Playback issue – IoHD / FCP 6.0.2

[Paul Huppe]

OK, so here’s the update:

Still no luck. Settings have been checked and rechecked:

timeline: DvcProHD 1080i60

viewer setting: AJA ioHD ProRes 422 29.97 1080

Tried reverting back to FCP v6.0.1 – same result.

Something funny has cropped up: I was able to set my frame res to medium at first. Now, I get the black screen of death.

Tried it without ioHD hooked up: High, medium, low = OK

with ioHD hooked up but external viewer set to ‘off’: High, medium, low = OK

with ioHD as external viewer: Pro Res 422 29.97 1080:
high: same result – dropped frames
medium: black screen of death.

I’m currently trying to reinstall ioHD driver (same version – only one available). I’ll post results shortly.

This is really starting to piss me off. Spoke with AJA tech support, but not much help. Actually, Jeremy, he was surprised that you could view it at all…

Cheers,
Paul

[Paul Huppe]

Nope. Still the same. Not sure why it crashes in ‘medium’ now.

Jeremy, when you say you can watch DvcProHD ‘all day long’, how was this captured? via firewire, or through the ioHD? Mine is via firewire. I’ll test some footage captured through the ioHD on Tuesday…

Thanks,
Paul

[Jeremy Garchow]

The stuff I have is P2 based DVCPro HD.

What you have to understand about the ioHD is that what it really wants is ProRes. It hands ProRes back and forth between your computer and itself. If there’s anything that’s NOT ProRes there’s a software transcode happening and smaller machines simply can’t keep up.

Make sense?

AJA was surprised huh? Well, I am a little surprised as well. But it is working.

17″ MBP 2.33 GHZ C2Duo 3GB RAM.

[Paul Huppe]

Problem with that, is that ProRes does NOT look as good as native DvcProHD – whatever Aja says. I’ve compared them on my HD CRT and there’s a HUGE difference in sharpness, not to mention ProREs gives it more of a ‘film’ look – which can be nice, but not when you can’t control it.

If you’ve got a DvcPro HD deck (AJ HD1400 is what I used) could youdo me a favor and capture some footage at 1080i60 throught eh firewire connection and see if that plays out? I’d love to compare apples to apples, if you’ve got a few minutes.

Thanks for all your help
Paul

[Paul Huppe]

OK, Update:

Captured DvcProHD footage through the ioHD unit, and still can’t play it out. Also tried captureing as 422 & 422 HQ, and it works! Footage looks great, too! The previous failed 422 attempt must’ve had something to do with the DvcProHD footage being captured through firewire instead of through the ioHD.

So, at least I can move on with a viable option. I’m still bitter that AJA has that false statement in their manual (p.69, BTW). But I’m happy that the 422 stuff looks so nice.

Thanks, Jeremy for your help.
Paul

[Jeremy Garchow]

No worries, Paul. I suggest you uninstall the current drivers the download the latest drivers (released yesterday) and in that process your firmware will be updated. After you have done that, try your DVCPro HD footage again.

https://www.aja.com/html/support_Io_swd.html

Yes, the ioHD will work best with ProRes, especially with laptops as that’s the native format of the ioHD. Also, FWIW, ProRes is a a better codec in my opinion.

Jeremy