Hi,

I use my XL1s for about 1.5 years for short movies, and I always used Sony Exellence DV tapes. Never had many problems, exept for maybe a few dropouts on around 20 tapes.
A partner of me rolled another brand of tape in it, without me knowing it, for about 7 minutes.

I planned to roll a head cleaner (Sony...?) in it, and maybe after that, switch from brand, because the sony exellence tapes are pretty expensive (25 euros for 3 tapes)... Would I have problems? Any advice on what to do, or maybe to which tape to switch over, that are a bit cheaper but still good? I was thinking TDK, because I used them in my inexpensive dv camcorder a couple of years ago, and never had problems, and they are much cheaper...

Thank you,

ps: if I could get a pretty quick answer, that would be nice, because I'm planning to buy tapes today for a shoot monday... Thanks,

EDIT: I bought TDK tapes... we'll see how things go monday...

Rolling 7 minutes of a different brand tape is not going to kill your camera. You shouldn't have any problems. Run the cleaning tape for 10 seconds and switch over to the TDK's if you can get those cheaper.

Also another trick to keep your heads clean is to "Pack" the tape. If time allows, when putting in a new tape, FF it to the end, then RW it back to the beginning before you record on it.

Mathieu,

You shouldn't have any problems, just clean the heads as Mr. Meyerson said.

I have been using the Sony Premium tapes, that I buy on ebay for less than $3.00 each and have never had a single dropout. Short of having a dropout, which I have never had, they all record exactly the same image.

Mike

Hi,

Thanks for the responses: I let a tape cleaner from Sony roll through it and went over to using TDK tapes. 3 Tapes so far, no problems.

Thanks for the reactions,