Panasonic's SDR-H80 / HDC-TM300 camcorders break cover

Panasonic's press event has yet to go down here at CES, but two camcorders have already surfaced on the outfit's Japanese portal. The entry-level SDR-H80 houses a 60GB hard drive, 2.7-inch LCD monitor, SD recording, face detection capabilities and optical image stabilization. The entirely more riveting HDC-TM300 comes with a 9.15-megapixel sensor to capture Full HD footage, and the internal 32GB hard drive (coupled with the SD / SDHC slot) should give you plenty of room. This one captures in MPEG-4 AVC / H.264, and reportedly it even supports 5.1-channel audio recording. Mum's the word on a US price or release, but hopefully we'll be hearing more real soon.

[Via iTechNews]

Read - H80
Read - TM300

[Ian @ Jan 7th 2009 1:38PM]

I wonder if they feature the same useless smeary 24p mode and over saturated cartoon color as their predecessors?

[Gad Get @ Jan 7th 2009 2:26PM]

Are you sure that "hard drive" isn't an SSD?

[LloydChiro @ Jan 7th 2009 2:33PM]

Is that a focusing ring on the lens? That's cool, even though it's likely a drive-by-wire type of control--not a good feel compared to regular lens control, I've read.

I can't tell, but hopefully it has an accessory shoe for a Rode Videomic.

[FILA @ Jan 7th 2009 3:04PM]

i like these to, but it sucks to be poor

[AlthalusTheThief @ Jan 7th 2009 8:46PM]

Just had a look at the translated website there are 4 models, HS300, HS200, TM300, SD200

HS300 with a 120GB HDD and SD Card
HS200 with an 80GB HDD and SD Card
TM300 with a 32GB SSD (as far as i can gather from the google translated Japanese) and SD Card
SD200 with SD Card only

they're pretty much all have very similar features, the HS200 and SD200 lacking a couple of features, the HS300 and the TM300 being the top models both basically the same camera but one with SSD Storage instead of a HDD

no 720p recording as far as i can tell.