It looks like I too have joined this "club"of black screen of death for the Canon MV650i. I tried my camcorder this morning and in record mode was greeted by a black screen - no image displayed (as if the lens cap had been left on). I tried the playback and this worked fine on both displays.

I tried recording anyway, and when I played the new recording back, all I got was sound and a black screen. It looks like the CCD has failed as with all of other listed Canon camcorders of the MV600 series in this forum.

I guess the age of the camcorder is about 18 months old and it hasn't had a lot of use. Assuming Canon are as dismissive with me as everyone else, looks like I'll never buy a Canon again!