On-Board sound, or purchase audio field recorder?

hi there,

going with a seperate recorder is always a better choise as it was designed for sound. the XH-A1 is a great camera, but was not designed with sound as a number one option...and to this day i have never worked with a Digital camera that had great sound...

you need a recorder with a built in Timecode generator and you will need a Timecode Slate as well...you will have to decide on what timecode to use and stick by it for the intire shoot...and you should record in 24bit/48.048Kh in a BWF/Poly File mode...there are a number of recorders out there that can do this...but most are going to start in the 2500. range like the Sound Devices 702T...this machine can also Mirror to a DVD-Ram as well for an extra 2-300.
I use this as a backup machine when working in case there was a problem on my main deck...

you should also send a feed to your camera as a backup as you never know what might happen in the digital world...a backup is always a good thing to have...

hope this helps a little

Why do I need a timecode? Is it literally impossible to get the sound synced up correctly without it?

I was actually thinking of purchasing this as the field recorder: http://www.edirol.net/products/en/R-44/

What can a 2500 dollar field recorder do, that the edirol linked above cannot?

I always prefer to use a separate recorder.

Being attached to the camera by audio cables just adds one more cable
wrangling issue in addition to the monitor cable. And while you can detach
the monitor cables from some shots, you don't have that option when
recording directly to the camera.

I have never had a problem not using a time-code slate. Sure it takes a
little more time in post, but syncing with a regular slate has always worked
just fine for me.

I don't own any audio equipment (other than a good mic and cables) but
on my last show the mixer used that R-44. I had no issues in post.

Just another quick question if I may, about sound.

The majority of my film will be shot indoors. Now as you can tell I don't really know much about sound, and was wondering if I should be using a hyper-cardioid mic like the NT3, or a shotgun mic like the NTG-2. I always thought for filmmaking, it's all done with shotgun microphones, but some things I've been reading and seeing say that hyper-cardioid sound MUCH better for indoor shooting. Your thoughts?