i hope i am in the right section and if i am not moderators please point me to it

alas i have parted with my Sony PDX10 and it is time to buy a new camcorder the thing is there are so many choices

i personally like the tape less option but in my country most of my clients ask for a mini dv copy and i hate the thought of coming home to dub to tape

i would like minimum a 12x optical lens xlr audio connections and low light capability

please post some options

I'll throw out some suggestions. To stay with tape and I'm assuming go to HD you could look at the Sony V1U (although lowlight might be a little of a problem) or the Canon XH-A1 would keep be closest to what I believe the PDX10 cost. Just do a quick search on B&H for min-DV cameras. There are really not a lot of choices in the pro range anymore.

You don't say what your budget is, but the pinnacle of the affordable HDV tape cam with all the features you want is the Sony Z5 with an MRC1k CF recorder. Best of all worlds.

If you're going to stay in Standard Definition, then any miniDV camcorder should be able to play any miniDV tape that was recorded in Standard Definition at full speed. I'm not so sure that that holds true in the High Definition world. It seems I've read somewhere that HDV recording is not so compatable from one brand of camcorder to the next.

If you are looking for a Standard Definition camcorder, consider the Panasonic DVX100B, the Canon XL2, or a used Sony PD170.

BTW, I've noticed posts about difficulty in finding places that still sell miniDV tape. If you're going High Definition, then seriously consider getting a camcorder that records to memory card. You could copy to their laptop computer (which would be a lot faster that copying to tape), or go home and make a BluRay or data-DVD's, or copy files to the clients USB thumb-drive.

Ken