There seems to be a lot of confusion over what has been upgraded with the iris settings between these cameras. Rather than try to sort it all out, I just tried a quick test with my VX-2000. Following is a list of what the camera displayed in the viewfinder as I turned the exposure wheel. To help clear things up perhaps someone can repeat this exercise on a VX-2100, PD-170 and PD-150. That should put an end to all the conjecture...

VX-2000
=====
1. CLOSE
2. F11
3. F9.6
4. F8
5. F6.8
6. F5.6
7. F4.8
8. F4
9. F3.4
10. F2.8
11. F2.4
12. F2
13. OPEN
14. 3 dB
15. 6 dB
16. 9 dB
17. 12 dB
18. 15 dB
19. 18 dB

the vx2100 has 21 clicks with settings 1-19 as above (zoom is wide)

clicks 20 & 21 dont do anything and are the same as click 19

Interesting. So if I understand you correctly, there is really no difference in how the iris works on the VX-2100, and it moves in the same noticeable jumps as the VX-2000. I wonder if the stepper motor in the PD-170 is actually different, or if this is just another case of Sony crippling the consumer version's firmware (as they did with the TRV-950 vs. PDX-10 16:9 mode)?

Yes the iris works the same apart from the 2 dead clicks on the right.


I find the best strategy for shooting in unpredictable light conditions is custom preset AE all the way to the left (- 2stop?), backlight on and use auto exposure - this way is safe since you are always exposing for the subject/foreground

the rest of the time I use manual

I think you're right in your asssumption Boyd.