[Doug Stallard]

Hey Bob,

Just wanted to drop a quick note to let you know how helpful you’ve been. For our situation which is digitizing content for archival purposes, it is extremely important that we’re sure everything is valid on the initial capture. I’ve decided to go with the J-30 decks and the SDI Proc Amps that you suggested. I feel this will give us the same level of quality/control as the DVW models, but at about 1/3rd of the cost. Again, thanks for all your help!

[Doug Stallard]

Hey Bob,

Wow, thanks for getting back to me so quickly! Basically, here is our setup currently. We have 3 DVW-A500 DigiBeta Decks. All are connected via SDI to a SDI router. From there we can send the signals to our Tektronix SDI scopes, to our Sony SDI Broadcast monitor, or to one of several NLE systems via SDI. So, currently, are basic workflow for ingestions is as follows:

1. Route Tektronix Test Signal Generator via SDI to Tektronix Scopes
2. Use known good signal from the TSG to calibrate Scopes (if necessary)
3. Route signal from DigiBeta via SDI to Scopes
4. Cue up bars and tone on DigiBeta, use TBC controlls on deck to calibrate deck to NTSC levels and set audio to -20.
5. Route DigiBeta to NLE & Broadcast Monitor via SDI
6. Perform ingest while watching on Broadcast Monitor for problems with tape

So, what you’re saying is that as long as the entire signal path is SDI, that calibration prior to ingestion is still considered a best practice at this point? If so, then I’m curious as I’ve just read the manual for the J-30SDI, and it specifically states that the controls on that unit for the Video Setup, Video Gain, Chroma Gain, Chroma Phase, and Setup Level “can be used only for video processing of the analog video signal. They cannot be used for video processing of the digital video signal (SDI/DV output). Does that mean that there is no way to control the signal as it goes out SDI? If so, what happens? Is there some sort of auto-calibration on the unit, or does it always run in some sort of “pre-set” mode? Or perhaps is calibration over SDI not really necessary? Can I trust these units to give the same quality signal as our older DVW-A500 decks? If not, should I only be looking at the new DVW series? And I think you’re right, this is all starting to drive me a little crazy! I just want the most accurate results at the lowest cost.

[Doug Stallard]

Hey Dave,

Thanks for the RAID suggestion, but actually we are already using RAID. On one system we have two external 8-bay SATA drives connected via SCSI 3, and on the other system we have 4 SATA drives RAIDed together in an SAS configuration. Both system are incapable of playing back these files.