Newbie here... I know the GH2 has a lot of hacks available. It's a bit overwhelming for someone like me who is new to the DSLR/mirrorless camera game. Can any of these hacks adversely affect another hack? What one(s) do you personally recommend? I've read about ones that boost the bitrate and allow higher ISO levels. That sounds interesting, but is there anything that lowers noise levels at higher ISOs?

Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? I've got the GH2 Shooter's guide by Andrew Reid and he suggests the Vitaliy Kiselev hack, but that was 2 years ago. No idea if its still preferred.

Higher bitrate hacks often lower apparent noise by making it finer-"grained." The noise is still there, it just doesn't confound itself into massive macroblocks of ugliness as easily.

None of the hacks will offer ultramassive improvements... they're incremental, and mostly improve the grade-ability at the back end or the appearance of fine detail and motion.

All that said, I'm currently only using LPowell's "FlowMotion V2.02." There may have been a version since then, but that's what I'm using... 50mbps 24L and 100mbps 24H IPB, with (IIRC) ~60mbps for the other framerates. WIth a resonably fast card (Transcend Class 10 or better), function is exactly the same as stock - record, span, play back, VFR, 720p, etc. It all works, and that works for me.

big-zoot hacks like "Apocalypse Now" Driftwood cluster whatever have yielded some damn fine looking media, and you can really lift the shadows, etc, but rock steady reliability isn't there.

is there anything that lowers noise levels at higher ISOs?

there is a low llight settings (http://personal-view.com/talks/discussion/948/gh2-settings-for-low-light-shooting#Item_26) patch, but i persanlly did not notice big difference in terms of lower noise in low light;
my favourite is GopStoppa, incredible quality, in fact better (more detail) than GH3, and very stable, didn't have any issues, but you need 95Mbps card.

Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? I've got the GH2 Shooter's guide by Andrew Reid and he suggests the Vitaliy Kiselev hack, but that was 2 years ago. No idea if its still preferred.

It's still preferred. He wrote the Ptools program we use to configure/install the various patches. I also use LPowell's "Flowmotion 2.02" patch because of it's rock solid stability. I believe I can see a small difference in rendition of motion over the "stock" GH2.

I've been using Mystereon for awhile and really dig it. Perfect for short interviews, b-roll, etc... but I have several 8 hour conferences coming up to shoot, and it just eats up way too much of my SD cards to practicable. My unhacked GH2 gives me a reported 8 hours on a 64GB card and my hacked GH2 gives a reported 1 hour and 48 mins on the same 64GB card. Thing is, the unhacked version is actually a little shitty I'm surprised to say (just went back to it today for the first time in years, so I'm wondering if anybody knows of a reliable medium quality improvement patch. Something that will give me more time on my cards, but still be an improvement from the standard firmware?

Any ideas?