Sony Handycam DCR-SR300

The 2.7 inch screen isn't big enough to accommodate more than about four virtual buttons per page, which makes the menu system cumbersome. Sony does a decent job of designing the menus given these constraints, but other manufacturers methods of navigation namely, joysticks tend to provide a better overall experience. Plus, with the LCD as the only way to frame your shots, a joystick could prevent the buildup of fingerprints on the screen.

Of course, some people actually prefer the touch screen interface, so if you're not familiar with it, you should try before you buy.

Since the finder is gone, Sony was able to create a nice, smooth shape to the right side of the camera and gain some real estate for buttons.

Unfortunately, they didn't make use of this extra room and instead left controls for functions such as Backlight, NightShot, and Easy mode on the left side behind the LCD screen.

The new positioning of the mode switch and zoom rocker is very nice it lets your fingers fall in a more natural way across the camera body and makes finer adjustments on the variable speed zoom rocker easier to perform. Like most of Sony's consumer camcorders, the DCR-SR300 includes four buttons on the left bezel of the LCD screen for menu access, zoom in and out, and record start and stop.

A notch above the standard Zeiss branded counterparts found in some less expensive Sony models, the 10x optical Carl Zeiss T* zoom lens covers a healthy range. Sony's Super SteadyShot hybrid image stabilization keeps your footage relatively shake free across the zoom range, though you'll likely still want to use a tripod when zoomed to the 10x maximum.

I was pleased with the built in microphone, which can create a faux Dolby 5.1 surround soundtrack and can be supplemented with an optional accessory mic (that can mount in the SR300's hot shoe) if you want a dedicated mic for the center channel. Note, though, that there's no minijack mic input, so you can't use a third party microphone with the DCR-SR300. If mics aren't important to you, you can also use the hot shoe to add a video light.