[Jeff Carpenter]

You want to put them in (Main Drive)/Library/Widgets

It sounds like you’ve done that correctly, though. Hmm…check to make sure the icon is the same as the other widgets. If it’s not it may need to be un-zipped or something like that. If the icon isn’t the same, just double click it and see if it changes into something that looks like a widget before you put it in the Widget folder.

Once it’s in there, just turn on the dashboard and click the little “+” icon in the lower left hand part of your screen.

If you do all of that and it still doesn’t work…well mabye there’s something wrong with that particular widget?

[Jeff Carpenter]

It’s my guess that Sony and JVC each played chicken with each other. “WE don’t need to spend R&D money making a large HDV deck because THEY will do it. We’re making money on the camera, we don’t care if our customers buy THEIR deck…whoever makes it will probably break even at best with it so why risk it?”

By the time they both figured out that no one was doing it, well, it was too late. Sony rushed together a tiny deck by building a new case for the camera’s tape drive.

At least, that’s how it happened in my mind…

[Jeff Carpenter]

I’d think you’d be further ahead getting an FX1 camera as your deck.
=====

Yup, or even this little guy:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=385368&is=REG&addedTroughType=search

A lot cheaper than the deck and I can’t see that the deck would be much different from it in practical terms. The lack of a good HDV deck is pretty odd, isn’t it? It’s one of the main reasons I’m holding bak on this whole HDV thing for now.

[Jeff Carpenter]

Ah, one more thing…

In the Firewall settings there is an “Advanced” button. Click that and select “Enable Stealth Mode.”

The keeps your Mac from responding to unsolicited network requests. In other words, you can go out and find stuff on the ‘net, but other users won’t be able to find YOU by sending out generic requests and listening for whatever replies they get.

[Jeff Carpenter]

Tell them to leave it alone. Tell them you KNOW what you’re talking about.

First thing, go into the Apple menu in the upper left and find System Prefrences.

If you’re new to Macs it’s a good idea to spend an hour looking in each of the sections, just so you know what’s there. When you find the Firewall, turn it on. (It’s off by default.) That’s really all you need. Feel free to connect to the internet.

Although you CAN download updates as files and run them you’re far better off to go to the Apple menu and select “System Update” once you’re online. Just do whatever that says and you’ll be fine. It will download them, run them, and erase any files it used. (After you run it, restart and check it AGAIN.)

SO many problems people have with Macs come from the fact that they run the updates from the files and they get some, but not others, and the system isn’t running evrything that Apple thinks it should be. Just do the auto-updates and you’ll be fine.

Also, since you’re new, go into Applications/Utilities and open “Disk Utility.” Click on your system drive and “Repair Permissions” after you’ve run a lot of updates or installed a new program. (If you’re installing a bunch at first you can do that after you’ve finished…no need to do it every time.) Try that as a first fix if you ever have an odd problem with the OS in the future. (For a REALLY thourough check, put your OS X cd in, restart holding the “C” key, and find Disc Utility in the menu from the CD boot up. That checks the disc while it’s not running anything. A far better check that’s not usually needed, but keep it in mind.)

And finally, download this free program:
https://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/video/fcprescue.html

Open it up and tell it to “Backup.” If you make changes in Final Cut (like changing prefrences or making custom transitions) go into it and “Backup” again. If you ever have an odd problem with Final Cut, close it and run this little program. Tell it to “Restore.” It can solve little problems that no one around here can figure out. It’s worth having.

[Jeff Carpenter]

He means two different boot drives. So you would re-start your computer depending on which Final Cut you wanted to use. It COULD be 2 different discs, or you can re-format a single drive into 2 partitions using Disk Utility (if it’s large enough). You would instal a different OS on each partition and treat each one as if it were a seperate computer within your computer.

[Jeff Carpenter]

After perusing the Apple Support site, it notes that any machine shipped with Tiger installed will not allow an older OS to be installed onto that Mac. Now I can understand OS 9 not allowed to be installed, but another version of OS 10? Doesn’t make sense.
=====

I think that’s all there is to it. The reason is that Apple spends a lot of time making sure that their OS works with most every past machine, they don’t want to ALSO spend time making sure each new machine works with every past OS. It sounds to me like they put something in there to sabotage that from working.

That’s kind of rude since I’m sure that Panther WOULD work on that machine, but I guess they don’t want to deal with problems coming up (which they would eventually if they’re not testing this combination) and people complaining about them.

So he could…
1) Trade it in for an 2.5 gHz from a 3rd party retailer
2) Upgrade to FCP 5
3) Just use 4.5 on Tiger and see how it goes

I dunno, what do you think? My first thought is to tell him to try #3 for now and fall back to #2 if it doesn’t work out. I have a feeling #2 should be ok for a while.

[Jeff Carpenter]

1) Do they have to remain seperate clips? I’d drop them all on a a DV timeline and make sure that the ratio is correct and it’s positoned right (in other words, you’re cropping 4 pixels off the top and 4 off the bottom). Then, just export one long clip from that. Will that work?

2) If you have Tiger and you can figure out how to make this conversion with Quicktime you might be able to set up an automator action that does it for you.

I know those don’t really help that much, but they’re directions to explore, at least.

[Jeff Carpenter]

It’s certainly worth a try. It works with a lot of programs.

There may be something built into that game to prevent it, however, so I can’t promise anything. But it won’t hurt to try, all you’ll have lost is the time it took you to do it.

[Jeff Carpenter]

I use these two free programs:

This will extract the DVD:
https://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/22715

Then use this to convert the files that program creates into Quicktime DV files:
https://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/video/mpegstreamclip.html