Panasonic is claiming today the light-weight world title for the smallest 3CCD 1080i camera with their HDC-SD5. Looking at its 2.6 x 2.6 x 5.3-inch 0.75-pound package, it seems they may be right. In any case, coupled with its 1,920 x 1,080 60 fields-per-second recording on SD or SDHC cards, revamped image stabilization system and Leica Dicomar lenses, the HDC-SD5 is one of the sexiest camcorders in a while. Full specs and price after the jump.

Coming this September, $999.95 will get you:

Signal system 1080 lines, 60 fields Weight (w/o Battery) 0.75 lb Dimensions (W x H x D) 2.6 x 2.6 x 5.3 inch

Image sensor
1/6-inch CCD image sensor
Total pixels: 560 k x 3

Effective pixels
Motion Picture: 520 k x 3(16:9)
Still Picture: 520 k x 3 (16:9)

Lens
Auto iris, 10x power zoom
F 1.8 to 2.8 (f = 3.0 to 30.0mm)
35mm equivalent
Motion picture: 42.9 to 429 mm (16:9)
Still picture: 42.9 to 429 mm (16:9)
Filter diameter 37 mm
Zoom 10x optical zoom, 25/700x digital zoom

Monitor 2.7'' wide LCD monitor (approx. 300 k pixels)
Microphone Stereo Zoom Microphone
Speaker Dynamic type
White balance adjustment Auto / White Set / Outdoor / Indoor (with IR sensor)
Standard illumination 1,400 lux

Minimum required illumination 5 lux (1/30 low light mode) (1 lux in Magic pix mode)

High-speed shutter 1/30 - 1/8000 (Motion Picture), 1/30-1/8000 (Still Picture)

Recording media SD Memory Card, SDHC Memory Card

USB Card reader / writer function ( No copyright protection support)
High-Speed USB (USB2.0) (miniAB)
Pict Bridge-compliant
Flash Available flash range: approx. 1m to 2.5m
Standard accessories AC Adaptor, Battery Pack, IR Remote Controller, USB Cable,
component Cable, AV-Cable, CD-ROM (HD Writer Ver 2.0)

Motion pictures
Compression MPEG4-AVC/H.264 (AVCHD standard compliant)
Transfer rate HG: approx. 13 Mbps (CBR)/ HN: approx. 9 Mbps (VBR)/
HE: approx. 6 Mbps (VBR)
Picture size HG: 1920 x 1080, HN/HE: 1440 x 1080
Audio compression Dolby Digital (Dolby AC3)/ 2ch

Still pictures
Compression JPEG (DCF/Exif2.2 compliant)
Picture size 1920 x 1080 / 2.1MEGA (16:9)
HE: approx. 6

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