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I/O HD – first impressions
I will hopefully write a full review on the I/O HD soon, but I just installed my first one an hour ago, and wanted to tell you what I think.
1) AJA is trying to put me out of business. It plugs in and works (like all AJA products). No suffering with complex setups, and conflicts. Load the damn drivers, plug in the FW800 cable, and GO TO WORK.
2) Although I did limited tests so far, there was a reason for the delay in the release of this product. It appears to be bug free (hard to really tell after only 1 hour). FCP sees it flawlessly, and works with it well. Of course, the AJA Control Panel is extensive for this product, and has great flexibility – anyone familiar with other AJA Control Panels for other products will feel right at home.
3) there is no direct selection for DVCProHD or uncompressed HD. It’s all ProRes422 to DVCProHD or ProRes422 to uncompressed HD. Anyway, it looks pretty damn good (although I did not have critical monitors at this install to really scrutinize anything). I am not expecting any bad reports.
4) Did I say that it just plugs in and works. I wish I had some more complex things to say to aid in it’s use at this point. I uninstalled the previous AJA product drivers from the AJA Utility folder, I rebooted, I installed the new drivers, pluged it in, and it started to work. Thats it.
5) Because this box does EVERYTHING, depending on how tests go with DVCProHD and uncompressed HD, I really can’t see recommending the other AJA products (or anybody elses products), as this “future proof’s” you for anything that you have or will have (but not 2K and 4K stuff). People will want to spend less (and get an LHe or I/O LA)- people will want dual link 4:4:4 (and get a Kona 3), but for everyone else, this will be the box that everyone wants.
Bob zelin
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12 Replies
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Yeah, it’s nice, isn’t it? And you didn’t even test or mention the timecoded live capture part of the equation. To me, that’s one of the most under rated but highly useful features of the whole thing.
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By the way, what kind of computer did you install it on?
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new MAC Pro, 4 Gig RAM, Cal Digit Fasta 4e port multipler SATA host, 5 750 Gig SATA drives. VTR was Sony HVR-1500, TV was consumer 42″ Visio.
I can’t wait to do a full hi end system with this box.
Bob Zelin
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yeah
I have to agree bob, the Iohd seems to fill a huge void,
did you try the cross convert?
or that it extract Varicam flags over HDSDI?I too love the LTC in, but DO NOT set the control panel to read incoming LTC if you have deck connected over 9 pin serial. FCP does not understand what to do since the 2 signals are fighting for control.
gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows -
Bob, where are my cookies? And could you or anyone else with a IoHD tell me if you can see a blinking green LED inside after it has booted up and is pluged in with FCP running? Mine has 1 sometimes 2 blinking LEDs inside.
Thanks
John -
[john] “And could you or anyone else with a IoHD tell me if you can see a blinking green LED inside after it has booted up and is pluged in with FCP running? Mine has 1 sometimes 2 blinking LEDs “
I have not opened my either of my 2 units up to see what’s inside- since that does void the warranty.
Why does it surprise you that there are indicators on the bus? The kona cards all have boot indication LED’s on them for visual confirmation of the cards working status.
gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows -
If I peer into the side of the grate, there’s a blinky green LED in there among other solid ones.
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I’m happy to report that installation of our new IoHD with a Mac Pro dual 3 GHz (2 Gigs or RAM for now) tower was successful. We purchased a Sonnet Tango Express 800 Firewire card, and connected a LaCie FW800 Big Disk Extreme (triple interface) drive to it.. I’ve been able to capture from a Sony J-H1 HDCam deck’s analog component output and analog (RCA) audio output as a source, and the IoHD set to cross convert the footage from 1080i to 720p ProRes422 (8-bit, I have not tried the better 10-bit HQ mode, not sure if the drive can handle the data rate). I’ve been able to capture the footage and play it back in a ProRes 720p sequence consistently with no problems…
But what about deck control and time code, you ask? Here’s a workaround I discovered in order to be able to control the deck and capture time code (kinda necessary, and with firewire control on the other FW bus). This deck is Firewire (the more expensive J-H3 has RS422 serial control and other goodies), so I took a firewire 400 cable from the deck to the LaCie drive’s extra FW400 port and got consistent and accurate deck control and timecode without any glitches, dropped frames, or errors. I also did a test with a RAID 1 pair of LaCie FW800 drives (the RAID was created using Apple Disk Utility) … they would not mount on the desktop with the Sonnet card, so I’m in the middle of working out that glitch with Sonnet tech support.
In the future we plan on purchasing an eSATA RAID (maybe Micronet or the like) so we can do 1080i 10-bit ProRes422 and better greenscreen keying. For now I’m a very happy camper just being able to use standard LaCie FW800 drives.
Ren
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[JeremyG] ” I peer into the side of the grate, there’s a blinky green LED in there among other solid ones. “
Duh
I have mine setting with the handle facing away, So it looks solid to me….
ROTFL
ga
gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows -
Bob, where are my cookies
REPLY –
post your address, and you will get them !
(if you are shy, you can send my your address at
maxavid@cfl.rr.com).Bob Zelin
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