Opinion on purchase of AJA IO

[Adam Schmidt]

I have been editing for 18 months, and have completed more than 75 hours of edited programing on the io (full size), most of it hour long documentaries at 20:1+ edit ratios. I also have a cinewave, and kona 2 systems. The io, as its name describes, is perfect for SD editing when multiple different decks are often used. I have never bought a deck, and only rent. I have cut 1″, 2″, 3/4″sp, Beta SP, Dbeta, Pani M2, DVCPRO over sdi, and DVCPROHD down converted out of the deck to SDI. I mostly offline at D50 and on line at UC10bit from the io. I feel that the io has given me grater flexibility than any other SD solution that I have ever used. I started with the io on a G4 dual 800Mhz with Medea RTR 1.2TB SCSI 160 raid, and have added a second io running on a G5 dual 2.5 with Xraid 14 drive 3.8TB raid. On both systems cutting D50 and UC10bit have been a breeze. The G4 will do two streams of UC10bit color corrected in RT, and the G5 will push around 5 streams color corrected. Both are running FCP 4.5 HD. I have never had drop frame issues, and I personally do not notice the 7 frame offset. All of my stability problems have been due to FCP corrupting its own preference files (a one minute fix) and not with the io. AJA’s tech support is the very best in the industry and is only manned by two guys. I had a deck fry my svideo in jack (yes, I know rental decks and all…), and AJA sent me a new io in less than 24 hours. Also I work in after effects and the io provides broadcast out at 10bits from AE. Also the io works with the Black magic 10 bit codec so I can work with PC clients.
Pro: stated above
Cons: Slow software updates (mainly due to Apple supplying drivers).
Automatic Duck is a must have to work with AVID projects In FCP ($500-$1000).
Optical Audio support is limited to ADAT (an update is coming… sometime).
FCP Cons: Title Tool Sucks (buy boris red or motion or AE), and I can’t mix codecs in the timeline. All my other gripes about FCP are fixed in V5.0.

That’s my opinion. You can save $$$ if you work only with one format (say SDI) but I don’t. I need the flexibility that the io offers. Oh, and seeing a client drool over UC10bit playing off a laptop (G$ 1.5ghz FW800 medea G-raid) through the io is worth the price of admission.

Adam

[Ed Stevens]

THanks so much , Adam for your lengthly reply. A few more questions.
If I go to the IO I need an additional firewire slot. ( I am using the G5 FW800 for my G-raid. Can you recomend a FW extention card?
For now I am only going to work in SD – Digibeta, DVCpro25, and Beta-sp.
Thanks Again
ED

[Ed Stevens]

I forgot to ask. Since I will be in SD for now, will the IO LA
be sufficient for me?
ED

[Miha_pece]

AJA IO LA has only analog connectors.

Regarding firewire 800 card, you can get card from G-tech, which they guaranty it will work. Actually that is my configuration: g-raid on firewire card and AJA LA on internal port. There are no concerns with this configuration.

Miha Pece
Audiovisual Laboratory
ISN-ZRC-SAZU
Slovenia

[Ed Dooley]

Just so ya know, the IO uses a FW400 connection.
Ed

[Ed Stevens]

Thanks for the reply

If I am doing SD, is there any advantage to use the IO instead
of the IO La.
Thanks
ED

[Mitch Ives]

The Io is a solid piece of equipment. The other comment about drivers being held up is true enough. Case in point, the Io won’t work with Tiger… not until the new drivers come out which will apparently be after FCP 5 is released some several weeks later.

I have not had any experience trying to use a FW800 raid with the Io. Personally, I’d avoid it. I prefer the SATA raids which are faster and don’t use the FW bus.

Mitch Ives
Insight Productions Corp.
mitch@insightproductions.com
http://www.insightproductions.com

[Michael Garber]

I actually use two old ATA drives that I striped over two FW800 external cases – but I just use it as a backup and archive drive.

I agree with Mitch – SATA drives striped are the way to go for 10bit UC. I have two 250gb internals in my Dual 1G with a SATA controler card. Recently, I had a client purchase a burly box with 4 drives and a 4×4 SATA card. It’s been a champ – but you don’t have any parity protection. So, there’s always a slight risk. Backup backup backup.

As for the Io, I’m a big fan. Get the full size. The options alone are worth the money. Unless some magic bullet comes out for HD and SD I don’t think I’ll be selling mine on eBay for a very long time. Also, I cut a lot of news-based pieces and use DV50 for offline/output to Beta SP or Digibeta. If I was doing a show with a lot of graphics or need for color correction, then I’d consider 10bit.

Recently, I used the Io to do color work on a show for OLN shot on the DVX100a. It’s a champ.

Good Luck,
Micahel

[Ed Dooley]

The IO LA is analog only, so I guess it depends how your Digi-Beta outputs. As for FW800 drives, I agree with Mitch etal about SATA *unless* you plan on using a laptop, or need to move the project video to other machines, that’s where FW is the answer. There are no SATA cardbus cards for Mac, so FW is the only laptop solution. AJA recommends the LaCie FW card. I have been using one for months with no problems.
Ed

[Tom Matthies]

A year and a half on my Io. About 5 months on the La.
Never had one single problem.
…Well, a bit of an sudio sync problem right at the beginning, but with some excellent tech support (thanks Rudy) and a firmware revision, all has been good for a long time.
I run two firewire cards (FW400&FW800) for my drives and let the Aja have the computer’s built-in Firewire bus.
Works like a charm and the video quality is great.
For SD, they’re keepers.
Tom