First,

Thank you for the forum, I have been looking for something like this for a while!

My question: In Feb 2003, I purchased a TRV 740 from Sears, as they were closing out the model. Sadly, after a big mess up by Sears repair people, I was in a box. I needed a Digital 8 camcorder for a project I doing, and I was out of time. The Customer Service rep was very gracious, and said they would trade for an "equivalent model", since it was their mistake. But, since the top of the line Sony these days is the TRV 350, I had a big decision to make.

In short, what that meant is that I got a new TRV 350 to replace the 740. Is it a good deal? How much did I lose in features by the trade? The lens according to specs is not the same, and the still resolution is worse with the 350. The outside is also not as nice, with no "infolithium" LCD.

It is still in the box, so if I am on the short end, the 350 can head to ebay, and a new 740 or 840 could head my way. The feature sets of the 2002 vintage 740 seem the same as the 2003 350.

Should I keep the 350, or dump it for a 740/840? And no, I am not interested in DV camcorders.

Thanks for the help, and reading the long post!

The TRV 350 is equivalent (but not quite equal to) to the TRV340 from the same model year as the TRV740.

However, based on the specs in the online manual at Sony's website, both the TRV350 and TRV340 had better zoom capability and better low light capabilty.

Zoom capability:
The 740 has 15x optical zoom, 420x digital zoom
The 340 has 25x optical zoom, 700x digital zoom
The 350 has 20x optical zoom, 700x digital zoom.

Low light capability:
The 740 has 7 lux minimum
The 340 has 4 lux minimum (better than the 740)
The 350 has 4 lux minimum also.

The 740 has a 1/4" CCD and 1,070,000 pixels
The 350 has a 1/6" CCD and 460,000 pixels (same as the 340).
As I undestand it, in spite of the fact that the 740 has a larger CCD than the 340 and 350, the fact that the 350 and 340 have fewer pixels/square inch than the 740 accounts for the better low light performance of the 340 and 350.

The 740 has a headphone jack, the 350 does not.

Both have a 2.5" LCD.

Even though the still resolution is better on the 740 this may contribute to the lower light performance as explained above - the 740's resolution is still not close to using a separate digital still camera.

With the 350 you can see the inforlithium battery status on the LCD or in the viewfinder by pushing the battery button on top of the 350.

Since the 740 was a higher model than the 340, I don't know what features on the 740 caused you to select it but without going through the manual in detail, the above are the most obvious good and bad points of the 740 and 350 based on the specifications.

cwhiddon ---

If you are critical about sound, as to find a correct placement for an external mike for example , then opt for the 740 as it has a headphone jack which the other model does not have