Digital Cameras
There are three brands of camera to buy for school use - Canon, Canon and Canon
I know dealers will tell you other brands are just as good but these are the reasons I believe Canon is best;
1) Ruggedness - Yeah I know many are made of plastic (despite their looks) but they just seem to take the knocks better than others.
2) Simple menus - things are easy to find / operations like setting up Macro, changing resolution are just easy to find and quick to accomplish - very important in a busy ICT classroom
3) They use common SD cards and most just use AA batteries - simple to find replacements / cheap to update.
4) They connect quickly and easily (especially to Macs) and don't have the same connection issues as others - no need to eject after downloading
5) They use the more common style of USB connector which means cables are easier to find
I know dealers will tell you other brands are just as good but these are the reasons I believe Canon is best;
1) Ruggedness - Yeah I know many are made of plastic (despite their looks) but they just seem to take the knocks better than others.
2) Simple menus - things are easy to find / operations like setting up Macro, changing resolution are just easy to find and quick to accomplish - very important in a busy ICT classroom
3) They use common SD cards and most just use AA batteries - simple to find replacements / cheap to update.
4) They connect quickly and easily (especially to Macs) and don't have the same connection issues as others - no need to eject after downloading
5) They use the more common style of USB connector which means cables are easier to find
Video Cameras
There are lots of different types and many different brands. This time, I'm going with Sony. While I've used a lot of Canons, I've also experienced a lot of trouble with dead power adaptors. As far as I am aware, Canon video cameras are only services in one place and it often takes quite a while to get them repaired and returned. There is excellent service for Sony video cameras in Christchurch and return times are excellent
As for type of recording, I still prefer tape as it is the easiest to use with groups in a classroom - you can have different tapes for different groups, and the picture quality of tape has yet to be equalled by any other medium. While there can be issues with tape transport mechanisms being damaged by children (and I've damaged one myself dropping the camera while the tape door was open, even the cheaper model Sony's use the same transport mechanisms as their high quality cameras and are usually in stock. It was still cheaper to get the one I damaged repaired than replace the camera.
Hard drive cameras have reliability issues and I would avoid.
DVD cameras cause major issues with downloading to use with iMovie etc. If they have not been finalized, (the finishing process a DVD goes through when you have finished editing it) the format your movie is written in, on the DVD, will not be readable by you computer.
If you do finalize it before taking it out of the camera, you will be able to watch it with DVD player, but not edit it in iMovie without a fair amount of work with additional software.
Memory stick recording is the only other option, and while large recording times are possible, it is still not yet up to the quality of tape.
As for type of recording, I still prefer tape as it is the easiest to use with groups in a classroom - you can have different tapes for different groups, and the picture quality of tape has yet to be equalled by any other medium. While there can be issues with tape transport mechanisms being damaged by children (and I've damaged one myself dropping the camera while the tape door was open, even the cheaper model Sony's use the same transport mechanisms as their high quality cameras and are usually in stock. It was still cheaper to get the one I damaged repaired than replace the camera.
Hard drive cameras have reliability issues and I would avoid.
DVD cameras cause major issues with downloading to use with iMovie etc. If they have not been finalized, (the finishing process a DVD goes through when you have finished editing it) the format your movie is written in, on the DVD, will not be readable by you computer.
If you do finalize it before taking it out of the camera, you will be able to watch it with DVD player, but not edit it in iMovie without a fair amount of work with additional software.
Memory stick recording is the only other option, and while large recording times are possible, it is still not yet up to the quality of tape.
TV / video equipment
I have to admit to being a huge Panasonic fan. They spend more than any other company on research and development, and while there are other brands that will have better quality pictures, many brands have poor support and if you have equipment over 12 months old, the chances of getting parts and therefore your equipment repaired is not so good. Any good service man will affirm the reliability and quality of Panasonic equipment.
Photocopiers
In the last few years, Ricoh has come from nowhere to take a significant share of the photocopier market in schools. And it is no surprise...
With a life long interest in all audio equipment (begun when helping my father do projection work with old Bell and Howell projectors!) I have observed what has happened when new photocopiers have been installed in schools - the frustration - the swearing, time wasted deleting user account boxes on the photocopier that have got clogged up with documents that can't be printed, etc, etc
You just don't notice this as much with Ricoh. Teacher's find them user friendly and just get on and get things done.
From a technical point of view, they are easy to set up on Macs or PCs (their technicians actually KNOW how to set them up on Macs!) and installing drivers and the help and support from Ricoh is excellent.
Using the web interface to sort out the in-built address book (user accounts) is a breeze and things just tend to be more logical
With a life long interest in all audio equipment (begun when helping my father do projection work with old Bell and Howell projectors!) I have observed what has happened when new photocopiers have been installed in schools - the frustration - the swearing, time wasted deleting user account boxes on the photocopier that have got clogged up with documents that can't be printed, etc, etc
You just don't notice this as much with Ricoh. Teacher's find them user friendly and just get on and get things done.
From a technical point of view, they are easy to set up on Macs or PCs (their technicians actually KNOW how to set them up on Macs!) and installing drivers and the help and support from Ricoh is excellent.
Using the web interface to sort out the in-built address book (user accounts) is a breeze and things just tend to be more logical
CD, DVD media for recording
There are lots of brands out there and different brands seem to work better with different optical drives (the CD/DVD drive in your computer that reads and writes CDs and DVDs) so a little experimentation is often needed. The brands I have had the best experiences with are TDK Gold, Imation and Verbatim.
While CD and DVD formats are no longer as important as in the early days of CD and DVD players, buying - R (CD - R, DVD -R) has the widest range of players that use that format. No longer so important but good to be on the safe side.
While CD and DVD formats are no longer as important as in the early days of CD and DVD players, buying - R (CD - R, DVD -R) has the widest range of players that use that format. No longer so important but good to be on the safe side.