And I disagree with much of what is below...;-)
It depends on what you use the footage for...
The picture is very clean on the VX-2000 at +12 db gain, and copies well to VHS, regardless of 'scope output. This thread was about low-light shooting - throwing out a few stops of essentially "free" speed by limiting yourself to 0db in low light is kinda silly - it forces you to shoot wide open (where the lens is less sharp than it is even a stop or so closed) and at a shutter speed that halves the vertical resolution, and those faults DO show on a VHS copy - more than "gain-grain"...
If you ignore the custom controls, you pass up the ability to shoot the image to YOUR liking (I prefer a little sharpening, a little warmth added, and a little darker picture than stock with the VX-2000 - as seen on my monitoring gear, NOT the fold out screen or eyepiece viewfinder!). Broadcast may be out of spec, but not by far, if your settings produce a good picture on a good monitor...
I have never found manual white balancing with consumer camcorders worthwhile - the color balance has always been worse for me than using AWB or one of the presets (which is better with the VX-2000, which is often somewhat off in AWB except under flourescents).

: And I disagree with the suggestion below. I would tend to side more with Alan who recommends to keep as much as possible into not going with high gain. However,I would not go into a slower shutter speed than 1/30. I own and use several broadcast cameras and also the VX2000 and I know that the minute you go into gain to boost the light sensitivity, you will have some problem. I am aware of the terrific low light sensitivity of the VX2000(f/8 at 2000 foot candles at 1/60, and, f/11 at 2000 f/c.) and the clean gain it delivers even at 12 db and more. However, when you transfer your footage to analog (VHS) that lower signal to noise ratio of your original tape with high gain will show even more in analog. If not watch the oscilloscope get filled with a lot of garbage when you analyze it.
:
: So the rule of thumb here is to keep the gain as low as possible closer to 0. And go manual with your white balance. If you want to be fancy, add a 1/8 or 1/4 CTB gel to your white balance to get rid of the excessive blue outdoors.

: Also, I do not recommend playing with the custom controls for color, hue or sharpness specially if you are considering to broadcast your program. If you have a vectorscope handy with you (nowadays this is a must for serious videographers), then I would say it is safe to adjust the chrominance to your liking.
: Otherwise you risk shifting it to the wrong side. Anyways, this is something that you can always do in post when you have access to oscilloscopes to analize your picture. Eyeballing the LCD screen of the camera to determine the level of chrominance is like trying to set the speed of a car by just watching the road without referring to the speedometer.


: << : I disagree with the above...
: : The VX-2000 picture is very good at higher gain settings, and unlike the VX-1000, you are better off taking the higher gain (+12db, or even more...) rather than the resolution loss from going below 1/60th (due to the loss of alternate fields and the time-smearing) - though once you have run out of available gain, by all means feel free to go to lower shutter speeds. On the negative side for the VX-2000: smooth late-evening sky can turn into a weird set of narrow parallel vertical bands with pulsing lower ends if it is not rendered black - not very attractive, alas... In general, the auto functions on the VX-2000 work very well, and I generally manually set only aperture and white-balance preset (plus the custom controls) to my preferences.>>preferences.>>