Despite this, the perceived detail of HDV is much higher than that of PAL or NTSC DV formats. 1440 pixels is still twice the horizontal resolution of SD formats. In total, each HDV frame has 1,555,200 pixels, which is 4.5 times the resolution of NTSC DV (345,600 pixels) and 3.75 times that of PAL DV (414,720 pixels).

The HDV format was developed by JVC and Sony Corporation. The format was also initially supported by both Canon Inc. and Sharp Corporation.?All four companies are potential manufacturers of HDV hardware. HDV has since been supported by several other companies, including Apple, Avid, Canopus (now part of Grass Valley), Sony Media Software, and Ulead.

More information http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDV