Need help with a few things
 

Please.

I have an FX1 for quite sometime now but rarely use it.

1) VMC-30vc cable is 3m long, the supplied vmc-15vc is 1.5m long, is there a longer than 3m alternative to this cable? I don't think sony makes one but I would purchase an aftermarket as well.

2) I purchased two NP-f970 batteries on ebay that look OEM to me in original packaging for $50 shipped from hong kong (25 a piece), are there any reports of those being fake?

3) Need help with this situation. My friend is a dj and we do live feed from my camera directly to his HD plasma monitors at weddings and events so people can see themselves dance etc. In dark situations I'm forced to open iris up to f/1.7 (even external light doesn't often help in particular situations). So I noticed that appears to be similar to focus ghosting , camera jumps on and off focus in AUTO, I can see it much better on larger screen. Will setting focus up to Manual and up to Infinity help resolve this situation? Any suggestions?
Thank you in advance.
KC.

Batteries
 

Those batteries are knock-offs, but as long as your charger reads them as info-lithium, then they are OK. I have a 'longlife' version and the charger tells me I have 600min record time.

do they last
 

whole 600 minutes too?

3. You're seeing the camera hunt for focus, which it has a hard time with in low light. Manual would be best, but then you have to take care of it, of course.

About the in and out of focus thing, I have noticed FX1 acts like that when there are low-light conditions (surely 1,7 setting means low light) combined with sudden changes in lighting (strobes or laser lights etc). Since the camera remains static, fixed focus is the better solution.

Regarding NP-F970 "copy" batteries, I have 4 of them from different manufacturers in addition to 4 originals but I use them mainly for my camera lights. They work with the camera superbly and have great duration, but that goes only if you recharge them through the camcorder. If you put them in an external Sony charger, I don't know what happens but FX1 refuses from that moment to accept the batteries saying "it's not Infolithium" and then shutting down. Not the best thing to happen during shooting.

This is the item
 

Brand New SONY NP-F970 Battery for DCR-VX2100 HDR-FX1 - eBay (item 180356199192 end time Jun-10-09 18:57:13 PDT)

Looks too good to be true but hard to believe someone went so far to make a copy.

Is it really the case about charging batteries with external charger vs. in camera? Can someone else confirm that? I charged original 970 in external charger and it was just fine, not sure about fake ones.

Google "fake sony camcorder batteries ebay" and get ready to be surprised.

Batteries
 

came last week, just as an article about fake ebay batteries some things are true about these, but not all. On observation everything looks in the right places and seems to be OEM quality with slight differences from the np-f970 that I had from 5 years ago or so. I paid $55 for two batteries coming from Hong Kong. Tested both, so far so good, they charge both in camera and in charger, camera recognizes charger charged battery just fine too. Time will show I guess. They might have been made for a different market.

I bought a "genuine" one from Ebay as well. I'm guessing it's fake, just from the fact that it weighs different than the stated specs.

But like you, it seems to work correctly. I've had it for a year or two and it's going strong.