[Gary Morris mcbeath]

If you want a conventional mouse, look at the Kensington Si300 Laser Mouse. I just purchased one, (available through the Apple Store), find it ergonomic on the hand, and tracks better than any mouse I’ve ever had. It has a new type of laser, invisible and not dangerous if you look directly at it. Although I don’t know why one would do that.

I bought the wired version, works better with apps like FCP and Color. I’ve tried a couple others, including a wireless Kensington, and have not had much luck. The Apple mouse, while it works well, is not easy on the hand.

Others on this forum like the tablet type, Wacom is the brand I think. Walter?

Cheers,

Gary
SaltAire Cinema Productions

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

When the HDCAM tape doesn’t have a few of timecode on each end of the clip to be captured (“handles”), in which to spool-up or down, it will demonstrate the problem discussed here. A break in the TC, or a blank spot on the tape will do this.

My solution has been to enter the clip name, cue-up to a spot a few seconds before the clip start, hit play, and use “Capture Now” to capture the clip or footage you want. You will have to type in any logging information you want after you’ve captured the clip.

Pain in the rear, but it works when the shooter didn’t keep good continous time code by using the return button after reviewing a shot, or shutting off and then repowering the camera. Also, shooter should always pre-roll and post-roll about 10 seconds; especially important at the beginning or end of the tape.

Gary
SaltAire Cinema Productions

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

Thanks everyone,

I’m considering this just for my little Mac Mini, that I use only for the internet. My FCS G5 isn’t even connected. I donwload updates etc here, then transfer them over to the edit station.

I’ll have a look at Clam AV. Sounds interesting. Have not had much luck with Norton, which is what I used when I used to do my internet on a PC. In fact, that’s why I now have the Mini, because a Trojan Horse got into the PC (past Norton anit-virus, firewalls etc.), and destroyed everything, not just the disk.

Didn’t want that happening to my little Mini.

Thanks again for your help,

Gary

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

And where in the world do you connect the rabbit ears?

Good night Chet. Good night David.

Gary

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

Hi David,

I guess there must be. What are your RT settings? Sequence settings?

Gary

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

Dan,

I had a similar experience, different RAID setup, but this might help. I have two, 5 bay e-sata drive boxes, controlled by a CalDigit Fasta-X port multiplier card, RAID 0. G-5, dual 2.7, 8 gig ram, FCS2. Working in 1080i uncompressed 10 bit.

Same thing: when I ran the AJA speed test, I’d get an average of 380 or so read and write, but occasional spikes down to as low as 25-50; not every time, just maybe once out of every 7-10 tests. However, in actual capturing or playback, it never dropped a frame; I’m assuming buffers somewhere smooth out the actual flow of data to and from the drives.

But I found an interesting thing: when first starting up the system, as well as the first AJA test after start-up, the first quarter or so of the test was nothing but low spikes on the graph; similarilily, FCP would report dropped frames the first time it accessed the RAID. But only once, the first time; after that, no problem. So now, I run the AJA test once after start-up or RAID initialization, before starting FCP, and have not had a single dropped frame in the last 2 months.

I have no idea why this works; Go figure eh?

Good luck,

Gary
SaltAire Cinema Productions

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

So, all of that other allocation, along with OS-X, could be why I’m seeing some snappier FCP performance with my increased ram. Thanks for the link to that article. Very helpful.

Gary

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

Well, there you go. Thanks for the info Jerry. I do plan to run Color, Motion etc., so I’ll stay with my decision to upgrade the ram.

Maybe it’s just my imagination, but FCP does really seem more responsive. Maybe the stars are aligned, the tide is in, and the air is full of the right kind of ions. And maybe the voltage isn’t lumpy.

Thanks for all your help.

Gary

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

I look forward to your response. I was given the memory to try out, but I guess I’ll go ahead and purchase it.

Thanks David,

Gary

[Gary Morris mcbeath]

David,

I seem to recall that earlier versions of FCP could only address 2GB of ram. Has that changed with later versions, like FCP 6 I have now?

I’d add a 2-4 gig more to my dual 2.7, if I though it would actually be used. I have 4.5GB now, and two slots still open.

BTW, my neurons seem to be firing quite well this evening. I think.

Gary
SaltAire Cinema Productions