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Video dropout when laying off to digibeta deck
Hi – We’ve been having problems with video dropout on our layoffs from Final Cut Pro to our digibeta deck using the AJA IO board. (it looks as if the tape is playing on a deck with dirty heads, however we’ve cleaned the heads several times, and our tech says he doesn’t think it’s the deck, based on tests he did). I’ve done the (below) trouble-shooting, and NOTHING seems to solve the problem (which is sporatic, but nonetheless highly inconvenient). I’m about to assume it’s a problem with the board (and send it in), but I thought I would give the Forums one last try to see if anyone had any suggestions.
Here are our specs:
– FCP 5.1.4 (although the problem was happening in an earlier version, as well)
– Mac OS 10.4.11, Dual 2.5G PowerPC G5 desktop with 8G of RAM, and three internal 250G 7200 Maxtor drives
– they are (all) SD projects (sequence preset is DV NTSC 48k)
– it happens with any of the settings we’ve tried, but mostly we use the “AJA IO- NTSC US SDI A-V 8 BIT TO DV” setting, chosen in the “easy setup” menu (as per the suggestion of the AJA folks – who, think that it is the deck rather than the board)
– the dropout happens with any and all types of (Quicktime SD) media, regardless of compression or weather or not it is coming from one of the three internal drives, or from an external firewire drive
– it happens regardless of which firewire port the external drive is plugged into (front or back), or which port the AJA board is plugged intoHere is what we’ve done:
– cleaned the digibeta deck heads (with the cleaner tape)
– tried different output settings, tried outputting without mirroring on the desktop, switched firewire ports
– shut everything down completely, re-started (and repeated)
– tried different pieces of tape stock, etc.Any suggestions on what might be causing this? (Again, at this point, I think it is the board – but any and all help would be greatly appreciated)
Thanks!
– Jennifer -
25 Replies
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Hi Jennifer –
I cannot believe that you own a Digi Beta VTR, and have chosen to use DV compression to output ! You should be using uncompressed 8 bit or uncompressed 10 bit SDI, not DV.With that said, I bet you a million bucks that you don’t have a NTSC black generator that locks both the AJA I/O Reference IN, and the Ref Video Input to your Digi Beta VTR. You must also go to the AJA Control Panel, and hit the CONTROL tab, and
select EXTERNAL REFERENCE. Do this, and I bet your “dirty recordings” go away.Just remember – I could be wrong, and I am wrong all the time.
Bob zelin
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Are you getting a clean output when recording to tape? That is, does your monitor show any glitches?
Do you have your reference setup properly?
Do you see these glitches in your timeline?
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Hi Bob, thank you for your response. We were originally using uncompressed 8 bit settings for our outputs, and the problems seems to be happening more often. The representative I spoke with at AJA suggested we output with the “AJA IO- NTSC US SDI A-V 8 BIT TO DV” setting, and that seemed to make it happen less often (which was worth the compression sacrifice for us, being that we were only backing up spots that only appeared online, and were never broadcast).
That being said, I am unfamiliar with the control panel (and forgive me) but, do you mean a software control panel? Or a setting on the back of the board? We just scoured the board, and didn’t find a “Control” tab, so I am assuming it is a software element. I search the computer for any AJA control panel software, and was unable to find anything – Can you please clarify?
Again, I appreciate your help tremendously. It’s refreshing to hear from someone who seems to have a grasp on what is happening!
Sincerely,
Jennifer -
go to http://www.aja.com. Go to support>downloads. Go to the AJA I/O product. Find the AJA I/O Control Panel, and DOWNLOAD IT RIGHT NOW. Open the AJA I/O Control Panel. click on CONTROL, and see if your I/O is genlocked to external reference.
You still have not answered me, if you have a black generator hooked up for your I/O and your digi Beta VTR.
Bob Zelin
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Hi Bob / Jeremy – Bob, we just downloaded the control panel and updated our firmware (as per suggestion of the control panel upon opening). Genlock is: “Ref in” (which, I assume is external ref) The box below in the control tab indicates Genlock is Freerun (but is is grey-ed out, and we can’t change).
In answer to your question, we do not have a black generator. In answer to Jeremy’s questions, the monitor shows no glitches, just the tape, and there are no glitches in the timeline, or in the source media (if you click on a corresponding quicktime in the Capture Scratch folder, it’s fine).
So, I guess my question is for Bob – How to change the Genlock tab that is greyed out? (or, other thoughts?)
THANK YOU AGAIN, Bob / Jeremy. I appreciate the time and thought you are giving to this…
– Jennifer
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(I forgot to mention in the previous post that we tried another layoff after the firmware update, and still had the same problem).
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Do you have a blackburst generator?
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No I don’t have a blackburst generator. (it’s a somewhat lo-fi system that is used mostly for editing web video content).
Another note, I re-started everything after the Firmware update again, and the Control Panel is no longer grey-ed out, and is in “Ref Run”.
Just tried another layoff… same problem.
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So.. I need to convince them to buy a blackburst generator that will lock the IO Ref In and the Ref video input to the digi deck. (Since you have both been so helpful), which ones do you use with your IOs? (or can you recommend one that I can suggest to them?)
And, again, thank you AGAIN for your help. I believe I’m getting closer to the solution to this problem.
– Jennifer
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In the control panel, lock you ref to video in (not ref in) and make sure that your digibeta is referencing incoming video and not external ref.
Jeremy
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