On Mon, 21 Dec 1998 07:50:35 +1100, "Graham Baker" wrote:

>>>Anyone run any real world comparisons on low light performance of
>>>these cameras?

>>Low light (ONLY!!!) --
>> EZ1, excellent
>> EZ20, ?
>> EZ30, excellent
>> TRV-9, poor
>> TRV-900, very good
>>First choice among the above would be the TRV-900 if
>>good-sound/stabilizer are most important, EZ30 if
>>low-light ability is most important...

>Sorry, I disagree.
>I have an EZ30 and a TRV900 and IMHO the TRV900 is better than the EZ30
>in low light.
>Direct comparisons in a room lit by 1 x 60W lamp shows there is not a
>great deal between them but the TRV900 shows a brighter image with less
>noise.
>This is under 'full auto' conditions.
>Using the 1/3 shutter in manual mode the TRV900 can give excellent
>images, just as long as nothing is moving around - at that speed things
>become very blurry very quickly.
>In reality probably neither the EZ30 or the TRV900 would be as good as
>say, the XL1 or the VX1000 with their larger CCCD's

Thanks for the data point - it makes the TRV-900 even more attractive!
In the list, I was best-guessing from combinations reported on here,
and on what I have seen (I did not try the TRV-900 side-by-side with
the EZ30, but the EZ30 was clearly outdoing my VX-1000's side-by-side
even in moderate light levels... [and I had heard that the TRV-900
was slightly behind the VX-1000 in side-by-side comparisons, so..;-]).
The low-light footage I have seen from the TRV-900 was excellent.
The EZ1U is known for its low-light ability compared with the VX-1000
(which actually does pretty well, too, and as you point out, dropping
the shutter speed [which the EZ1U can't do...] opens a whole new world
of low-light shooting - if you can stand the resolution loss from dropping
one of the fields, and the smear [it is often worth it, to pick up better
color...!]). I have seen various stills "proving" the
superiority of the (not very small, so not in the list above...) XL-1
compared with the VX-1000, but I found them unconvincing... (maybe
the differences are more obvious in the actual footage...). I
guess this narrows the mini-DV camcorder choice down a LOT! ;-)
For around $2100 (on up even to $4000...!), the Sony TRV-900 looks
like the choice! ;-) (I still like my VX-1000's, though, and I
would miss the custom picture controls if I went to the remarkably
able TRV-900...)