Amongst Canon’s new line of ZR camcorders, the ZR830 finds itself between a rock and a hard place. It is the middle child, wedged between the ZR800, which includes a microphone jack, and the ZR850, which offers better video quality and larger stills. Sadly, the ZR830 was fed table scraps and grew up to live a no-frills life of mediocrity. Let’s find out why.

The ZR830’s 1/6-inch imager is capable of producing 680,000 gross pixels, which is pretty standard amongst the vast majority of entry-level camcorders. In bright light, the ZR830’s colors appeared saturated, yet remained strong in the greens, blues, and reds. There was a noticeable lack in sharpness, though, and the ZR830’s step-up sibling, the ZR850, showed much less noise and saturation. In low light, the ZR830’s image was overcast with uneven, washed-out colors. The ship truly sank, however, at our lowest light setting, as the ZR830’s once saturated and vibrant image was swallowed up in an ominous sea of darkness.

You can’t expect much from an entry-level camcorder in terms of solid construction, and the ZR830 is no exception. It has a thin, low-strung hand strap attached to the tape hatch, placing an added strain on the hatch door. In addition, the ZR830 must be removed from a tripod in order to swap out a tape, sacrificing time and continuity. The viewfinder looks neglected, wallowing in its non-retractable, short, hard plastic design. The ZR830 just feels cheap, but what would you expect in this price range? You do get an LCD-mounted joystick, responsive zoom toggle, and sliding lens enclosure, so don’t bust out the Kleenex just yet.
 
Canon’s ZR line is equipped with a respectable array of automatic and manual controls. Slipping the ZR830 into Easy (auto) mode disables all controls, aside from the zoom, as the camcorder drifts into autopilot. Even in Easy mode, you can access the Auto Slow Shutter On/Off, Digital Zoom, Zoom Speed, Widescreen, and Self Timer. When the ZR830 is shifted into P (manual) mode, the gates to the manual focus, exposure, shutter speed, white balance, and gain are opened. A gamut of AE, or “Scene modes” are available, including Sports, Spotlight, and Fireworks.
 
The ZR830 records directly to MiniDV tapes. At the moment, DV is superior to other formats such as DVD, HDD, and AVCHD because of its high data transfer rate of 25Mbps. In addition, MiniDV tapes are cheaper and provide ample amounts of recordable time on a single tape. An HDD camcorder can store a lot of footage, but requires the shooter to repeatedly dump the footage on a computer to clear out more space.
 
For $299, you could have a mediocre entry-level DV camcorder with no microphone input (the step-down ZR800 does) and subpar video quality. The ZR850 offers a slightly better image, bigger stills, and a video light. Is it worth it? If you’re shackled within the entry-level price range, look online for a Canon Elura100, last year’s Camcorder of the Year from CamcorderInfo.com. It’s still available, and cheaper than the ZR830.