Could anyone tell me if I should panic that my VX2000 has a noticeable hum when filming? The footage still looks great - no issues, but you can literally feel the hum when holding the cam. At very low location volume levels you can slightly hear the cam...time for a service? What could be wrong?

Nothing wrong, that's the way the beast is when the drum is rotating. Or at least my PD150's all exhibit some hum that can be heard in a quiet room and can be recorded with an on-camera microphone.

That said, you didn't mention if the hum is getting louder or not. I had a PD150 that ate its drum bearings. But that sounded like a grinding sound although the video was still great.

An off-camera microphone will solve the hum problem.

Lower head drum assembly..............650 dollar reapir.


<<<-- Originally posted by Brian Patterson : Could anyone tell me if I should panic that my VX2000 has a noticeable hum when filming? The footage still looks great - no issues, but you can literally feel the hum when holding the cam. At very low location volume levels you can slightly hear the cam...time for a service? What could be wrong? -->>>

The best thing to do is to post some audio of the hum and let us hear it. Or send it to me via email. Just audio, please.

Can I still honestly expect good results for the short-term or should I get the camera in for service tomorrow in an emergency?

By the way, just to clarify...currently you can't hear any humming noise on the footage once it's reviewed on a separate camera, it's just that in an extremely quiet room, I feel like people may be able to hear the hum.

I can also feel the vibration very slightly when I hold it on the bottom.

Thoughts?

In an extremely quiet room people can hear these cameras. Its the nature of the beast.

Actually most cameras make noise and can be heard in a quiet room.

What about the slight vibration? We have another camera that is about 1 year newer and it is absolutely still - no bottom vibration. Is that just because one of the cameras is about a year older?

I just checked my 2 PD150's

one has
210 hours in operation
110 hours of head rotation
80 hours of tape motion

The other has
100 hours in operation
50 hours of head rotation
30 hours of tape motion


With tape loaded and recording, I cannot hear them in my living room unless I put them close to my ears (I'm mildly hard of hearing)

Vibration? Maybe just a little bit. on the older unit, nothing on the newer unit.

When the lower drum bearings and tension arm failed on my first PD150, they went from not a noticable noise in a living room to a grinding noise that everyone could hear. This happened over a 3 hour taping session. That camera had about 500 hours of operation, and probably 250 of tape motion.
Sony replaced the drum bearings and the tension arm and then ended up replacing the entire camera because they had no idea what was making the OIS slam into the stops.

Turns out the OIS problem is caused by EMI fields like those caused by radio transmitters.