David Smith
Forum Replies Created
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Take a look at DH-Box. They bill it for split screens and picture in picture, but I think it will serve, is easy to use and very inexpensive.
https://www.digital-heaven.co.uk/fcplugins/dh_box.php#
Watch the tutorial, it’s a very cool plug in, like everything from Digital Heaven.
Regards,
David -
[Jeremy Garchow] “which 2 drive bay do you have?”
I have the Seritek 2EN2, the newer one, but I believe they use the same power supply for both models:
https://firmtek.stores.yahoo.net/sata1en2ps.html
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[David Roth Weiss] “BTW, I do think your criticism of Firmtek is “slightly” unwarranted. In all fairness, when their 2-bay units were designed, the largest SATA drives of the day were only 320Gbs, and since the Firmtek products have always worked very well for anything up to 500Gb, what they were designed to do, its a bit unfair to critize them now. While it would be nice if everything we bought always stayed up to date, that’s just not possible when technology advances as quickly as it does.”
Point well taken David, I don’t expect older products to always keep up. Allow me to point out however, that the Seritek 2EN2 is still for sale on their website. There is no mention of any limitation as to drive size, and they are still using the 60W power supply.
So my criticism is not about the box itself. I own a four bay Firmtek which has been great, and two of their eSATA PC cards which have worked well also. I do have a problem with their attitude towards resolving customer issues. They completely ignored several attempts to offer suggestions about the connector used on the 2EN2, and I know I’m not the only person to approach them about it. My opinion that they do not understand professional production was formed when I discovered their choice of connectors on this box. I took the time to explain in careful detail why that was a problem and offered some suggestions, including that they could offer a locking connector as an upgrade and charge more for it. No response.
They told me today that using large drives will damage the power supply, but offered an exchange only if it was still under warranty. I don’t find that acceptable.
Have they updated their marketing to reflect this limitation? They have not.
Have they notified registered owners like myself about the issue? They have not.Their suggestion to me today that I purchase yet another power supply from them did get my dander up, so apologies if my tone was rather sharp. However, I stand by the gist of my comments.
Regards,
David -
Well, it sure seemed like a good idea at the time. Seems that among Firmtek’s problems in the power supply area is a “known issue” that the 60 watt supply they sell for these boxes is not powerful enough for current generation large capacity (750GB+) drives. Have they superseded the supply with a larger capacity one? No they have not. “We can’t find a source for anything larger” is the line I just got from a (the?) Firmtek customer service rep.
Anyway, while I have gotten two 750GB drives to power up and read/write between them, I can do so only without the extension cable attached. I suppose the longer cable length drops some voltage, increasing the current draw to more than the power supply can handle.
The rep. also warned me against using the larger drives at all as it would “degrade the power supply”. Their solution? RMA the supply back IF it is under warranty, or buy another one.
I will be looking for another solution. A larger capacity supply with 4 pin XLR connector and a matching XLR wired to the Firmtek box. This is not a company that understands professional production requirements.
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I would suggest you create a test project with three or more clips in it, crack open your manual, and learn how, step by step. That way you won’t have a deadline to meet or clients looking over your shoulder while you get comfortable with the process.
There are various other tutorials available. I used Tom Wolsky’s DVD when I first started using FCP. You might also take a look at lynda.com to see if they have a multicam specific tutorial you could buy access to.
Regards,
David -
Carson,
Do you have anything else attached to any of the FW ports on your machine? They all share the same buss.
Regards,
David -
It would help to know how and to what are you trying to play the video. Does it show up on the camera’s lcd monitor? On an external monitor being fed via the A/V cable?
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Have you ever evaluated the V3HD yourself Walter? You have repeatedly bashed MOTU here on the COW, but I only see anecdotal reasons in your posts. I own two of these units and have been very satisfied with them. I know another company that owns seven of them and they are quite happy with the product.
I really like the fact that I can bring timecode directly into Final Cut Pro without any additional hardware. A fact that I’ve mentioned in several threads when people erroneously report that the IO HD can’t do that because of a problem with Final Cut Pro.
I really like the fact that MOTU has been very responsive to customer input. Re-designing the unit with a quieter cooling system, for example, and offering free replacements for units with the original design.
I really like the fact that I’m being offered a free upgrade (limited time) from the V3HD to the V4HD.
I find the anti MOTU, pro AJA bias to be rather odd. As I’ve stated in the past, I own products from both companies. I like both companies. I have had both good and not so good customer service from both companies. I wouldn’t hesitate to purchase a product from either, based on my own, real experience with products from both companies.
So I’d really like to know: Have you, yourself had bad experiences with the V3HD or with the MOTU company?
Regards,
David Smith -
I don’t know the answer to your question, but just have a few observations as I routinely record live events of several hours between intermissions. You might want to consider having two recording chains with the same feed and overlapping your recordings. Otherwise, if you have clips of the length you are talking about you’ll have huge clips to deal with. It can take a lot of time to back up and move such huge clips. Also, if you have a recording problem, and they do happen, you won’t know it until you stop the recording at the very end of your event.
Regards,
David -
My experience has been very positive. Very easy to operate, and responsive support from a very video knowledgeable team at MOTU. I’m a Kona owner as well and have nothing but good things to say about AJA. I see the io HD as a very good tool and I wouldn’t hesitate to use either from a build quality, software interface or design basis. The decision was more one of codec choice for me, and DVCPro HD fit with what I needed. It also saved quite a bit of money as I had several recording chains to purchase and the V3HD costs less and works with Powerbook G4 laptops.
Regards,
David