How much is too much?

S

Sublimize23

New member
Hey all, first time poster. I'm sure you get these types of questions a lot and i apologize, I searched through a few old threads but nothing quite answered my question clearly. I'm looking to pick up a nicer, used prosumer camcorder to film an upcoming vacation to San Francisco. I used to own a Sony PD150 years ago and loved it. There's one I'm looking at buying locally and it has 1185 hours according to the meter. I read the manual and it lists 1000ish as it's time to replace. The guy says he used it to film weddings, it had been cleaned and maintained twice during the first 3 years of ownership but has been sitting. The price is really reasonable but again the head conditions worry me a bit. I am not in the business, but i still dont want any dropout or video errors, etc. What do I need to be concerned with? What can i look at to make sure I'm not buying a paperweight? Please help me out. Thanks!
Edit : forgot to mention it is a dvx100a
 
1185 is way too much use, considering that you can easily find a good deal on a used 100a or 100b with under 300, or under 500 hours. Check the Marketplace here at DVXUser. With lots of folks bailing on their DVX cameras in favor of HD, the market is starting to get saturated and there are tons of good deals on great cameras with much less mileage.
 
Everyone says this and reiterates, but has anyone had to actually replace their recording heads? Or know anyone who has?
 
I wouldn't be so worried about the heads , but C2V is right - with that many hours on it there's a lot of other things that could go wrong esp. the firewire (and I've heard of those going much more than the heads) C2V is also right about the great deals all over the web on low hour DVX100Bs and As. Here and on EBAY....a couple of them on EBAY are members here. Make sure you see a photo of the screen showing the hour usage, and a photo of the actual camera - not a stock photo.
 
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