SANYO Xacti VPC-HD2000 Black 1/2.5" CMOS 10x Optical Full HD Dual Camera - International Model, no US Warranty. Covered only under Newegg's 30 Day Return Policy

Pros: Great camera for the price. IMO its the best bang for the buck if you are looking for a camcorder around the $500 range. Has high quality resolutions (read the specs) and is easy to use.
Stills are great quality also.

Cons: Hard to hold still since it is shotgun. The stabilizer doesn't help a whole lot.
The manual focus and other prosumer-like camcorder features aren't easily accessible and aren't easy to use (actually things like the manual focus are useless with how it works)

If you are buying the camera for some of these better features, you might want to consider a more expensive one.

Other Thoughts: NO WARRANTY AT ALL! After some time the camcorder developed a vertical digital line across the left side of all the videos I take and it is quite annoying. It ruins most of my videos.
I've been trying to work something out with NewEgg but they haven't been much help and only offer the short return warranty which is only for 30 days I think.
I called the company and they said this version is a foreign version and therefore isn't covered unless I have an international warranty.

If you are going to buy this camera (which I would recommend), buy it somewhere else because NewEgg is selling foreign versions that don't have manufacturer warranties.

Pros: The cameras super8 pistol grip and thumb operated joystick makes it easy to handle. excellent video quality in well lit environments (especially with vibrant color mode applied). cool built in pop up flash for stills. jaw dropping 1920 X 1080 at 60 frames per second! with very good quality for such a small device! face chaser option. tiny 1x2" remote for 1 man operation. mp4 file output with great compression while preserving quality video footage.

Cons: the pop up light is only a still camera flash. picture becomes muddy in very low lighting conditions and at times (not often), the recording may display "line like" artifacts.

no SD Card, no HDMI cable included.

Other Thoughts: Id say, for the video quality I got from the Xacti, the money was well invested. adobe aftereffects/premiere cs4 have no problems importing the files.

Pros: Very good camera. Very good low light performance.

Cons: This is not the newest version. Look for the VPC-HD2000A (Notice the "A" for American) with iFrame support, which is almost the same price.

Pros: Great picture quality, microphone input and cold shoe for holding a mic on the top of the cam are really useful. Extremely good low light shooting, colors stay vibrant, even though there is a little noise on the image . Pistol grip is actually pretty comfortable and the included microphone is pretty darn good.

Cons: Switching between manual and autofocus for video shooting is challenging, and the autofocus system isn't that amazing. Also, cannot control gain for included mic, but can for external microphone.

Other Thoughts: Ordered it from DigitalRev 3 months ago since Newegg didn't carry it at the time (but really wanted to go with Newegg)

Pros: its cheap for a high definition camera.
it can record in slow motion.240fps and 600fps
for mac users its easy to edit with imovie at full-hr mode=1980x1080p at 60 frames per second.
you can get additional lenses for it. ie wide angle. half fish eye.
it comes with a dock to connect to your computer or an external harddrive. also hook up to a tv.
there is so much more but i cant think of it all.

Cons: the only cons i can think of is to transfer stuff of the memory card you either have to have a card reader or hook the dock up. because there is no usb output on the camera itself. but other than that nothing that i can think of.

Other Thoughts: i didnt get my xacti from newegg but i love it that i had to post about it.