The Blackmagic Ultrascope

[Steve Harley]

Nick,

Do you think that lag is a fundamental performance characteristic — or a function of your host processor and graphics adapter?

[Kristian Lam]

Hi Nick,

Thanks and that’s what I would expect from your setup as well. Basically, the 9400GT is just on the threshold of the performance required by UltrasScope and what you’re noticing with 1080i59.94 is a result of that. If you were to bump your graphics card up a notch to the 9600GT, this will go away.

regards

Kristian Lam
Blackmagic Design

[Kristian Lam]

Hi Steve,

This is a result of using a graphics card that is underpowered.

regards

Kristian Lam
Blackmagic Design

[Nick Hasson]

For 23.98 it works perfect. And in 59.94 it is great. You can barely notice the lag. It’s maybe a frame. Very minor. It could also be i have 2GB of ram. I have 4GB coming, so i’ll let everyone know what I find out.

[Bob Zelin]

Hi –
I will respond to the general questions first, and then to Craigs long post –

1) when you ask questions like “well, what about this computer – will it work” ? The key answer is ALWAYS the graphics card, not the computer. If you don’t have the right graphics card, the Ultrascope WILL NOT WORK. When you ask questions like “but I found this really slim model from HP – will that work” – the answer is YOU TRY IT, and you tell us if it works, becuase I have suffered thru many HI END graphics card (that were AVID approved NVidia cards) and they DID NOT WORK with the Ultrascope. Get the right APPROVED graphics card (as you can see on the Blackmagic website) and you will have no problems.

2) the Ultrascope is an inexpensive HD-SDI/SD-SDI scope. It is designed as a general purpose waveform monitor/vectorscope. It does not offer error logging functions like $12,000 scopes, but neither do entry level HD-SDI scopes from Harris, Leader, Hamlet and Tektronix, all costing over $6000 – $7000.

Response to Craig below –

Craig writes –

I realize this is a new product however, it simply cannot be compared to a Tektronix rasterizer, not yet. The way I can customize a WVR7100 almost reaches the infinite.

REPLY –
Compare the Ultrascope to the Tek WVR5000, which is an “entry level” HD-SDI scope from Tektronix, not the expensive WVR7100. The Ultrascope blows the doors off the WVR5000 (which costs over $6000, and won’t let you display a waveform and vector on the same display at the same time).

Craig writes –
In my predominate job as a live tv multi-camera video operator (I am also a camera DIT and post colorist with FCP, Color and I am daVinci trained), with the Tektronix patented diamond trace, I can line up 5 to 20 cameras in my shows in no time what so ever. With the Tektronix rasterizers I can also view YRGB as well as an expanded vectorscope with the diamond display.

Reply –
I have been doing post production installations since 1978, and I have NEVER EVER actually seen anyone use the Tek Diamond or Lightning displays EVER. I fully understand what they do, and I commend you for learning how to use them correctly. To this day, 90% of the people I deal with still REFUSE to look at a parade mode display on a waveform monitor, and switch it to Y only. Videotek was wise to make a simulated “composite display” on the original HD scopes, and now Blackmagic “forces you” to have both parade mode and “composite mode” on the display monitor. It’s great that you have learned to use these wonderful features developed by Tektronix, but you are probably one of 100 guys in the US that actually use them – even Tek owners.

Craig writes –
As of now there is a horrendous waste of screen real estate with Ultrascope. I don’t want a 24 inch widescreen monitor for scopes, I’ve spent 20 years of live tv experience looking at crt scopes and they are 5 inches big and I can read them very very well. I want YRGB and I want and an expanded vectorscope, all the time on a 12 inch display. I want a customizable display so when I do work with audio, I can see those meters as well

REPLY – this is a main feature request for me as well. 100% of my clients with machine rooms would put an Ultrascope rig in their machine room racks, but it’s kind of hard to fit a 22 – 24″ LCD in a 19″ rack. I have tried smaller LCD monitors, and it’s bizarre what happens. You would ASSUME that the image would just shrink down (scale down) in size, but it crops the image, and as you use your mouse to move over, the other displays come into view. You are correct – a 12, 15 or 17″ display that fits into a rack is critical for many potential users, and the ability to select YPbPr parade and Vectorscope only (and hide the other displays) is a very important feature, that hopefully can be implemented in future firmware releases.

Great feedback.

Bob Zelin

[Craig Sommerer]

The WVR5000 is a huge disappointment to put it mildly and you are correct. The Leader 7700 is a very fine product with a very fine price and I also agree with you about Harris products; waste of time and money.

As stated, I have very high hopes for Ultrascope and I want to see a flexible display as well as a small form factor pc to install it on.

[Marco Solorio]

Thanks to everyone’s posts on this thread as it answered a few questions we had. We just received our UltraScope from UPS today and I have a couple of questions before settling on a dedicated computer to install the card and haven’t found the answers anywhere.

Firstly, why does Windows Vista Ultimate need to be installed instead of, say, Vista Home? As mentioned, this will be a dedicated computer solely for UltraScope. No other apps or PCIe cards will be installed in it, nor will it even live on our network. It’ll run one app, UltraScope, and that’s it. No BS anti-virus, email, nothing.

Requirements say an Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.5GHz or more. What would an equivalent Dual Xeon be? Just thinking of a cost-saving alternative as there are some deals on used dual Xeon systems out there.

Would really like to get a rackmount computer since this will be installed in the machine room… any recommends that can hold any of the approved PCIe graphics cards AND the UltraScope card itself? The one area we wont skimp is the PCIe graphics card as I clearly understand this is the heart of full frame-rate refresh.

Lastly, the one major “fault” I see with the UltraScope is that I can’t control it via a 1RU unit at my edit desk like my current rasterizers. What would be an AWESOME companion to the UlatrScope would be a 1RU remote control interface that can connect via USB or Ethernet for long runs to the machine room (like we’re doing).

Looking forward to getting this installed.

Marco Solorio | CreativeCow Host | OneRiver Media | Codec Resource Site | Cinesoft | Media Batch

[Derrick Abeyta]

I’m using Vista Home Premium with Ultrascope with no problems.

Here’s my full specs:

Velocity Micro 2.8ghz Intel Core 2 Quad processor Q9550
8 gigs Ram
Vista Home Premium 64bit
Nvidia 9800GT
Samsung 24″ 2443BWX

[Marco Solorio]

Thanks for the confirmation, Derrick. I don’t see why the “Home” version wouldn’t work. Curious to know why it’s listed as a recommend on the website.

Marco Solorio | CreativeCow Host | OneRiver Media | Codec Resource Site | Cinesoft | Media Batch

[Simon Blackledge]

Loving the UltraScopes.

My spec

Antec Sonata Case
,Asus P5QProTurbo
,INTEL CPU CORE 2 DUO 2.8
.BFG 9800GT
,Corsair 4GB TWINX XMS2 6400 DDR2.
DESKSTAR 500gig.

£420

Dell monitor was spare.. 🙂

PC took me 3 hours to build.. (never built one on my own before)
1 hour windows updates
2 mins install Scopes card
4 mins software install

Done. No hiccups, nadda. (well missed the lan driver lol )

I now own scopes that do what I need and don’t have to rent anymore and on top i have a machine I can use to render in the evenings.

The monitor is run as a 2nd screen for the mac when required.

Si