Reviews

Home > Consumer Camcorders > Camcorder Reviews > Sony Camcorders > Sony MiniDV Camcorders > Quick Review Camcorders : Sony DCR-PC55

Quick Review Camcorders : Sony DCR-PC55

by Nick Hyacinthe
Published on September 07, 2005

The Sony DCR-PC55 is hailed as the smallest MiniDV camcorder to date. This model comes in several colors, providing you with the freedom to color coordinate your shooting experience. This camcorder is basically a fashion accessory, nothing more. It's an ornamental gadget that can easily slip into a purse or pocket until you are ready to play James Bond. It ships with an entry-level imager, 1/6” CCD, with 680K gross pixels. This camcorder is lacking in several areas, especially in performance, manual controls, and digital still capability. The DCR-PC55 is petite, but wanting; however, it does sport a mammoth 3” touch screen LCD.

This model had lackluster performance in several lighting conditions. In bright light settings, comparable to a bright sunny day, the DCR-PC55 produced dull images. The colors were muffled and lacked vibrancy.

In dimmer settings the DCR-PC55 had an atrocious performance. The images are barely usable. The camcorder produced noisy images with flat and lifeless colors. More affordable camcorders like the PV-GS19 and even the Sony DCR-HC21 have far better color representation than this camcorder.

Considering the camcorder’s horrid video performance in bright and low light conditions, its photos were gracefully mediocre. More affordable camcorders like the DCR-HC32 displayed images with considerably less grain and more potent colors. This camcorder only captures stills on a MemoryStick Duo at the standard 640 x 480 resolution. Other than the Slide Show Plus feature, which allows you to view a slide show presentation of captured images, the camcorder is void of any other still capability.

As with most entry-level Sonys, this camcorder is very easy to use. To make things even smoother, Sony has armed its 2005 line with an Easy Handycam mode. With the press of a button, the user can relinquish all control over the quality of the image to the camcorder. It is the ultimate autopilot for beginners and point-and-shooters. The camcorder's automatic controls perform well, responding quickly and adequately to varied settings. This is an area in which Sony typically does well.

Those that want to control the quality of their image will be annoyed by the lack of options, as well as the cumbersome means of accessing what little there is. The camcorder provides very few manual control settings; exposure, focuses, and white balance are the only offerings. Manual controls are initiated though the touch screen menu system. The user has to roam through a screen littered with menu options in order to make necessary adjustments. True F-stops and focal measurements are not provided, forcing you to eyeball the screen and guess at the proper adjustments. The camcorder is cumbersome to handle to begin with, and the addition of the bad navigation system, makes it difficult to make the necessary manual control adjustments.

The DCR-PC55 is a gimmick meant to appeal to the kid in all of us. Owning the smallest MiniDV camcorder is an appealing prospect, no doubt about it. It garners attention and lets us pretend that we are James Bond for a little while. Admittedly, it is fun have to have a recording device in your pocket at the ready; however, the novelty wears off as soon as you attempt to record images. You will look stunning with this camcorder, we promise. But your images will not share the same fate.

Sony DCR-PC55: THE BOTTOM LINE....
Rating: 148.30

Likes

-Design
-Ease of use
-LCD
-Portability
-Slide Show Function (VCR)

Dislikes

-Handling
-Button placement
-Manual Control
-Video performance
-Still Capability

Sony DCR-PC55 Compared to the...

Sony DCR-HC42 Rating:175.80	Sony DCR-HC32 Rating:182.70	Sony DCR-DVD203 Rating:167.12	Panasonic PV-GS150 Rating:220.69	Canon Optura 50 Rating:207.65

Better	Better	Better	Better	Better
-Ease of use -Still Capability -Optical Zoom Specs -Widescreen Mode -Slightly better Video Performance -Audio Dubbing -Flash	-Video Performance -Ease of use -Low Light Performance -Optical Zoom Specs -Handling -Flash	-Optical Zoom -Imager Specs -Zoom Specs -Viewfinder -Still Capability -Inputs	-Manual Control -Still Capability -Imager Specs -Video Performance -Low Light Performance -Audio -Widescreen Mode -Ports -Image Stabilization	-Manual Control -Still Capability -Imager Specs -Image Stabilizer -Handling -Still Capability -Built-in Flash -Ports
Equal	Equal	Equal	Equal	Equal
-Manual Control -Automatic Control -Audio -Image Stabilization	-Automatic Control -Manual Control -Still capability -Widescreen Mode -Ports -Image Stabilization	-Image Stabilization -Audio Dubbing -Accessory Shoe -No Flash -Automatic Control	-Optical Zoom Specs -No Flash	-Optical Zoom Specs -Audio Dubbing
Worse	Worse	Worse	Worse	Worse
-Portability -Low Light Performance -LCD -Wide Angle	-Wide Angle -LCD -Audio -Portability -Cold Accessory Shoe	-LCD -Portability -Ease of use	-LCD -Automatic Control -Ease of use -Wide Angle	-LCD -Cold Accessory Shoe -Portability -Ease of use

Area	Weight	Raw	Adj.	Poss.
Video Performance	2.00	4.50	9.00	20.00
Front	0.20	8.00	1.60	2.00
Right	0.30	4.00	1.20	3.00
Back	0.25	6.00	1.50	2.50
Left	0.20	7.00	1.40	2.00
Top	0.15	5.50	0.83	1.50
Automatic Control	0.50	9.00	4.50	5.00
Overall Manual Control	0.60	5.00	3.00	6.00
Zoom	0.75	6.00	4.50	7.50
Focus	0.70	5.00	3.50	7.00
Exposure	0.65	5.00	3.25	6.50
Shutter Speed	0.60	0.00	0.00	6.00
White Balance	0.55	8.00	4.40	5.50
Gain	0.50	0.00	0.00	5.00
Still Perfomance	1.20	8.00	9.60	12.00
VCR Mode	0.30	6.00	1.80	3.00
Low Light Performance	2.00	5.00	10.00	20.00
LCD / Viewfinder	0.60	9.00	5.40	6.00
Audio	1.00	4.00	4.00	10.00
Handling	1.25	7.00	8.75	12.50
Jacks / Ports / Plugs	0.80	6.50	5.20	8.00
Other Features	0.70	5.00	3.50	7.00
Value	1.25	3.00	3.75	12.50
Total (weighted)			90.67	170.50