ok, case solved.
I'm very sorry for the worries i might cause, but today i discovered that the cause of my camera's hanging lies in the zoom rocker switch. It happened to me in playback mode a couple of times today. Seems like maybe the switch shorts something and that causes the camera to hang. I'm calmer now, better that damned switch, than some mechanical parts inside lenses. Shouldn't be expensive to replace.
Barney, as for camera noises - sadly, S3 makes quite some noises. When i put my ear to the camera i can hear ticking, clicking:) I think they can be related to IS too. they get recorded in movies and can be heard when recorded in quiet environments. lenses makes silent "slap" sound when stop moving (zooming) in movie mode. Hey, it's a big step forward anyway:) ultrasonic zoom is so much better than any else i'v seen in any similar camera. And my A70's inverter is easily heard from a meter away if one can hear high frequencies..
as for the backlight. now it's obvious to me, that in case of shorting some circuit by the zoom rocker(as i suspect), the power surge causes the camera to shut down without resetting the LCD display to blank, so that the image is still present. But before i thought that there is something blocking the lenses, that the camera wasn't expecting and causing the software to go into an unknown state too.. You'll never know..
anyways i'm kind of happy that the reason is not that serious.
