[Andy Mees]

Hi Bill

Ian’s post here may help:
https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/142/873347

Given that the post is quite old, it may be a situation where using the newer XDCAM Browser app (being a combo of XDCAM Transfer and XDCAM EX Clip Browser) is a more convenient option than using XDCAM Transfer to export first and then Clip Browser to refresh.

Personally I’d recommend something like a Matrox MXO LE or AJA Express box, then you can feed straight from the timeline without the need to go back to camera … always good to have more time for editing / finishing in a fast turn situation.

Cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

Appreciate its not directly answering your question Bill, but you might want to suggest / offer up a regular NTSC DVD for refusal first … pretty much most (all?) PAL DVD players will work with that just fine. Certainly in my PAL neck of the woods I can’t remember the last time I saw TV, DVD Player etc that wasn’t multisystem.

[Andy Mees]

[W. Lawrence Stevens] “I’m not feeling this is a reliable system if you have to jump through hoops just to get simple concepts to work.”

Craig is absolutely right Lawrence, it’s your existing workflow that is flawed, not the reliability of the system. Follow the right practice and you’ll be fine, use a shortcut and you’ll probably be fine too … right up to the day when you’re not.

[W. Lawrence Stevens] Using Browser to “import” the individual MP4 files is tedious but it appears to work.

Is it 89 USD worth of tediousness? That’s all it costs for the EX-MP4 import component. Then again, using Clip Browser is free. Just think how much more tedious it would have been if you’d lost 10 grands worth of footage …

Glad I could help
Andy

[Andy Mees]

[W. Lawrence Stevens] “Please help me read and save these 10 BPAV folders. We will be out approximately $10,000 if we lost this material.”

Try reading the individual MP4 files using Clip Browser or XDCAM Browser … if the MP4 can be read then you can use the same app to rebuild a new BPAV directory for those clips, and so import them into your NLE as per normal.

Another option might be to buy and use Calibrated Software’s MP4-EX Import component which would allow you to read and edit directly with the native MP4 files (so you don’t need the BPAV directory) … as would Sony’s Cinemon import component (which they call their “workflow accelerator”).

https://www.calibratedsoftware.com/MP4EXImport_Mac.asp
https://pro.sony.com/bbsc/ssr/cat-datastorage/resource.latest.bbsccms-assets-cat-datastorage-solutions-cinemon.shtml

Cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

Thats good news Jim, glad you got it sorted.
Cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

See my post above Jim … although the raw and sustainable speed of the Mac’s USB implementation was never quite up to that of it’s PC cousins, I don’t think the issue you’re having is directly due to your Mac’s USB connectivity per se. If its taking you 2hrs to import the contents of a single 23GB disc then you have some other problem at play. What version of the XDCAM Drive software and XDCAM Transfer are you using?

[Andy Mees]

Hi Jim

Am talking about reinstalling the Sony XDCAM Drive software … not Apple’s USB drivers.

As for the speed of working with the XDCAM optical media, using single head equipment (connected vi FW … but the bottleneck is the speed of working with the optical disc technolgy not the interconnect) I can import the contents of a full 23GB disc (about 60-90 minutes of footage) using XDCAM Transfer in about 40 minutes or so. With your U1 I’d think you should be able to do the same in around 20 minutes.

Cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

Nope, they’re USB2 Noah.

Jim, Apple have been a bit rubbish with their own USB2 support in the past, and they only really started getting it together in late 2008 when it seems they may have started changing the USB controller chip they were using … am afraid your early 2008 MacPro’s may not have enjoyed that revision, so part of your issue may indeed be hardware related.

That said, you might want to try reinstalling the drivers; creating and using a new user account; try with your Mac booted from a clean backup system; try using the drive on a different Mac and/or PC etc etc … the usual barrage of troubleshooting steps.

Cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

Hi Gabrielle

You can and should use Sony’s XDCAM EX ClipBrowser (or XDCAM Browser) to do a checksum verified data copy the full card contents including folder structure to your laptop whilst you’re in the field. It’s far preferable to just doing a manual drag copy as you propose, as there is no guarantee that the copy is 100% successful with such a method (corrupted data during a manual copy is unlikely, but these copies are going to be your camera master’s and you can’t afford to risk it … you can’t just copy it over again if you’ve already reused the card).

Cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

Interestingly (or not, depending on ones need to try these things) I’ve found that I can delete roles from the roles list, and can edit role names too as long as I remain in the Role Editor window … but once I exit that, then on reopening the Role Editor then I can no longer edit or manually delete the roles I just created. If I quit the app and the relaunch tho, any unassigned roles ie ones I haven’t actually used anywhere (other than the defaults) appear to have been automatically deleted.