DaFireMedic
Contributor
If you get an HD camera, you MUST have a high-end computer to edit the video with, the latest in editing software, a Blu-ray burner, and an HDTV. If any of the pieces in this equation are missing, your final output won't be HD! .
This is not entirely true anymore. Most newer computers can handle HD now. I'm editing HD on a $600 HP desktop thats a little over a year old. It handles the .m2t files from my HV20 with no problem. If I need to export to a lossless codec for other work, it will make all but the fastest computers stutter a bit. But if you are having trouble editing in real time, you can make "proxy files" of lower quality to edit with, then replace the file for the final render, leaving all of your cuts, effects, etc. in place. Then, as Ronscuba said, you can upload in full HD to Vimeo or Stage 6 (I use Vimeo, if only for ease of use). I do not have an HDTV yet, but thats never been a concern for me. I shoot everything in HD, and downconvert if I don't need it to stay HD.
HD camcorders now are far beyond SD in terms of video quality, and with the cost coming down, theres very little reason to choose SD over HD. With an HD camcorder, you can also shoot SD for now, and wait until you have any of the other HD pieces that you want in place before using HD.