D7 with external recorder for better 60fps

[Falk Wieland]

although this might seem like a letter from the past, i have to take the chance.
There might be a 7D filmer to enlighten me somewhere…

I`m going to shoot with a EOS 7D
as far as i understand this cam shoots
24/25/30 fps at 1,920 x 1080 px
but 60fps only in 1280 x 720 px

but in “research” i learned, that some cams can benefit from an external recorder, grabbing the signal via HDMI-Out – before its compressed and gets written on the CF. But i cant find reliable specifications of that for the 7D.
My questions:
anyone here with experience on that?
does the HDMI-Out at the 7D have higher bitrate/different coding aka better quality?
and, will i be able to crank that 60fps thing to full HD? (maybe via ML?)
thanks in advance

[Michael Whitlock]

External recorders do usually improve the compression rate, but they cannot change frame rate/resolution. You won’t be able to get the 60fps in 1080p.

While an external recorder will probably be a little cleaner, you will not see any noticeable improvements on the 7D. Even on the 7D Mark ii, the HDMI out only gets 8 bit, which is what you get in-body in both the mark ii and the mark 1.

As I’m assuming this is your A cam, with your max resolution being 1080p, I’d feel safe using the 60fps slow motion if you need it. It’s noticeable to tech nerds like us, but for the most part you’ll be fine.