Replying to a question to all you filmers...

so i just got a vx1000 from a friend, and i'm having a little trouble with it. for some reason, my apple wont recognize it when i hook it up to firewire, even thug hit has recognized my other sony trv11 just fine. i was wondering if any of you have had a similar problems, or have suggestions on how to remedy it?

also, i've heard that if you use a really shitty cam just to upload, not film, it will upload the same quality of image as was shot on the original cam (ex. using a shitty jvc to upload vx2000 footage). is this true? if so, i might just buy a really bad cam off ebay and use it to upload.