I originally had a JVC GR-HD1 and have probably a hundred tapes of footage I shot over 3 years.
Last fall I "upgraded" to Canon HV-20 and have been thrilled with the camera.

Not what I'm wondering is, do I need to keep the JVC camera if I ever want to get anything off the old tapes? Or can any HDV camera output over firewire the contents of any HDV tape regardless of manufacturer ie Sony, Canon, JVC? Kind of like you can play any MiniDV tape in any MiniDV camcorder.

I had firewire go out on JVC HD10. I bought an open box Canon HV10, hoping it would play my existing tapes. It did not, so I returned it, and I had to get the HD10 repaired just to capture existing tapes. I take it your HV20 would not play them either.

I just got a Panny SD5 with REMOVEABLE SD card. An inexpensive card reader can do the job. I'll not have that happen again.

Sounds like you have a pretty significant capture job to do.

Good luck,

That is something to think about in terms of archiving then. Maybe tape isn't the way to go, who knows if your camera will still be working years down the road or what the technology will be.

In general will any 1080i HDV camcorder play tapes from another 1080i HDV camcorder? I think that would be Sony & Canon right now.