My two big bugbears with our Canon MV600i DV camcorder were (i) its size and (ii) the tape motor noise (which always seemed to intrude on any quiet scene). So when it packed up and I was looking for a new camcorder I was keen to get something smaller which recorded on to an HDD or memory card.So I came across the Sanyo Xacti VPC-HD1A which is larger than a compact digital stills camera but way smaller than the Canon (it fits quite neatly onto my belt). It records to SD and SD HC cards for both video (up to 720p) and 5 megapixel stills. A 4Gb card will give you about an hour of video.
This isn't going to be a camera for everyone (especially left handed people) but it does everything I need and it means I'm happy to carry it around. And that's the most important thing for me; there were so many times that I missed opportunities to record things simply because I couldn't be bothered to lug the Canon around. Of course the limited capacity does mean you need to swap out cards but how many times have you actually shot continuously for more than an hour without any opportunity for a break?
The HD1A has now been superseded by the HD2 which takes 7 megoapixel stills.
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