Motor Noise?

[Paul Rickford]

I picked up a Hv20 (25p Pal Version) on Saturday morning. Great picture quality as i expected already having a Hv10 and Sony V1.

Plus point is the lovely clean and sharp 25p (Dear Sony please take note -no line twitter to be seen!)

Big minus that I have not seen mentioned here before is the motor noise level which ruins the sound even with a seperate mic, I don't expect perfection on an £800 cam but it's a lot more noticable than on the Hv10, any one else noticed this?

[Fergus Anderson]

Paul this is indeed a worry.

What external mic did you use?

I have the HV10 and can notice the moror noise so if its worse thats a problem :(

Where did you pick up the HV20 from?!!! (how much did you pay?) I have had mine on preorder for a while and still nothing :(

[Paul Rickford]

What external mic did you use?

The Canon DM50 which fits the Advanced Accessory shoe, had it left over from my XM2 days.

Paul

[Marty Hudzik]

I will concur that I hear way more motor noise with the HV20 than I ever did with th HV10. I haven't tried an add on mic yet but would be willing to if I knew it would help.

[Roman Shafro]

Originally Posted by Paul Rickford

Big minus that I have not seen mentioned here before is the motor noise level which ruins the sound even with a seperate mic, I don't expect perfection on an £800 cam but it's a lot more noticable than on the Hv10, any one else noticed this?

Paul, when you say it ruins the sound, is the noise noticeable when recording silence only? Try to record some quiet music - do you still hear the noise? If you don't - it could be the AGC problem. Have you set the sound level?

[Dennis Wood]

I noticed the HV20 camera noise when testing with the Brevis adapter. You can't hear the Brevis at all, but the motor whine from the HV20 is noticeable. The testing unit I have here would not provide acceptable audio IMHO with the onboard mic. Then again, any serious audio work is seldom done with onboard mics.

[Luc Fender]

Originally Posted by Roman Shafro

Paul, when you say it ruins the sound, is the noise noticeable when recording silence only? Try to record some quiet music - do you still hear the noise? If you don't - it could be the AGC problem. Have you set the sound level?

This was actually reported before. See thread couple of weeks ago (there were some tests included with external mic).

I found the noise profile is centered around 6kHz. So you could either use software to filter out that hiss (create a noise profile using adobe audition or so), or get an external mic. But not all external mics really reduce the tape noise. So see the thread for some ideas.

[Paul Rickford]

I'm a bit more happy now, went back to the dealer and swopped out the HV20 for another which the motor seems a tad softer with more of a 'hiss' than a high pitched 'whine'. It's still louder than the HV10 but I think I will get away with it with a directional mic, will do a few more test when I get a chance.
It must have seen quite comical to anyone watching through the window at this madman holding all these HV20's around his ears!

Thanks
Paul

[Henry Cho]

the problem with the dm50 or any mic without a shock mount is that it will do very little to absolutely nothing to isolate the mic from camera handling and motor noise. if you need an external mic on camera and noise is a concern, put your microphone in a shock mount with a shoe adapter, like the rode sm3. proximity of the mic to the camera does matter, and you will still unavoidably pick up some degree of motor noise, but, depending on your mic of choice, you should hear a significant improvement in your audio.

[Peter J Alessandria]

Originally Posted by Henry Cho

the problem with the dm50 or any mic without a shock mount is that it will do very little to absolutely nothing to isolate the mic from camera handling and motor noise. if you need an external mic on camera and noise is a concern, put your microphone in a shock mount with a shoe adapter, like the rode sm3. proximity of the mic to the camera does matter, and you will still unavoidably pick up some degree of motor noise, but, depending on your mic of choice, you should hear a significant improvement in your audio.

I think Henry is right on this. I just got an Azden SMX-10. http://www.videodirect.com/Merchant2...ry_Code=AZSGZM The sound with the Azden is superior to the built-in mic and b/c the Azden mic is directional, sounds in front of the camera dominate (unlike the built in mic). But 1) I stll hear some motor noise from the HV20 and 2) because the shoe mount of the SMX-10 is made of hard plastic, handling noise is transmitted to the mic and thus recorded. (I am monitoring the sound with headphones and handling noise sounds worse than what's actually recorded to tape.) Also on the headphone thing, with the SMX-10 there's about a 1/2 second delay in headphone monitoring - which makes for some interesting effects. For instance, listening to my own sounds/words 1/2 second later seems to drag things out like I'm speaking underwater. Very strange... :-)

For my informal family videos the SMX-10 is the ticket. But for my filmmaking efforts, I'm going to get a Beachtek adapter to use with my off-camera shotgun mics and my wireless mic setup.

[Luc Fender]

Originally Posted by Paul Rickford

I'm a bit more happy now, went back to the dealer and swopped out the HV20 for another which the motor seems a tad softer with more of a 'hiss' than a high pitched 'whine'. It's still louder than the HV10 but I think I will get away with it with a directional mic, will do a few more test when I get a chance.
It must have seen quite comical to anyone watching through the window at this madman holding all these HV20's around his ears!

Thanks
Paul

Ah that's what I always expected! I've listed to at least a dozen video clips posted by several users and noticed that the noise varies a lot. In the worst case I even heard the motor zoom but in most I didn't.

The low hiss is actually much more easy to remove with software. Then again the internal mic sound is muffled so an external mic should sound better. Again, check out an older thread here where you can hear sound files comparison (although the best one is almost $1000).

[Paul Kepen]

Originally Posted by Paul Rickford

I'm a bit more happy now, went back to the dealer and swopped out the HV20 for another which the motor seems a tad softer with more of a 'hiss' than a high pitched 'whine'. It's still louder than the HV10 but I think I will get away with it with a directional mic, will do a few more test when I get a chance.
It must have seen quite comical to anyone watching through the window at this madman holding all these HV20's around his ears!

Thanks
Paul

I just got an HV20 last weekend. While doing some setup/test shooting out of my hotel window, I noticed a very loud and obnoxious "gritty whine" in the play back audio. Also, you can clearly hear the zoom whenever you use it. I have a Sony HC-1 that is very quiet - just a slight hiss to it. From what you say there maybe something wrong with these noisy units since you were able to find a quieter one. I got mine at Best Buy. Its noisy in those stores, so probably would be hard to hear it there. Also, I don't know if Best Buy would be open to the idea of exchanging it :(
Has anyone else taken there HV20 back for loud motor noise in the audio?

Thanks - PK

[Marty Hudzik]

Originally Posted by Paul Kepen

Has anyone else taken there HV20 back for loud motor noise in the audio?

I was prepared to exchange mine for another unit in an effort to get away from the "whining sound" but my dealer is telling me Canon has told them they are not allowed to swap out for a new unit (this is not HV20 specific...juist anew Canon policy or something). I have to send it back to Canon for them to test. I have not decided if I am willing to do that at this time as I feel there is a 99% chance they will just say "the camera is operating within specifications" anyway.

I am really disapointed as I notified my dealer within 2-3 days of receiving the camera that I wanted to exchange it and they had none in stock. Now, they say they aren't allowed to exchange them. Normally I have had good customer service from them and they are a DVinfo.net sponsor but this makes me inclined to save some money the next time I buy something like this and by from a big box store instead.

Peace.

[Tim Sills]

I too have a HV20 where the motor noise is clearly audible. In fact, it's down right annoying and hard to remove in post-processing. Even worse is the fact that when turned on, and held a full arms length out in front, it still sounds like a mini nuclear reactor.... The audio from my 4 year old JVC MiniDV is far superior in the sense that there is NO motor noise.

Tim