[Bob Zelin]

overall, the room looks very nice, but
1) doesn’t the noise from the computer and VTR in your face bother you, and
2) is that a 1976 Tektronix 528/1420 combo in your photo
and
3) tell John Connely Jr. to stay out of Florida, or I’ll take him out the back and whoop his arse.

The room does look beautiful.

bob Zelin
ps – I love the little green man to the left of the scopes.

[Bob Zelin]

you should simply buy a Blackmagic Decklink Extreme, based on your VTR requirements, and be ASHAMED that you were an In Sync Speed Razor user. Bow in shame right now (and if this offends the Blackmagic forum, please post on the Aurora or AJA forum or AVID forum, and I will shame you on these forums).

The Blackmagic Decklink Extreme is a no brainer.

Bob Zelin

ps – please remember that the HDV VTR’s have the ability to down convert to analog Y Pb Pr, which the Decklink Extreme can handle with no problems.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

you are well advised to have your SCSI drives in an external enclosure. There are countless companies (like AVID, STorCase, HUGE, Medea, Rorke, Granite, etc.) that make these products. And YES – they cost A LOT MORE MONEY than Firewire 800 drives.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

I don’t know where Fred is getting his information, but if you are using the SUPER HI END HP xw8200 (the PC that is not only recommended by AVID, but by Blackmagic, and AJA) – if you stick that FW800 host card in slot 3, 4 or 5 (where I stick external SCSI and SATA cards in addition to the native LSI SCSI host adaptor) – you STILL CANT GET 1:1 TO WORK WITH FW800 on an AVID Xpress Pro or AVID Adrenaline with reliable playback. Even if you went with SATA, you need FOUR SATA drives in RAID 0 to get RELIABLE 1:1 playback – (I have tried with 2, and its not RELIABLE – and 2 SATAs in a FCP MAC G5 config do 10 bit uncompressed SDI just fine – FW800 on FCP G5 will do 1:1 8 bit uncompressed just fine). Don’t be confused by mis-information. There is a big difference between getting 15 seconds of video to play back, and getting a half hour show to play back. FW800 aint’ gonna do 1:1 on an AVID product.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

the IO control panel does not change the setting inside FCP’s Audio/Video settings. IO Control Panel is a stand alone application. Simply go into the Audio/Video settings, go to Capture Presets, and select the correct selection.
If you don’t see a selection that you like, simply double click on one of the selections in Capture Presets, and you will see the input selector, which lets you choose countless settings.

If this is all too much of a pain for you, simply go to EASY SETUPS in FCP, and choose a setting. Don’t do it in IO Control Panel.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

NOT EVEN FIREWIRE 800. This ain’t Final Cut Pro.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

first you say BSG-50, then you say CSG-50. Some Horita products use an open collector output circuit, so for it to work you MUST MUST MUST terminate the looping input with a 75 ohm BNC terminator – if you don’t have one, loop the Ref Input of the AJA into a VTR input that has a 75 ohm term switch. If you don’t terminate, you don’t get black.

Modern genlock circuits strip the H + V sync information off the composite video signal (that’s why they call it COMPOSITE – its a combination of the video signal and the sync signal). The difference between SYNC and sync from color black (or a composite video signal) is the level – SYNC is a 4V P-P signal, and composite video is a 1 V peak to peak signal.

Simply terminate the reference loop on the AJA IO, and you will be fine.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

the BSG-50 can be reconfigured to output sync, H drive, V drive, and blanking instead of composite color black. It’s been years since I have been inside of a Horita – but Horita can be called at 949-489-0240, and would be happy to tell you the jumper information.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

very simple answer – firewire drives are simply not fast enough to play back 1:1 uncompressed. You need a minimum of 4 SCSI drives to play back 1:1.

Bob Zelin

[Bob Zelin]

Dear Curtis –
You are attempting to use the XLR inputs on your mixer because you want to plug in the XLR cables from your Decklink Extreme cables right into your mixer. Almost 100% of the mixers manufacturered today use the Tip Ring Sleve stereo phone plug inputs (clearly labeled LINE INPUT) for the +4dBu line level input, NOT THE XLR MIC INPUT. Blackmagic, AJA, AVID, and every other manufacturer in the world keep with the +4dBu standard of audio to match professional equipment like Sony and Panasonic VTR’s – and you can plug your XLR cables directly into a Sony VTR and get the correct levels. AND GUESS WHAT – so do all the audio mixer companies – except they universally use the 1/4″ TRS phone plug as the +4dBu line input. This is done by Mackie, Behringer, Soundcraft, Yamaha, Tascam, Phonic, and everyone else you can think of. The XLR inputs are for microphones, and have some “trim” capability, but are not designed for line level inputs.

Do you know why this is ? Because the Mackie Mixer (the original cheap mixer) – was designed for bands that play in bars, and they wanted to plug their mics into a cheap mixer, and any “line level” products a band would use would be like a keyboard, or guitar thru a processor, which all use 1/4″ stereo phone plugs. Once the Mackie 1604 was released a long time ago, professionals, that were used to spending $4000 for a Soundcraft 200B, or Sony MX-290 mixer (all used XLR line inputs) – said SCREW THIS – lets get a cheap Mackie, its just as good, and it’s 1/4 the price. And the sacrifice was having to get different cables.

After 10 years, NO ONE is willing to spend $4000 for an analog mixer, and EVERYONE started making CHEAP MIXERS just like the Mackie, that used 1/4″ stereo phone plugs.

So the answer to your problem – GET XLR to 1/4″ (stereo phone plug) cables – END OF STORY.

bob Zelin