[Joe Mantaratz]

Thanks for all the replies I appreciate the suggestions.

Video Guys stated they would be coming out with another build shortly. I own a Mac and have been on the edge of deciding which way to go. I’m not doing much work on the Mac side anymore although I do love the stability.

Thanks for the alternate Boris Red option I will look into it and I’ll take a look at your build. Dual hex cores is attractive so that may be the direction I go. A detailed list of a build with no hiccups is exactly what I was looking for. I wish Sony would list thoroughly tested systems approved for their software as do other companies.

Questions John..
If you were doing a build today what would you select?

thanks again

[Joe Mantaratz]

I would gladly upgrade if this was an option or a plug in.

Thanks John

[Joe Mantaratz]

I already do the FX at the media level I was hoping ( have not looked at the links yet) that being able to keep any crop/pan\, FX edits when creating the multicam track.

Does the suggested software provide this? My events are multi cam shoots for hours at a time so I need a time saver in post. Thanks as always.

[Joe Mantaratz]

Here’s the final update I hope helps others to avoid this issue.

Maxell tech finally got back to me ( via phone) and basically stated that they do not have a solution and are aware of the problem but not officially admitting anything. They have a new firmware coming out that “MAY” extend the file size limit to 4 gig instead of the 2 Gig split it is using now.

Shining Technology the company that actually writes the firmware and makes the drives is partially at fault. So the two units I have are useless for HD work unless countless hours are available to spend joining the files and then scrubbing them.

Hard to believe they market this and have not documented any of these issues. Once again we are the beta testers.

Advice to the rest…do not purchase these units you will just be wasting your precious time.

[Joe Mantaratz]

Thanks John now I remember reading this at some point and you just reconfirmed it. I will pass this info onto Maxell and ask them to have you on their tech team since none of them could offer a reason after a weeks time.

So now that begs the next question, which system is indeed smart enough to avoid this issue?
If recording to NTSF was an option this would be a solved but alas not the case.

[Joe Mantaratz]

That is what I thought as well but the answer seems to lie elsewhere. Simple File Joiner as suggested by Maxell does work and recaptures the lost frames somehow but it requires long processing, which is a waste.

So not sure where the exact answer is here but will wait on Maxell Product support yet again.

Question? Don’t you lose the timecode with your unit if you do not utilize the record from the camera as opposed to the unit? Thought this was the case since TimeCode comes from the camera. (As I was told)

Thanks again

[Joe Mantaratz]

Understand your point John but I fail to understand why there is no issue with SD only HD.

The tech docs don’t mention a word about requiring any 3rd party joiner software for this. The adverts and tech docs all mention drag and drop. To be honest I have used other devices and have never had this issue. Maxell suggestion is to also scrub the files with hdv splitter after joining. By the time all of this is done hours have passed and that is unacceptable.

Just can’t imagine this is the way it is supposed to work. We film with varied cameras depending on the shoot so I can’t have a proprietary device.

John why would the GOP not being complete cause Vegas to not see the frames while the joiner can? There simply must be a better way. Thanks as always

[Joe Mantaratz]

Your HDR system Stephen is only for Sony products as no doubt you already know and I have an array of Cameras. But thanks for the mention anyway…

[Joe Mantaratz]

Changed the subject to try and be a bit clearer.

Been a long week of frustration trying to get the correct answers from Maxell and that did not happen so today no choice but to rent another company’s unit.

I’ve used a few others such as the one you suggested and they work fine I just prefer to use a HD based system for the obvious benefits. Some of my shoots are hours and swapping cards is not the best option for me.

Take a moment and Google the system and you wont find anything that supports their 3rd party solution. So I thought perhaps my go to source community might have had some experience or another Hard Drive based system suggestion.

Not happy about being an unpaid beta tester for yet another company.

[Joe Mantaratz]

Been looking for any info on problems with Citidisk problems and only found one thread.

I recently puchased 2 Maxell IVDR VC102 250 GB systems and have had nothing but dropped frames when filming in HD, SD is fine of course It does this every time it splits the file due to the FAT32 limitation. According to their specs they assure that no frames will be dropped. But alas they are dead wrong .

A week has gone by round and round with tech support which responds fairly quickly but admits little. They have told be that others have regained those dropped frames by using a utility like Simple File Joiner. So they have admitted they know about the issue without but not officially.

Tried the utility and it does work however by the time you join files and scrub (as required) you will have spent a load of time and lost all the benefits of going tapeless.

Can anyone shed light as to why this utility can see these frames while Vegas, Premiere, Final Cut cannot?

This is a huge issue so mine are being sent back unless a fix is coming soon. I liked the hard drive for all the obvious reasons but this is a waste of time. Any better suggestions for a hard drive based system?

thanks as always