1. CamStudio. This is a nice free and open-source desktop video capture program. Make sure to use their Lossless Codec, and go with these settings:
Set Keyframes Every 30 frames
Capture Frames Every = 50 milliseconds
Playback Rate = 20 frames per second
Video codec: CamStudio Lossless Codec
Quality: 70%
2. Handbrake Video Transcoder. This will help you to shrink videos before uploading them to Youtube. It is free and open source. You can cut the size of a video 10x and it will still look & sound good.
3. A Blue Microphones Snowball USB Mic. About $65
4. An Acer Aspire 5742 Laptop (Core i3, 8GB RAM). I like this laptop for the following reasons:
- got it at Wal*Mart for $369 (plus $70 for the extra RAM)
- built-in number pad
- built-in high-def web cam
- gesture mouse pad
- hdmi output
- decent battery time
- light
The only problem with it is the crappy built-in microphone, hence the Snowball.
