Sony DSR-390P Camcorder - Testing - Butterflies and Botanical Garden 

Thank you very much Steve! Exactly, that is a Sony DSR-DU1 Video Disk Unit, which helps to bypass the ever more unreliable tape deck 😀 I got it in 2013 and it still works perfectly today. Actually I´m looking forward to using it in a special recording setup for my "new" Sony DXC-3000 Camera, which I hope to show soon.

@@sirvivor_1974 Cool. I've seen the HDD recorders listed in brochures of the time but I haven't seen one anywhere. I'll look forward to seeing the DXC-3000.

You are perfectly right there is a big difference in overall image quality. Actually it´s mostly hardware related. The DSR-390P´s CCD Block delivers 752 x 582 effective pixels while the DSR-450WSP´s has 1064 x 980. So the 450 is almost an HD Camera hampered by the SD-Video recording section. However that means there is plenty of room for oversampling, which is the best option when dealing with a low resolution final output like DVCAM. Still I would be interested to see if someone can provide better results from the DSR-390. I tried to optimize the menu picture settings but I might easily have missed something. Regarding the MSU Deinterlacer, it´s excellent even when compared to QTGMC, check it out.

@@sirvivor_1974 Yes, the effective number of pixels is much higher than what can be obtained from a camera with the SMPTE 259 standard. For example, the DVW-970/P uses an HD CCD, but the maximum quality can only be extracted through SDI (SMPTE 259). I have two Sony BVP-E10WSP with CCU and WF, but unfortunately, I don't have triax for them. I would like to test them (They are some of the best SD broadcast cameras. Among studio models, the only better one is the BVP-E30/WSP). Regarding the image quality, I meant to say that there is no pixel stretching like in the DSR-450WSP, and for that reason, these ones with native 4:3 should have a sharper image.

@@k.m.1524 Great to hear you could maybe test your BVP-E10WSP sometime! It indeed looks great and seems to feature progressive scan (PsF), which is really nice for a camera from 2001. Recently I was lucky to obtain a Sony DVW-970P in near mint condition for almost no money, crazy times... Additionally I got the fitting SDI-Out Board. Hope I´ll be able to test it sometime. I don´t yet have any experince with SDI though, so maybe I´ll come up with some questions😀

@@sirvivor_1974 I'd be happy to help if you need. Could you provide me with your mail so that we can discuss it there? The fact that it has progressive segmented frame (psf) is not anything special, even the Digital Betacam and DVW-700/P had it back in 1993. I also found a DVW-970P + WF in the original box for 130 Euros recently, but unfortunately, I didn't buy it. I've seen quite a few for sale recently around the 100 Euro mark. Additionally, I found a DVW-790WS/P for 120 Euros, also in excellent cosmetic condition, but I didn't purchase that one either.

@@k.m.1524 Hi, you can contact me: sirvivor@mail.com Cool, I didn´t know the Sony DVW-700 Digital Betacam could do that. It is not mentioned in the brochure or manual therefore I assumed it wasn´t featured. Right, the DVW-970 can be had extremely cheap, but I found the ones with the SDI-Board installed more costly. The SDI out makes the camera much more useful if you don´t want to use an extra Digital Betacam player, like me. At least I hope it will work that way, we´ll see😀