MC 4 — How to get it??????

[Andrew Kimery]

Why must you stick with MC 4? New versions of Avid should be able to open up your MC 4 projects no problem.

[Shane Ross]

Because he needs to get another system for an assistant, and they will need to work together. MC4 to later is easy…later version to MC4…not so much. Can’t even open bins made in MC7, for example.

Scour eBay or the like…call Avid rental houses to see if they have old copies to sell. I’ll have to see if I can find my copy and my dongle…I think I have one that might be MC4…not sure. I started that dongle on MC 3.5…but after a bit I went dongle-less.

Shane
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[Andrew Kimery]

[Shane Ross] “Because he needs to get another system for an assistant, and they will need to work together. MC4 to later is easy…later version to MC4…not so much. Can’t even open bins made in MC7, for example.”

Why can’t both machines be MC7 instead of both machines being MC4? Is it a budget thing (one old copy of Avid vs two new copies of Avid)?

[Shane Ross]

Well…the OP said that he was very partial to MC4…

Shane
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[Ross Spears]

Hey Shane,

Sorry to be so long in reply — other issues kept me from the computer. Thanks a lot for your helpful reply. I will try all those avenues, because I really need to keep using MC 4.

The problem is that everything has been digitized using MC 4.0.5. That includes several hundreds of hours of footage over 4 years. And a lot has been edited too — numerous sequences are done.

When I started to purchase a new AVID system, the dealer told me that all of the “experts” he was consulting told him it would be very risky to start using MC8 at this point. I am only one year from completion of this project, and so I don’t dare do anything stupid. However, needing an assistant is important too and so I need a compatible system! MC 4.0.5, if possible. Please check your back systems!

Thanks, Ross

Never Give Up

[Andrew Kimery]

Hey Ross,

Not to belabor the point, but Avid is typically known for older projects opening up just fine in newer versions. Do you have a machine you could download the MC8 demo on and do a test with the MC4 media and projects? I’ve worked on a couple of shows running Media Composer 7 and they opened up bins and accessed footage from 2009/2010 (so probably created with MC4, but I couldn’t say for sure).

I certainly understand not wanting to rock the NLE boat, but testing out the free trial version of MC 8 might get you and your AE up and running faster than trying to track down a license of MC4.

[Ross Spears]

Thanks for your suggestion, but would you risk losing four years of work so as to save a little time? I think the better choice will be to finish this project with the MC4. This project is a labor of love and I don’t want to muck it up. .

How would you go about finding such a critter? I will gladly pay the going price!

Thanks Ross Spears

Never Give Up

[Andrew Kimery]

[Ross Spears] “Thanks for your suggestion, but would you risk losing four years of work so as to save a little time?”

How is installing a free trial of MC8 on another machine/separate drive to run a test a risk? If you want to be super careful you can Consolidate some media onto the separate drive as well and that way nothing ever coms in contact with your original media.

If it works then you can buy MC8 and get started on the work that needs to be done. If it doesn’t work then you keep looking for a copy of MC4. Win/win.

I worked on a doc once that started out in FCP 5.0, then went to FCP 5.1, then to FCP 6 and finally finished in FCP 7. It was certainly worth testing and upgrading as FCP 7 had many feature improvements over FCP 5.

[Ross Spears]

Thanks for your suggestion; I may try it. But here is what I hear from my local AVID dealer and their staff of experts: (Baltimore/DC area):

“There’s also no clear cut path move Media composer 4 projects to Media Composer 8. It’s four very significant generations of the product.
Media composer 4 was a still a 32-bit application for example. “There is no upgrade path from 4 to 8 he could go to version 6.0 the reason for that is that 6.0 is the last version to support 32bit OS’s after that it’s 64bit OS only. That would make it impossible to go to version 8 from version 4. Even getting to version 6.0 will be difficult. It’s hard to come across these days.”

That seems pretty definitive to me. What do you think? Do you think there is a path?

Thanks. By the way, Shane, if you’re still reading this, did you find any MC4 systems among your files?

Thanks! Ross

Never Give Up

[James Beattie]

The good news? Theoretically, if you have a Dongle of Media Composer that is higher than 4, then it should run 4 just fine. As long as you are licensed higher than you need.
then you would install MC 4.

I would put money on the fact that your MC 4 sequence would work just fine in version 8. Unless you have complex effects, like color correction or other 3rd party plugins.

But if you are stuck on MC4, then a newer dongle than 4 should give you what you need.

James Beattie
ACSR Elite/Avid ACI, Apple Certified Technician

Consulting for Workflow and Digital Technologies at Comprehensive Technical Group