I must agree with Jon and Martin. The Zoom records great sound, but the fact remains that the criteria for good picture (one or two metres away) and the criteria for good sound (simply put, the closer the better) are in conflict when the mic is built into the camera; and, as noted before, there's camera (and operator) noise to contend with. Using an external mic means that you avoid all of this, get greater sound isolation and lower noise. You can get nice sound with a Zoom in a nice, quiet, acoustically sympathetic environment, but with the external mics you can record anywhere.
You might like to see a little video comparing the Zi8, the Flip Ultra and a Sony Z5 that I made last year and posted on the JISC Digital Media website:
http://www.jiscdigitalmedia.ac.uk/blog/entry/side-by-side-comparison-of-kodak-zi8-sony-z5-and-flip/
One other thing: if you get a 2 x minijack female to 1 x minijack male adaptor (should be under £2), you can actually run two external mics into the Zi8 and, e.g. record a conversation with 2 people each wearing a lapel mic.
If you have any other questions about anything to do with digital media you might want to check out our advice docs or our helpdesk service.
Steve Hull
JISC Digital Media
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