[most deleted - check above...;-]

>>I prefer the sharpest, lowest artifacted, cleanest,
>>most neutral-colored image possible...
>>Odd, huh? ;-)

>And this is just not necessary... but it gave me chuckle :)

Ah, here we have our basic difference...;-)
The picture defects I pointed out are not
"my opinion" (they are evident to anyone
who would look), but you find it preferable
to ignore (or, to even select for...) the errors.
This is much like people who listen to reproduced
music who may be concerned that the reproducing
system is as neutral as possible; or they
may not care and will accept large errors;
or they may actually prefer the "sound" of
some errors, and will select gear that will
introduce them. This is preference, and is,
of course, OK - but to claim ever that a device
that shows more defects is "better" than
one with less is silly, though that device
may be preferable to you... It isn't to me,
since I prefer what I said above, and was
checking gear to see what camcorders were
closest to providing what I wanted (which
is also a general ideal - otherwise we may
as well give up trying to find better gear,
since color biasing, artifacting, and other
picture errors are "OK", or even preferable).
Where, then, will be standards of quality
for gear? It appears it would be only a
matter of preference among the various
possible errors substituting for standards
of quality - and one person who likes orange
images with lower than average resolution
and a lot of stairstepping finds "X"
camcorder "best"; someone else prefers
a strong red bias and edge softness, so
"Y" is "best"; another likes monochrome
green and a "dreamy" diffuse image, so
"Z" is "best"; etc....;-)
My point: there are standards of quality
(and it is desireable to have these standards),
and some devices better approach these than
others; this is not so much opinion as
observation, common to many - and one is free
to prefer alternatives that less well approach
the ideal, but one may not claim that
these are "somehow" universally better,
though they may better serve the needs/wants
of some... Choose what you want, but don't
dismiss the observation of errors as
"opinion", or the holding of standards
as worthy of a "chuckle".
(This stuff is kinda basic, really...;-)