farss is correct . . one "should" be doing this as a matter of course. Nothing like having an audio backup.

Grazie

Absolutely, save your money for a cam and buy a DAT or minidisk or portable hard drive or even try recording recording on a laptop using vegas.
If you must get a new camera and audio is a big concern then buy the pan dvx100A. By far the best audio recording cam in this price category.

What are you filming most of the times? Exteriors? Interiors? Weddings? R'n'roll shows?
You usually shoot alone ?(so nobody to help you out with sound...)

What about new Sony PD170 ?
Manual levels, balanced XLR plugs, phantom power... and these 3 chips of course..!

Guys above are right; since you already got a good camera (GL1), next thing that would be great is having budget for sound if it's that important. ; )
AND (good news!) that could be like $300, look at that:

http://www.locationsound.com/proaudio/ls/00064.html

... I'm pretty sure it would work with your camera and if you do a little more research, you can find one or two more brands, probably all around the same price. I don't know if the 1/8" jack on your cam is bypassing these damn "auto" levels though...

As a first consideration if what you record is general shots: get rid of that camera mic and put a "real" mic on there ( Neumann, Sennheiser, Sanken, Schoeps are good brands) with windstopper (this bizarre fur...). There are semi-pro mic systems that allow you to "transform" your mic into a shotgun mic, an omni mic, etc... and are relatively affordable considering the improvement you'll get. I swear!
Check this site out too: www.locationsound.com
It's a rental/selling shop (with on-line .pdf catalog so you can have a look at the gear) but there's a "tip" link on their site that is very valuable for most people regarding audio and a good reference, even if you know a bit on the subject.

The "new" PD170 seems to have a few problems in the audio department. The old one had and still has major problems in the audio department. We've only recenlty found this. Leave the AGC on and at around 110 dBA the audio just cuts out for a few seconds. Very nasty. Even without that it's not a stellar performer in the audio department.
The DVX100 has everything that the PD170 has and better audio and much, much more. If you want to make movies and not just shoot video it's hard to beat. Not for the gun and run brigade though.
No matter which camera a better mic is a good move as suggested, getting it off the camera is an even better step.

Oops, didn't know about these "technical problems" they had at Sony... Good thing to know!

I know just a little about this Panasonic cam. Didn't have time to experiment a lot since the shooting I was on, well, after 1 hour of recording the cam wasn't giving decent playbacks so the production had to return it to the shop (3 hour loss on a 15 people set... ouch!) (it was brand new : first day of shooting ) and we finished everything with the (usual) PD150. I guess that you're right concerning the "run and gun brigade" lol ! (I like that expression!)
But just seeing these 24fps go for that hour was a *gas*...wow!

I didn't know eiher that the Pana was so good with sound: THIS is a good point. Plus the menus, lens, etc...
But since I was, on my side, recording on a Fostex PD4 recorder with all the gear, that kind of answers the question. ; )

I was just wondering if anyone here records to an Ipod or Mini-disc for sound. I am looking for a high quality, low price alternative to on camera recording (or at least a back up). Is Atrac-3 a problem with the mini-disc? Thoughts?

P.S. As far as shotgun mikes go, I have a Sennheiser MKE300 and as far as mini-plugs go, it is the best $125.00 I have spent on sound.

If you shoot 16:9 check out the Sony PDX10. Great glass, very good sound also.

If you are thinking lower budget, I have a Panasonic DV-953. Not great in very low light, but the best deal on a 3 chipper out there, and it shoots in native 16:9 too!

If you already have one Canon I would stick with the XL 1s. If you get involved in a two camera shoot, the footage will look different as you switch back and forth between them thereby creating a lot of unneccessary work in post.
There is a $500 rebate from Canon on the camera:
http://www.canondv.com./promotions/index.html

John

Sevente:
I got the PD-100 and in november when I noticed this PDX-10 that was out at the SAME PRICE I paid for my cam 3 years before, I almost cried... what an improvement on these chips!

Pana DVX100: almost the same price but definitly in another league for me in term of optic, feature, sound support, etc.

Works exceptionally well but do yourself a favor and use a clapper board so you can line the sound up in post. Also helps to have a sharp sound person to make sure the record button is pressed at the same time as the camera... and the pause button as well.

DVX-100a. Nuff Said.

I have the Beachtek DXA6 fUtZ posted. Been VERY happy (make sure you
get the newer dual phantom).

There is also a shoulder brace you can get from Videosmith that has mounting for this.

Corug7:

I have begun using a Minidisc. The audio is analog but remarkably transparent. The compression format (ATRAC) is at least as good as MP3, and most folks would call MP3 running at 128Kb/sec pretty much equivalent to 16-bit wav. Well, ATRAC runs at close to 300Kb/sec. In other words, it sounds terrific.

Traditionally, the Sony Minidisc recorders have been crippled by the fact that you need to come out of the recording mode in order to change the record level! The Sharps, by contrast, operate just like a traditional recorder. I bought a used Sharp MD-MT15 on eBay for about $60, and it's wonderful. Mic and line-in, two AA cells, transparent sound, rugged, tiny... only problem is that your audio transfer has to be analog and at realtime. So what?

Minidisc has been a topic here many times. You can probably get a lot more information with a search.