[Luke Maslen]

Hi Jordan,

Thanks for this link and I think the key information here is that the customer was using a PowerMac G4. I haven’t tried using a SATA card in a G4 myself but, based upon customer reports, it appears that there just isn’t another bandwidth in the 33 MHz PCI bus to simultaneously run a SATA card with a DeckLink card. I’ve heard from customers with SATA cards from different vendors and they seem to run OK by themselves but not if both cards are installed simultaneously.

This contrasts with G5’s where SATA and DeckLink cards work fine together and this might be a function of the speed of PCI-X slots and/or because of the independant 133 and 100 MHz buses in the G5’s.

I understand the attraction of making an ultra low cost system using a G4 and a SATA card. However it just doesn’t seem to work well when you add other cards, including DeckLink cards. Cards that do work well together with DeckLink cards in a G4 are the ATTO UL3D and UL3S SCSI cards as well as Fibre Channel cards. I find that you should only run two PCI cards in the G4 when using DeckLink cards. If you try to use a DeckLink, UL3D and Apple Fibre Channel card, the cards just won’t work well. Remove any one of these cards and the G4 will perform well again. So it appears to be a bandwidth issue and G5’s don’t have many of these problems compared with G4’s.

Thanks again for the link.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Peter,

You’re welcome and please let us know if you have any further questions.

Thanks Jonathan!

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi,

Thanks for your answers and you have found out everything I wanted to know. Based upon what you have told me, it appears the problem is confined to Final Cut Pro for some unknown reason. Here are some tests which should help to overcome the problem.

1. Maybe your FCP project has a problem. Close the current project and create a new project. Now open Log & Capture and see if the delay disappears. If not, proceed to step 2.

2. Maybe there is a preference that is causing a problem. The Final Cut Pro preferences cache some information and it is possible this preference file is the cause of some problems. Accordingly, create a new Admin account on your Mac. Then log in to that test account, select a Blackmagic easy setup, create a new project and then open Log & Capture and see if the delay disappears. If not, proceed to step 3.

3. There aren’t many obvious possibilities left now but it is possible that Final Cut Pro HD itself is misbehaving and should be reinstalled. You will need to delete the FCP application and then install FCP 5.0 and apply the latest FCP 5.0.3 upater. When finished, reinstall the latest DeckLink drivers.

Hopefully one of these steps will pinpoint your problem. Don’t worry if the version number for Deck Control is still v5.1. It is only the drivers that have been updated to v5.1.2 but not the utilities are still at v5.1.

Please let me know how you go.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Brian,

FireWire 400 is capable of coping with SD-SDI data rates but not HD-SDI which is much higher. Even though FireWire is wonderful for use with DV-based formats, you can only use comparitively short cable lengths and it also suffers from latency issues unlike SDI-based hardware. Our web site contains some brief information about the Serial Digital Interface (SDI) which explains a few of its attributes.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Brian,

Before HD existed, SDI was always standard definition digital video and audio. Since HD became popular, we now have both SD-SDI and HD-SDI standards. When people refer to “SDI”, they might be using the term in a general way to indicate an uncompressed digital connection or they might be implying SD-SDI. If in doubt, it is always worth asking to be sure.

The DeckLink Extreme includes SD-SDI input and output as well as analog connections for your Betacam SP.

We have various cards including ones that can be switched between HD-SDI and SD-SDI. They would not be applicable to your Betacam SP and my guess is that the DeckLink SP is all you will need for the moment unless you already work with Digibeta’s or other SDI-based decks.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Brian,

The DeckLink SP card is all you need for connecting to analog decks such as the Betacam SP. If you also want to connect to a Digibeta sometimes, then the DeckLink Extreme would be good as it has SDI connections for uncompressed digital transfer to the Digibeta. SDI enables you to run cables of up to 300 feet from your DeckLink card to the deck and doesn’t suffer from the latency issues of Firewire over distance. So you can still use FireWire for compressed DV video with cameras and DV decks but if you want to work with high quality uncompressed digital video, then SDI is the way to go. Of course, these comments are not relevant if you are working with a Betacam SP as it is an analog deck. The DeckLink SP card includes an SDI output which would enable you to output SDI video with audio to an SDI monitor or a SDI deck such as a Digibeta.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Michael,

If you have found settings that work well, click on the Save Table button so you can reuse them later if the following suggestion doesn’t help.

Are you using the HDLink default setup or have you chosen the Viper LUT. To choose the Viper LUT, click on the Load Table button, then click on “Built-in Table” and select Viper Filmstream Gamma Correction from the pulldown menu.

Does this help?

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Bill,

Thanks for your information and that does sound encouraging about the Parhelia card with newer drivers. When we get a chance, I hope we can retest this and see if there are any current issues.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Bill,

I’m a intrigued that you seem unaware of the problems given your previous post regarding Parhelia cards.

The reason for specifying a lack of support for the Parhelia cards was due to many customer reports last year indicating problems using them in conjunction with DeckLink cards which did not occur with either NVIDIA or ATI cards. One of the more common reports related to black flashing on the output of DeckLink cards which went away (in most cases) when another card was used. There are other reasons why you might see black flashing including lack of PCI bandwidth or genlock issues. However there certainly have been significant problems in the past and we wished to avoid those. It is possible newer cards or drivers work in harmony with DeckLink cards but I’m not aware of any recent testing of the problem so I couldn’t say for sure either way if the problem remains or if you can use the Parhelia cards reliably with DeckLink cards.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Kurt,

The HDLink utility does not have any capability to alter the brightness controls on your computer monitor. I would suggest checking your Displays preferences and ensuring that the computer monitor is set to be the primary display as it should definitely have brightness controls. In the “Arrangement” tab of the Displays preferences, drag the menu bar to the top of the display which represents your primary display. This might solve your problem.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design