Got a birthday coming up and would love to pick up a new camera and editing software. I've been doing some edits with a little cheapo Handycam using movie maker (
http://vimeo.com/user1838426/videos)... but want to get into HD footage. Price range for the software and camera needs to stay under $800. I have been looking at the Canon HV30 and the HF200... I currently work on a Dell Precision M2300 and use a 500GB external HD for storage.
Any advice or suggestions would be great.