Stu, Tracy,

I got the HC1 in the end, and the Bescor adapter, and I'm happy with it and my Videomic. Maybe I use it in nosier environments or have poorer hearing, but I don't find motor noise an issue with it. The one thing I do pickup which bothers me is the cheap tripod I have makes a creaking sound when I pan... but I plan to solve that by getting a better tripod!

Mark

Are you guys able to use the Rode Videomic on the HC1 hotshoe?

EDIT: also, does the Hi-pass filter on the Videomic do anything to negate the handling noise?

Nope, it is a SONY proprietary hot shoe. Only SONY accessories can be used on it. Many people have created adapters that allows you to use other accessories to be used with it, but as of yet, there is nothing officially made by a manufacturer.

The Hi-pass filter from the Videomic does seem to avoice handling noise from being picked up. I haven't heard any complaints about it.

There's a photo of one in use on an HC1 here (just so you can see how it relates to the LCD etc...):
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=59056

Two things:

(1) using the high-pass filter on the VideoMic can significantly help cut down motor noise (not to mention wind chop).

(2) Slapping a mini-to-XLR adapter onto the end of the VideoMic doesn't necessarily get you a "balanced" connection. It will let you plug the VideoMic into an XLR input, but to be truly balanced for long cable runs, there's more to it than that.

Can you explain #2 a little more?

Thanks......JD

Sorry, elementary learning question: what does balance and unbalanced mean, and what are the advantages and disadvantages?

This link gives a nice overview:

http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/ar...ced_cables.htm

In short the advantage of balanced audio is less noise (e.g. electrical interference). But this only becomes significant for "long" cable runs. I.e. if you are talking about a camcorder mounted mic there is no real advantage (other than many high end mics use the XLR connectors).

I'm not sure how "long" the cable needs to be before the difference in balanced/unbalanced becomes significant... some number of meters...

No disadvantage to balanced, other than it needs a XLR type connector.

Mark