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switching back to M100
Well, I am one of the many who decided to jump ship and go to FCP. I bought the G5 and installed FCP4 and upgraded to HD. For the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to learn FCP. I’ll admit, I haven’t put in as many hours as I’d like, or should, BUT…….I find FCP to be quite frustrating! I like the clean interface of M100 and it’s ease of use. FCP has too many windows! “Capture now” window, “viewer” window, “canvas” window, “edit” window. All of this is done in one place in M100 – the “monitor” window.
“Capture now” (digitize) – unless I’m missing something, there is no running time as to how long you are digitizing your clips (it gives you the time once you are finished). I also like the “start” “stop” button in M100 monitor window – simple. To stop in FCP, it’s the “ESC” key.
I even purchased the DMTS DVD for FCP4. Only problem here, they assume you already know FCP from a previous version – it’s not really a “newbie” tutorial.
I’ll probably still dabble in FCP from time to time, but for now, it’s back to M100 where I’m so used to using my timeline to do my cuts, copies, moves, inserts, pastes, link & unlink, and so on…..not in all the other windows in FCP. I know there are many who love FCP. I know it has more features than M100. But for me, for now, I’ll stick with M100, which I’ve always loved.
So….now it comes to this. I’m using 7.5 on a G4. I have purchased 8.2 and am wondering if I should keep in in the G4 (upgrade to 10.3.8) or should I install it in the G5 (yes, I know about the expansion chassis). Unfortunatly, M100 HD is not in our budget at this time. If M100 does end up disappearing in a few years, maybe by then FCP will be more “user friendly” for those who want to make the switch. Some just get it more quickly than others.
Thank you. -
6 Replies
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What kind of G4 do you have? Coming from OS9, there can be huge speed differences. To work nicely with V8.2 under OSX I would recommend at least a Dual1GHz G4; faster will be better. If you have a G4 like this, give it a try. If you are not happy about the speed you still can get the expansion chassis and install Media 100 i on the G5. And if you are going to NAB you definitely should get a free Media 100 SW (software only) CD and have a look at HD. Once you get used to the speed and features of HD and SW it will be difficult to go back to Media 100 i 😉
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Thanks Flo. My G4 is only a dual 800 with around 640 ram. That being said, does the G5 make more sense?
M100 should offer the free sw disk to everyone. We are a small company and don’t have the budget to attend NAB – we are on the east coast. We’ve looked at a HD demo and liked 98% of it. It’s just a cost thing for us right now. -
[CJ] ” That being said, does the G5 make more sense? “
Probably it will make more sense; at least the system will be much quicker on the G5; you need the expansion chassis for the G5, but for the G4 you definitely need additional RAM, and the speed of a dual800 will not be great. Btw. if you still have an old expansion chassis somewhere you definitely should give that a try. We are working with old chassis on all our systems.
And you definitely should install the software codec on your system, refgardingless if it is a G4 or G5.[CJ] “M100 should offer the free sw disk to everyone”
I bet they will after NAB. They will draw the people to their booth with the disks, but probably some weeks after NAB we will see sw as a download, I think.
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You know… I don’t know if this will work, but you MIGHT be able to use your G4 as a “capture station” only. You would just do all your digitizing from here.
Then, you put the software only version on your G5, and use it to edit. You might have to manually switch your scsi drives (or figure out your specific storage issues), but then you could still get the best of both worlds…
Lossless on the G5… no expansion chasis.
…just a thought.
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Thank you Flo. Unfortunately, we don’t have an old chassis. We see the chassis comes in a “quiet” model which is 275W compared to 300W. Any thoughts?
I hope you are right about M100 offering the sw disc to everyone. I really would like to see M100 continue on. I’m not saying FCP isn’t great, but for me, I’m happier staying with what I know, what I’m comfortable with, and what works…for now. -
CJ,
Could you contact me off list? I’d like to ask you a few questions about your editing.
Thanks.
Steve Bayes
Director of Marketing/Product Marketing
Media 100/Optibase
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