I have to agree with the majority of people on here. The quality of re-encoded AVCHD is shocking in PD8!

Isn't it dependent on the source? Aren't the 'majority of people on here' with whom you are agreeing all using Canon camcorders with a higher bit rate than PD8 outputs? I do think that while clearly some people have a problem, others don't - and it's the nature of an internet forum that people tend to post about what they don't like, or are having problems with - sadly not many go to the trouble to report that they're pleased.

Their seems to be a different flavor of AVCHD for every camera manufacture so I don't know if the perfect solution is available or not.

That indeed is a large part of the problem.

I need to go find something 'simple' like PD8 now that works well with AVCHD.

Good luck. There's no single good solution else we'd all be using it. Here I have a variety of different AVCHD editors and to get the best results it's necessary to use a bit of several of them, according to the task in hand.