I'm not sure how you're capturing to a card, Director. I think you're just saving to a card. Once it's there, just leave the card in the camcorder, connect the camcorder via USB and use Premiere Elements' Get Media/From Flip, AVCHD and Hard Disk Camcorder to open the Video Importer. You should use it to get the video from the camcorder/card into your project.
The reason this is all a bit confusing is that you've confused some of the vocabulary. Here are some simple definitions.
HDV is a tape-based hi-def video system. Your camcorder is not an HDV camcorder, so you shouldn't be using any tools or settings for HDV. HDV video is CAPTURED in real time using Premiere Elements or a capture utility.
AVCHD is a hard drive/card/storage high-def video format. This is what you have. Video from AVCHD camcorders is IMPORTED or downloaded into a project. When you use Premiere Elements' Video Importer tool to import the video into your project, it simultaneously adds the video to your project and copies it to your computer's hard drive.
You can't work with video while it's still on your card or in your camcorder, even if you've linked the video to your project. You need to use the Video Importer or Finder to copy the video to your computer.
Make sense?
Hey, check out my free 8-part Basic Training tutorials. They'll make a lot of this clear -- though our Muvipix Guide book goes into step by step detail.
http://muvipix.com/products.php?searchp ... 2&btn.y=15