Which HD camera for car videos?

[batmanbegins]

I'm a novice at HD video recording/editing but want some recommendations to take some videos of my cars.

I tried a GoPro HD (£250) - great mounts inc suction cup and stickers for outside of the car, but so called 1080p HD video quality wasn't great at all, presumably due to the size of the tiny lens?

I also bought a Drift HD170 (£150) which was similar average video quality to the GoPro HD, but figure its worth keeping as its easy to mount to a helmet etc.

Whilst the GoPro HD is good for taking exterior videos, from my experience with picture quality issues, it's clear those who are posting videos on YouTube of them driving their cars are using something a lot better. Someone recommended the Sony HDRCX700 http://www.hispek.com/sony/hard-disk-drive-and-sd-... - at £900, am I going to get "proper" HD video quality? The only downside is I can't imaging mounting this on the windscreen with a suction mount (camera too big?)

Is there anything inbetween this and the GoPro HD anyone can recommend that is small enough to mount but offers good enough video quality?

Edited by batmanbegins on Saturday 15th October 10:53

[GetCarter]

I find the GoPro to be excellent quality in HD

This is squashed to buggery for web, but looks stunning on my 42" HDTV

http://www.stevecarter.com/R5005.wmv

[CHIEF]

Drift are brilliant and have a lot of advantages over the GoPro - A LCD screen as one.
Look at their videos online and view it in HD they are in my opinion just as good as GoPro - The only advantage of the GoPro is they are properly fully submersable although the Drift are waterproof up to a metre deep.

I prefer Drift but obviously i am biased.

[Magic919]

Look at Hague if you want to suction mount a larger camera. I use one with a Sony HD cam.

[Speed addicted]

You get an LCD backpack screen for the go-pro now. I'd go for the go-pro just for the vareity of mounting options and the submersable housing.

[baz7175]

Speed addicted said:

You get an LCD backpack screen for the go-pro now. I'd go for the go-pro just for the vareity of mounting options and the submersable housing.

Seconded, I actually have the backpack on mine and it proves invaluable

[mrmr96]

baz7175 said:

Speed addicted said:

You get an LCD backpack screen for the go-pro now. I'd go for the go-pro just for the vareity of mounting options and the submersable housing.

Seconded, I actually have the backpack on mine and it proves invaluable

Same here.

Look around and there's a LOT of 'pros' using the gopro. (Top Gear, 5th Gear, Mythbusters all do, plus most of the drift teams and extreme sports dudes seem to use them.) I chose a GoPro because it seemed to be the 'iPhone' (or indeed the TomTom) of the action camera world... by which I mean it's the most popular so it gets the most users and most accessories and this drives more users. I'm happy to go with the wisdom of the crowd, which I admit also makes me a 'sheep' but quite often the crowd is right.