[Jas L.]

Hi Francois

With all the HD talk, it does get a little confusing. HDV is based on MPEG2 compression and currently the HDV is “defined” by JVC and Sony. JVC uses the 1280×720 progressive where as the Sony uses 1440×1080 interlaced with I belive a GOP of 6 and 15 with data rate of 19 and 25 mb/s respectively. The “true” HD frame is 1920×1080. DVCProHD uses 1280×720.
So if you like to go to the HD frame rate of 1920, then yes, upconvert would be the answer (others please add or clarify if I a missing something as I have not worked with the DVCProHD codec extensively). To upconvert, Kona2 is an excellent perhaps the best choice. You will be very happy. DVCProHD codec itself is quite excellent from what I have seen and many people are using as codec of their choice for many projects. Also, please have a listen to Cowpodcast #2 I think, there is an excellent talk and explanation with Frank & Tim on HDV.

Hope it helps
Jas Lamba
Toronto, Canada

[Jas L.]

Kurtis

Keep in mind that the Kona2 and LHe will not go in the same system. Kona2 is a PCI-X card and LHe is the PCI Express. If you want to buy a new card for your existing G5 or the PCI-X Dual 2.7, you can go ahead with the Kona2 or the LH PCIX card. But for the New Dual Cores, your options are LHe and/or the IO not the Kona2. As for right now, there are no current Kona2 product for the PCIe. As Bob pointed out that Kona2 is great for upconverting and LH series do not allow for that (although they have downconvert). As for Kona2 and IO working together? Works like a charm! All analogs to IO and then Digital/HD to Kona2. One of the workflows that I have tested uses IO Easy Setups for all Analog inputs for capture and then switch to Kona2 Setups for editing. Seemed to be more ‘smoother’ using the Kona2 Setups. Being a PCI card as oppose to FW box its more responsive. But Kona2 + IO, 100% Go! You won’t regret it!
Hope it helps

Regards
Jas Lamba
Toronto, Canada

[Jas L.]

I do agree George that more than likely PCIe is here to stay (well for a while atleast) and I think that the PCIe are going to be carried over to the IntelMacs. No reason for them to look back at PCI-X, I mean look at the difference in horsepower. So investing in a new PCI-X, well it depends what it is and whether you are going to stay put for a while with your current equipment. Bob’s point is well taken that the Quads may be outdated within a year but so are the exisiting Dual 2.x so IF (and that is a big IF) the tests on the Quads are reliable and you want to invest in a new(er) machine, then I would look into the Quad. TODAY for production its hard to say if the new machines are a good move until we see one and test one first.
I personally have a feeling that Apple *might* have a prototype for the IntelMac at NAB next year but we’ll see.

Jas Lamba
Toronto, Canada

[Jas L.]

Wow!
These new machines have sure caused a big mess 😉
I had a client who wanted to setup a new machine but all of a sudden saw these monster Dual Cores. Now I had a dilemma on what to recommend the client because I haven’t even used or seen these new machines.
So the problem was:
Go for a Dual 2.7, use the existing Kona2, Apple Fibre PCI-X etc and everyone is happy! But when a client is spending the money, he or she wants to make sure that its the hottest and latest they are paying for.

OR get the DualCore 2.3 and replace everything. After talking to few people (Thanks Walter) we soon came to realize that 2.3DC is almost equivalent to the DP2.7 and that a real leap would be to go Quad if anything but it comes with a big price tag of replacing the internal guts and cards.

So what did we do?
Client is indeed going DP2.7 and is going to use the existing hardware for now and wait and see what happens over the next 6 months when they are going to indeed add another machine.

As for me, after all that hussle bussle, I am really starting to get an itch for a Quad and test it out to see what it actually has. And as I was telling Walter earlier that I have been just hearing rave benchmarks and feedback about the Quads really blowing FCP and Motion rendering. So I might pick up the Quad when they ship. But please keep in mind that I will be mostly using that for testing and consulting work and will be testing some hardware on it before recommending it for production. Well I really hope that PCIe carries onto MacIntels.

Please keep us posted with any Quad benchmarks and feedback if and when someone else gets their hands on them. Hope this helps in making your decision
Regards

Jas Lamba
Media Consultant
Toronto, Canada