Panasonic HC-X900 Camcorder Review

Sony HDR-CX700V Comparison

For the past couple of years, Sony has sat in third place behind Panasonic and Canon in our year-end camcorder awards. Sony's flagship model from 2011, the HDR-CX700V, was a very good camcorder (like most high-end models are), but it didn't do as well in our performance testing as the competition. As far as handling, features, and usability goes, the Sony HDR-CX700V was right up there with the best of them.

Sony tends to equip its camcorders with lots of special features and fun auto controls that are likely to attract pleasure from beginners or novice videographers. The CX700V does have a decent set of manual controls, but its not on the same level as the Panasonic HC-X900M. Like the X900M, Sony does include a 1080/60p record mode on the HDR-CX700V—and that's something you won't find on the Canon HF G10.

It is certainly possible that Sony's newest flagship camcorder, the HDR-CX760V, will do better in our tests than its predecessor, so we're excited to get the new camcorder into our labs. In a year where Canon didn't release any new high-end models and Panasonic provided just minor updates with the HC-X900M, the door may be open for Sony to climb to the top of our rankings.