Hi there from Portugal.
I'm new at the block and i'm incredible without know what to choose.
I use to do some footage at cultural evenements and some familiar too. At the moment I pretend to go far away and do some nice jobs for institucional matters.

The question came when I decided to upgrade my Sony Hc-40. After some readings and talks a question came out: Wich camera will allow me better DV final image: Sony Fx-1 or Vx 2100.

- Both could record on DV. I will not take really advantage from HDV by now, but if recording on DV, wich do you prefer?
I know that 2100 have more sensivity to the light (1 lux!!) and Fx-1 not (3 lux).

Besides that??? Fx-1 has more manual controls...? Please give me a light.

Note: All the material will be puted on dvd, and archived also on the tape for security, as I always do with important recordings.

Can you tell me more?

Thank's, and sorry for some english mistakes :)
James

Wecome to DVinfo James, and your English is just fine! I have a VX-2000 and an HVR-Z1, which are basically the same as your choices. For me - personally - I would buy the FX-1 without even thinking twice about, unless you absolutely need the low light capability of the VX-2100. The FX-1 does have MUCH nicer manual controls - the iris knob alone would justify choosing it. With practice you can do much slower zooms on the FX also (over a minute vs 40 sec on the VX). Then there are the picture profiles which let you control a lot more parameters than the VX's custom preset, and you can save/recall them. Another big difference is the 16:9 widescreen mode on the FX which is very nice while the VX does a really poor job. Finally there's the LCD screen and viewfinder which are much higher resolution and larger on the FX1 and make it much easier to focus.

So even for regular DV I would still choose the FX1 in a heartbeat.

Many thanks!

I think future will bring HDV for all, in a while, but indeed might be a good deal, thinking that I cant buy a camera like this...every year!

One question: the shooting in HDV in this camera is also 60/90 m? (sp/lp?), or there are no LP mode in HDV?

I saw a shootgun micro adapted to a FX-1 ( the same look as the Pd-170), is there any good micro that we can atach, even if we dont have Xlr inputs?
:)
James

Hi James

If you go for the FX1, which I too would recommend... get a Beachtek or similar XLR adapter... you can then plug in a shot gun mic like the Audio Technica 897, and other pro XLR mics.
use something like a Beyer Dynamic EA-86 mount to fix your mic to the camera.. (this won't be far off what you've seen on a PD170

With these this is a pretty good camera and hard to beat for price and functionality...

I agree with Boyd the manual controls, esp the Iris knob are really nice to use...
In answer to your question HDV is always 16.9 and no it can't be used in LP. Personally I wouldn't use LP anyway and never have done when shooting in SD mode.

If you look around the "Dv for the Masses" board on here you'll see some really fantastic stuf shot on this camera....

Cheers
Gareth