Have you tried switching between VBR and CBR (variable and controlled bit rate)? How about different resolutions (ie. trying 720p to see if it exists on that resolution)? I've had the pulsing occur from time to time on mine, though this has usually been in complex scenes and/or strong lighting changes (where half the yard is in shade and half in sun)...It seemed these situations would always max out the bandwidth and would start causing the pulsing on every iframe...Also I've noticed it in times when it was very windy and the trees were moving around a lot. The "movement predictor" couldn't keep up with the tree motion between iframes and would cause a strong pulse/picture jump at each iframe.
I'm not sure about the dark band and focus issue on one side..All I know to do is manual focus adjustments and/or maybe adjusting the focus mode (auto/semi-auto/manual) and the focus distance settings.
I'm willing to send any files you would like to try....Although unfortunately, I fear it probably will not accept the old PAL/NTSC firmware easily...I downloaded a copy of the new firmware and decompressed it to see the files inside. It appears to have a "signature" file, meaning it will only allow "signed" firmware to overwrite it...The old firmware is not signed, so it would most likely reject it....I've seen some talk that you may be able to override this block by using a serial cable directly to the camera's circuit board and sending the old firmware through
TFTP...Though that can definitely get more complicated and I don't quite yet understand all I've heard...Trying to get more clarification as to what all steps are involved to do this. I would really like to upgrade mine to the new firmware just to see what kind of results I get, but want to make sure I fully understand how to get the old version back in case I run into the same problems that you're having.