Question: I just bought a new HD Canon Vixia HF M300. I records with AVCHD files. I came with an AVCHD editing program but it doesn't do very much. I have other editing programs but because of the file it won't work with them. Does anyone know of a good inexpensive program I could buy? I need to be able to make DVDs from this file also.

Analysis: It's not easy to find thrifty AVCHD video editor software. Below is a list which collects major Video Editor tools for modify camcorder videos.

CyberLink PowerDirector 9 Ultra.$ 69.95; no trial download.

Final Cut Express 4.$ 162; no trial download. For Intel-based Macs only. As far as we can tell, there's no list of supported models, which bodes well in my mind. Notably, FCE4 can mix HD and SD video on a single timeline, just like its very expensive big brother.

Sony Vegas Video Movie Studio Platinum Edition. $129.95; 30-day trial download. As of Version 8.0c, Vegas Platinum supports Panasonic and Canon files. I opened a few files to check. Woo hoo! According to the release notes for Version 8.0d, it now supports 1,920x1,080 files, but not for Panasonic.

Pinnacle Studio Plus 12. $100; no trial download available.

Final Cut Pro 6. $1,299 (part of Final Cut Studio 2); no trial download available, and AVCHD editing requires a Mac Pro with Intel Xeon CPU.

Corel Ulead VideoStudio 11.5. $99.99; The current version of VideoStudio now lets you import AVCHD files-it no longer requires the entire directory structure-and author AVCHD discs.

Apple iMovie '08. Apple only supports a few of AVCHD camcorders, however, and even those have a couple of caveats. Here's the current list of supported models.

Answer: for consumer users, it is very reasonable to convert AVCHD Video to other PC friendly formats like AVI, MP4 etc. And output video will be editable on majority of Video Editing tools. Thanks to currently mature video transcoding technology, you do not have to worry about the quality loss since the quality degradation is hardly noticed by naked eyes.

BDlot Video Converter is decent choice for converting AVCHD file to HD AVI / MP4 / MPEG and other commonly used formats. Thanks to the embedded CUDA/GPU accelerating technology, it really brings you the enjoyment of speed while you don't have to waste time waiting for ever. Below are step-by-step tutorial about how to convert AVCHD video to easily editable formats:

Step 1: Load your source AVCHD video.

Step 2: Choose the output format. You can also convert AVCHD video to Apple, Sony, MS, and other mobile / console devices.

Step 3: Click Start button to get your desired output.