Apple has debuted iMovie ’08, its low-end video-editing software, with support for many of the latest AVCHD, HDV and DV camcorders. Unlike its professional-level Final Cut Pro sibling, iMovie ’08 is designed primarily for speed and simplicity.

The completely redesigned video-editing application, a component of Apple’s iLife ’08 ($79) suite, displays the user’s entire video library, whether it’s stored on internal or external drives. Editors can preview any video clip by moving the mouse over the clip to “skim” through it forward or backward at any speed, including faster than real time.

Users select video in the same way as selecting text. Sequences are built by dragging the selected video clip into the project. The software has the capability to add music and narration tracks, as well as superimposed titles.

As with the previous version, Apple supports most MiniDV camcorders that use a FireWire cable. The new version adds many camcorder models that record to flash memory, a hard drive, or DVD media. These random access devices normally use USB 2.0 for connectivity.

Apple said it had tested iMovie ’08 for use on Intel-based Macs with Sony’s HDR-SR1 and HDR-SR7 AVCHD camcorders, both recording to hard drives. Also supported is Panasonic’s HDC-SD1, which records AVCHD video to flash memory. AVCHD DVD camcorders are not supported by iMovie ’08, while many MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 models are.

iMovie has long been used by both professional and student filmmakers for basic presentations. For this reason, there was some criticism that iMovie ’08, which is greatly simplified over the previous version, has lost some features, such as the original timeline view, chapter markers and some audio tools.

To address that criticism, Apple immediately began offering the previous version of iMovie as a free download on its website at http://www.apple.com.