I need to pick up a camcorder as the old one stopped working. Any recommendations or "don't buy this piece of junk" for the 10-12K budget. I'm just looking for an all around use basic camcorder.

Might not be what you want but I bought a few months ago a Canon PowerShot SX20IS, this is a 12 MP still camera and that is the purpose I bought it for. However it does such a good job with video I don't bother with my video camera. Price was just a little over your budget but not much.

was your old camera a DV camera? And if so do you still need to be able to watch and edit the old tapes?

If so I'd go for any of the old canon DV range - they're still great.

If you're going for something more modern - hard disk based I'd go for the Canon or Sony camcorders. Both small, compact, great quality. My mum bought a panasonic - top of the line one a couple of years ago and it's fidgety and doesn't always get the best results in dim lighting. Stick with the Canon or Sony and you're on to a winner I'd say

Thanks for the info. Funny I went into powerbuy and the two cameras we looked at we went to buy and we got "sorry, have to order from bangkok", so they lost a sale. Ended up just buying more memory and will use the digital camera for video tomorrow.