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Which Capture Card and External Storage
Hi All and I hope this is not a broad question
MacPro 3.2 dual 8 core 10GB Ram three internal 500GB drives, NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT ( FCP7 ).
I’ve never needed a capture card or external drive, as most of the time shooting DVcam for broadcast and firewire capture and finally edit to tape, three internal drives (500GB each) are more than enough (so far), but soon I’ll need to shoot lots of green screen and thinking to use my Sony HVR-S270 to shoot HDV and capture uncompressed via the SDI output for higher data rate (never tried it before). I’m also on the verge of shooting a music video using my EX3 ( thinking of 24p 720p) and export to variable formats.
Now, I know it’s time to get a capture card, but which one is the best that suits my needs (thinking of Kona 3), and do i need an external raid and also which one (is it the CalDigit Mini ?). I don’t think I’ll shoot red (as far as i could imagine).
thanks very much in advance
Salah -
6 Replies
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Uncompressed HD needs a hard drive system with serious speed. You can test drive speed with free software. Both Decklink & Kona have free speed disk software to download.
Kona3 is probably the best card but think about your needs and compare features with Decklink & Matrox. There are cheaper Kona’s too.
Capturing as ProRes is probably a better alternative to uncompressed and may be Ok with your internal drive system, depending on how you have set that up.
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thanks Michael, I’ll compare between the three cards (i don’t mind the price), but i love to buy kona 3 specially after you suggested that it is the best. and I’ll take your advice and use ProRes and see how it goes.
thanks again -
I don’t see why you need to capture to uncompressed unless your delivery is going to film. ProRes is a wonderful codec and very managable from simple SATA raids. I work with 1080i ProRes files every day on my MacBook Pro from a 1.5 TB two drawer SATA rig, it works great.
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really grateful for your response chris, and because i have no experience with capture cards i understand that i don’t need it unless i delver to film but what about the best conversion from full HD to SD ? don’t you think a good capture card like Kona (not sure which one exactly) will give me the best quality?
and i understand from your post that i better go for an external raid, even if i have three internal drives when working in full HD.
thanks very much for you patience.
Salah -
Kona 3 is probably the best card. Plus great support from the AJA folks. There are several ways to take HD down to SD, for non-broadcast jobs I often just do it in FCP, and set nder video processint to render in high precision YUV, with motion setting on best.
You also can down convert directly through the Kona, or use Compressor.
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Thanks so much Chris. I do convert using compressor all the time, but this time its for broadcast (music video) and thats now my main concern. Michael suggested that i don’t have to go for Kona3 as long as the delivery is not going to be for film, so Kona LHi or LHe would do the job while saving a fortune.
Thanks so much
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