Digital Home Thoughts: Canon's HV20: A High-Definition, Vista-Certified Delight

What's in the Box
Canon's out of box experience, no matter which product you buy, has always been on the basic side. Looking at the box and the packaging, you feel more like you're unpacking a box of light bulbs than a $1000 piece of technology. Canon needs to look to a company such as HTC: if they can have a smartphone phone costing half as much be so much fun to unpack, I know Canon can do better. Here's what you get in the box:

• HV20 Camcorder;
• BP-2L13 Battery Pack (with Terminal Cover);
• Compact Power Adaptor;
• Stereo Video Cable;
• Wireless Controller;
• USB Cable;
• Component Cable;
• Digital Video Solution Disc for Windows and Macintosh.

I normally prefer to see a separate charger for the battery, but in this case charging the battery while it's attached to the camera didn't prove to be a hassle like it is with digital still cameras. As you can tell from that list, all the basics are there except for a Firewire cable. I can understand printer manufacturers not giving you a USB cable with a $99 printer, but if you're dropping $1000 on a video camera, it should come with absolutely everything you need - there's no excuse for not including a cable that would likely cost Canon 75 cents to buy. I've dealt with consumers and video cameras a lot over the years, and because a USB cable is included, but not a Firewire cable, many are under the impression that you can pull video off the camera using USB. Needless frustration could be avoided if Canon just ponied up and included a Firewire cable.

The wireless controller is a standard affair, offering one-button start/stop recording, zoom in/out, stop, play, rewind, etc. The included component cable is a nice touch, but an HDMI cable would be even better - we are talking about a high-definition camera here, and like the Firewire cable, including it should be standard when buying a camera that costs this much. The "Digital Video Solution Disk" seems to have been named by someone with a strong sense of irony: it includes no video editing software, only Canon's ZoomBrowser EX 5.7 software (which is only useful with photos) and a TWAIN driver for using the camera as a live video capture device (think expensive Web cam). Although the camera will work just fine with the HD-friendly version of Windows Movie Maker included with Windows Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate, I would have preferred to see some form of video editing application included - though with those versions of Vista now including a DVD burning application, this is less of an issue.