Does anyone know this?

[Aaron Neitz]

I just looked up specs: the 5500 specifically states it CAN record HDCAM. The 5800 only says it can PLAY BACK HDCAM.

[Nik Mahoney]

Yes this is right. The 5800 is not able to record to Digibeta or HDCAM. It can only playback those formats with the addon card, but I don’t believe there is an addon card available for the srw5800.