The zoom speed dial on my new PG-L seems to have a "bad" place where the zoom speed suddenly jumps from to a much higher or lower zoom speed (depending on my zoom direction). The the variable hand grip zoom rocker seems to have the proper smoothness across this same speed range, which makes me think that it is the controller.

I was wondering if this was typical for this controller? It is very annoying because the speed range it skips over is one I use frequently in my work.

David,
No, this doesn't sound normal and mine does not have such a jump. You should give the VariZoom folks a call on this right away. They're really nice folks and eager to help their customers. In fact, the big kahuna comes on these boards from time to time.

Call my good friend Tom Smith at VariZoom -- he is not the Big Kahuna (that's Tom McKay), but he does take care of all tech support and repair issues. 1-888-826-3399 during business hours CST. Hope this helps,

That's definitely not typical or normal. My PG-L will micro-adjust the zoom speed at any point on the dial. ust be sure not to take it apart yourself, I am sure that VZ will stand behind it and get you straightened out quickly.

I just finished talking with Tom Smith at Varizoom as Chris suggested. He said that it is possible that what I am experiencing may be caused by the fact that the XL-1 does not have a continuous zoom but that it is divided into 8 descrete steps (the GL-1 and most other miniDV cams have fewer descrete steps). He said that the jump between steps 1 and 2 is the most drastic. He suggested that I compare zoom speeds with the on-camera zoom rocker and the PG-L, if there seems to be a speed that the on-camera rocker has that the varizoom skips then there may be a problem with the PG-L.

After checking it seems that the varizoom controller was functioning properly. I was just trying to get the camera to zoom at a speed between steps 1 and 2, which it is not capable of doing.

David Hunt