Replying to Mid-price cam

hey guys,

i am looking for a camcorder for mostly filming sports (biking, skiing, you know)...
we used some old SD-cams for our films now two years in a row. and i think that theyre enough (even though they werent too expensive, like 200-300 bucks) for what we did.

but now i want to push our movies a little more. editing is getting better, skiing gets better and so i want the cams to keep up with the progression.

so my question is: which cameras are you guys using? i am talking to people that know a little about videography and had possibilites to try a few different cams.

my problem is, that i could get a damn good SD-cam for like 1500 (the XM series) but i am not sure if a decent HD cam will end up in a better picture on modern flat tvs or high resolution computer screens.

infact, i want to spend as less money as possible to get semi-pro-images.

thx alot