Given the current popularity of DVD camcorders and the demise of HD-DVD, you could be forgiven for thinking that the world would be beating a path to Blu-ray’s door. That’s patently not the case. There are just two Blu-ray toting camcorders available in the UK, of which this is one (the more expensive DZ-BD7HE, also from Hitachi, being the other).

It’s not hard to see why. Compared with the sylph-like AVCHD camcorders here, the DZ-BD70E is something of a monster. Its considerable bulk is barely softened by the stylish silver colour scheme that at least makes it look sophisticated and hi-tech.

Having said that, the idea of using a physical disc at all seems like a throwback to an earlier era. The clunking, whirring and whizzing the DZ-BD70E makes as you start it up even reminded us of the old Sony MVC-FD85 Mavica. And tracking down 8cm BD-RE discs for recording can be frustrating. Your best bet is to buy a job lot online, although at £25 a pop, flash memory alternatives start to look a lot more enticing.

So what’s to love? Like the other HD camcorders here, the DZ-BD70E enables you to shoot 1,920 x 1,080i footage. The big plus, supposedly, is that you can take a movie you’ve recorded on a 8cm Blu-ray disc, drop it into your Blu-ray player and then watch it straight back on your HD TV.

What we don’t love, though, is the picture quality. Although the DZ-BD70E serves up decent enough results in well-lit scenes, the built-in auto settings have a tendency to over-compensate. It also copes badly with low-light levels, and the top-mounted microphone picks up noticeable motor whine and disc clunks from within the camera body.

Most damning is that the DZ-BD70E refuses to be recognised by iMovie ’08. We had to resort to Hitachi’s own ImageMixer 3 HD Edition for BD software running on Windows Vista on a Boot Camp partition.

In fairness, Hitachi says the DZ-BD70E isn’t Mac compatible. This is Apple’s fault – it doesn’t offer Blu-ray support in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, despite being a founder member of the Blu-ray Disc Association. Should this situation change we’ll take another look at it.