Mini Laptop Review

- I can't get my panasonic mini DV to download onto my laptop?
I have a Panasonic Mini DV GS-17 and I have a Windows 7 HP laptop. I have windows live movie maker and the 2.0 version the films on my DV cassettes won't download from the camera because the PC will not recognize the camera as existing. However the USB input WILL work when I stream it on to VCL but the quality is rubbish and it doesn't seem to be able to record it so I know it is able to go down the USB cable, the 1394 cable doesn't work AT ALL. Can anyone help?

A You need a Firewire (IEEE1394) card so you can get the video off of your MiniDV tape camcorder. You have the best quality video, better that any HD camcorder that is under the $3500 mark, on that tape. You need to get the firewire card ($20) and a 4 pin to 6 pin firewire cable ($10) to get that high quality video into your computer. I use Pinnacle Studio HD Ultimate ($120) to import my video from my 3 MiniDV tape camcorders. It opens a screen that actually has camera controls on it, so when I hook my camcorder up by firewire, turn the camera on, open this program and click import, it is almost automatic and gives me the ability to control what is being imported.

- How can I transfer footage from a Mini DV Camcorder (Panasonic PV-GS85) to a Dell Pc or a Dell laptop?
It only came with a USB cable and I can only transfer still images through it. What can I do?

A Add a firewire (IEEE1394a, i.Link, DV - all the same thing) port to the computer - then, using a firewire cable and the camcorder in play/VCR/edit mode, connect the camcorder's DV port to the computer's firewire port with that firewire cable. Launch MovieMaker, specify the port, and "Capture" the video from the camcorder. USB will not work. USB-firewire converter/adapter will not work. As you have discovered, USB is used only for transferring stills from the memory card.