio quite well, when shooting videos.
On the camcorder, you get connectors and ports set mini-HDMI or component to connect the device to HDTV, USB port for copying the videos to a computer and mic and mini headphone jacks.
Nitty Gritty:
Except for touch screen interface, Canon Vixia HG21 has all the features that Sony HDR-SR11 has. This product also goes in to competition with HF11 which has flash based memory and gives same performance. Presence of hard disk makes this camcorder cheaper than those flash based memory units. Pick this one up if you want a bigger memory and are not too fond of touch screen.
