Tuff question. The provid cant handle HD signals, so you need to dowconvert the signal. The arm and sled cant handle to much weigt, but if you strip the camera down you might be able to get it in balance. The provid will limit you fast, so if your looking to invest in a rig i would reccomend something else. There is enough to find on the second hand market. The provid isnt a rig you can rebuild or upgrade. For learning, oh yes, go start flying with it. I started with an sk2 many moons ago. Buy a book, get a workshop and practise till you drop ;-)
Best
You are so kind Job,,,,
It should be better to leave your girl friend for a travel than to start with a Pro-vid (I had one).
Zephyr is, for me, one the best choices to begin and start flying steadicam systems... Any way , if you can get an "old" EFP well used and good priced, go go go...
It is only my opinion...
best...
..and agree... If you found a second hand Pro-vid, may be the CRT monitor was in it last second of life...
I have a seen a couple provids out there with nice HD monitor conversions, it can fly the sony 800 easily. Even the 24v addon battery conversions look good, extend the life of the rig, do the job just fine.
If you have the provid for cheap and it does the job what is the problem with that?