JVC Everio GZ-HD3 review

JVC Everio GZ-HD3 Review

Reviewed by: Philip Ryan

Reviewed on: 25 October 2007

Performance
Another major difference between the HD7 and HD3 is that the HD7 had, albeit ineffectual, optical image stabilisation, while the HD3 relies on digital image stabilisation. Normally this might be seen as a drawback, but given the HD7's problematic stabilisation, you might actually get better results from the HD3's stabilisation, which was effective to about 60 per cent of the camcorder's 10x optical zoom range.

We wouldn't call the HD3's autofocus exceedingly fast, but it wasn't slow either. As was the case with its more-advanced cousin, the wind filter did a great job of neutralising the auditory effect of breezes when filming. We didn't run into the same battery problems as with the HD7, but if you're planning on shooting for extended periods of time, it always makes sense to buy an extra battery with a camcorder.

Image quality
In our tests, the HD3's 1440 CBR video looked extremely similar to the HD7's, which is to say that it looks good. It has the same interlace artefacts, horizontal jitter and stutter and blown-out highlights as the HD7, but colours look fairly accurate and well saturated. 

Conclusion
When the company introduced the Everio GZ-HD3, JVC suggested a price much less than the GZ-HD7, which doesn't make up for the loss of the focus ring or the other button-based manual controls. However, the HD7's price has dropped precipitously since its introduction, no doubt because of its image-stabilisation troubles.

Since it's hard to recommend a camcorder with stabilisation issues, we find it difficult to suggest the HD7 over the HD3. Ultimately, for image quality, you're probably better off opting for a tape-based HDV camcorder, such as Canon's HV20. If you really want a hard drive camcorder though, check out Sony's Handycam HDR-SR7.

Additional editing by Shannon Doubleday