Canon MV930: Relentless eye

If you're like us, then nothing makes you happier than consumer electronics. In a world where drug abusers hold ultimate political sway and arms dealers masquerade as primary school teachers, what refuge is left but to sit in the calming glow of your 42-inch plasma watching widescreen footage from your Canon MV930 camcorder?

CNN vomits generic war footage in the kitchen and the morning paper's tyranny lies silenced by your refusal to open its shrink-wrapped horror, but you're pleasantly anesthetised by the true 16:9 aspect ratio and 25x optical zoom of Canon's latest masterpiece. Life is good, life is consumer, life is electronic.

In your concrete bastions, flanked by 24-hour CCTV, you marvel at the miniDV-based Canon's 69mm (2.7-inch) LCD. But, record all you like with the Canon, citizen. You yourself are catalogued by timecode and stored on reams of magnetic tape -- sitcom character to a security guard spilling Hobnob crumbs onto a sweat-sodden copy of Heat magazine. At least your footage shot with the MV930 will be crisp and vibrant, while CCTV footage will always remain just grainy enough to be utterly inadequate when identifying the assailant who bladed you in the goods lift.

You record your children on the local playground using the Canon's easy shooting and simple six-button control. Smiling to yourself, you lightly finger the stickers reading "800x digital zoom" and "9-point Artificial Intelligent Auto-focus" (AiAF). The £221 price tag belies how good this makes you feel. It doesn't get much better than this. -CS

Update: a full review of the Canon MV930 is now live.