[Chris Elley]

The official diagnosis from Dell technical support is a bad motherboard on the laptop. No apparent relationship to P2 or drivers. Thank you all for your suggestions.

[Chris Elley]

In my search, I have now found this:

https://eww.pavc.panasonic.co.jp/pro-av/support/cs/csregistp2m/p2indexe.html

[Chris Elley]

Interesting revelation… the Firewire port only performs unpredictably in a transfer between the P2 card and the external firewire drive. It does not perform poorly if the footage is first moved from the card to the internal laptop drive, and then from the internal drive to the external firewire drive.

Could this be a driver issue with the P2 card? Our HVX200s are from a very early batch, so maybe they came with early software discs? Is there a newer driver for the P2 card? If so, where can I find it?

If not a P2 driver issue, what about the card slot on the laptop?

I am most perplexed by the fact that this used to work well consistently and now it’s all over the board, even after a system rebuild.

Thnak you for your thoughts.

Chris

[Chris Elley]

I have to echo the sentiments of those who have run into trouble using the Firestore. We’ve had two of them for a long time, and we have dealt with a large number of problems. On the onset, they’re bulky. They make noise. They take too long to fire up, and there is a lot that can and has gone wrong.

Physical connection is a huge concern. The firewire connector is not strong at all on the HVX200. We’ve had a couple problems there.

The ability to review clips cannot even begin to compare with the freedom you have with P2. Comparably, the Firestore’s review process is clunky. It does not utilize thumbnails in the camera, so it’s harder to get around.

Out of our two Firestore units, we have made four product returns. Of our two, one has worked fairly well and the other has been an absolute nightmare, even with the same settings. We’ve kept them upgraded with the latest firmware. Both of our units have resulted in corrupt files in the respect that Final Cut Pro rejects roughly 1 out of 30 clips. I’m told that this should no longer be a problem with the new firmware upgrades, but honestly we feel quite misled by things we’ve been told by the manufacturer in the history of this product. They’re nice folks, but their marketing has exceeded the real-world performance of this product. It’s also diffiuclt to get a hold of tech support at Focus Enhancements.

I fully acknowledge that there are people out there using their Firestore units without any problem whatsoever. It just seems there is a consistency problem from unit to unit. You don’t want to get dealt a bad one. If you get a good one, you can have some long record times, but you’ll still need to live with it’s size and the possibility that you didn’t actually get a shot you thought you were getting (due to the FCP translation issues we’ve experienced). On our bad unit, every clip has to be rendered in FCP, but the good unit that’s not a problem.

If you’re using this in a professional context, consistency probably means a great deal to you.

We’ve dropped a small fortune on proprietary Firestore batteries, charger and accessories. Be familiar with these costs before you think you just have to buy the Firestore. The standard battery is not nearly sufficient. For each unit, you’ll need a high capacity battery ($200) and a charger ($180) and most likely a mount kit ($?). In the end, it was not worth it. Then, you’ll need to learn how to safely remove the battery and not allow other untrained wouldbe battery removers to touch it. The connectors are fragile, and a bad battery removal can completely render the unit useless.

We are now increasing our fleet of P2 cards and retiring our Firestores to last string. We could not be happier with the camera or the P2 cards. The cards are simply amazing in their performce. Not one problem in all of our use.

I was an advocate of the Firestore early on. We made a substantial investment in it. We wish it would have worked. In our particular set of experiences, it did not. I’m glad to hear for some it has. In our appeals, Panasonic has not stood behind the Firestore product like it has the camera and the P2 cards. It seems to be an awkward relationship between the two manufacturers. In our discussions with them, Focus Enhancements is never shy about blaming something on their perceived shortcomings of the HVX200, and Panasonic was unwilling to refund us on a dud of a Firestore. This is counter to any other wonderful interactions we’ve had with Panasonic not concerning the Firestore.

As a previous poster mentioned, do your homework. If you’re still considering a Firestore, rent one and test it fully in your workflow, all the way through post.

Chris

[Chris Elley]

You are not misinformed. You are correct if you are referring to offloading directly from the camera. Howevere, our workflow demands that the cameras continue to work and we offload directly from the P2 cards loaded into the PCMCIA slot of the laptop. We use a total of 6 cards and 2 cameras.

Chris

[Chris Elley]

Our Firestore does have the latest firmware update, however the footage we’re discussing was shot with the first of the two 2.0.0 upgrades. Why they didn’t name them 2.0.0 and 2.0.1 doesn’t make much sense.

We’re using the DVCPRO HD 24p easy setup. We have selected remove duplicate frames.

At this point, we’re fairly convinced that this footage is not going to import at the correct frame rate. We’re now just looking for ways to convert without spending additional money.

In our experience, the Firestore FS-100 units are not consistent from unit to unit. We own two and they tend to perform differently with the exact same settings. We’ve also had a series of other problems with one or both units, the most notable of which is corrupted files. That said, the P2 cards have been very solid.

Chris

[Chris Elley]

Thank you for the suggestion. I have tried it, unfortunately without differing results.

If this is not going to happen inside FCP, can anyone think of an efficient way to convert a lot of FS-100 59.94 footage to 23.98, knowing that the camera was set to 720 24p when it was shot?

I have tried the DVCPROHD frame rate conveter. It doesn’t work with “remove duplicate frames” checked either. It also only addresses one clip at a time and divorces the audio and timecode.

I’m definitely up for more FCP suggestions, but outside of that I’m open for other possibilities to get the footage converted (without having to spend even more money).

Thanks for all of your help.

Chris

[Chris Elley]

We also shoot with P2 cards as well. We never have any trouble with them whatsoever (for 9 months running). We only have trouble with the Firestore footage.

Thanks
Chris

[Chris Elley]

The camera was set to 720p24. The frame rate converter does not work on the footage if I select “remove duplicate frames.” It just freezes the converter. However, if “remove duplicate frames” is not checked, it processes the footage… just resulting in a super slow motion clip that must be sped up 250% (and no connected audio).

Thanks
Chris

[Chris Elley]

The DVCPRO HD frame rate converter didn’t really do the trick, because it would not allow me to “remove duplicate frames.” Every time I attempted to use that option, it failed to complete. As such, my only choice was to proceed without removing duplicate frames, resulting in a super slow motion clip with no attached audio. I had to speed up the resulting clip 250%, but it was a total pain to sync up with clips from the other timecode synced (P2 acquiring) camera.

Has anyone had better luck with importing 24P footage into Final Cut Pro with the result of the clip actually identifying itself as 24P?

Thanks
Chris Elley
Austin, Texas