[Mike Maloney]

Since I started this monger I’ll add this: I believe that Peter may be correct…it’s the G5. It is an older model, a 2.5 dual with X slots. I’ve a 2.66 in the house which I’d like to take away from the web department and stick the KONA LH card in, loaded up Pro Tools 8.0, FCP 6.04 and see if that makes a difference. Problem is in a busy agency, we’re all working our Macs to their fullest. My company is no different. It’s what we do…how we make the rent money.

I tried the dual boot scenario with no luck. The KONA only runs on the 133mhz bus, so you can’t just switch over to a different slot. A design flaw on the early G5’s. But, it’s fine for SATA cards, etc.

I have just dumbed down. I have gone back to a G4 in the video suite running a simple 7.4 version of Pro Tools which is fine for our audio for video. It just adds a step to the process of networking the files over to the other computer. (or sticking in a jump drive and pulling off the AIFF files).

I am surprised to the small extent that this situation has occurred or others have responded. All in all more money means better technology. I need a newer Mac Pro and that’s probably the best answer…or spend the money, get a new Mac Pro and KONA 3.

For what it is worth: the ProAxcess line of DigiDesign is a premium but “thank goodness it’s there” service. At $3 a minute ($75 cap per call) you get a Senior tech that knows the product and the Mac.

On the other hand, AJA is amazing for their service. I’m blown away by their “give our customers the best” attitude. It’s incredible in this industry.

I can’t fault either and admittedly should look inward to the computer.

Mike Maloney

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

That’s encouraging.

My set up is a Digi002 rack and the KONA is PCI-X.

MM

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

I don’t know, exactly, other than to say I tried this and it did not work for me. I’m using an LH card, which is the X slot version. That could be the problem. Basically, I cannot run Pro Tools and use a KONA card on the same computer.

It was something that suddenly started, which is the thing that bugs me. Trying a simple AIFF import into Pro Tools kept crashing the program. So, I upgraded to V. 8.0 LE thinking that might be a solution. No. It was not.

I spoke at length with DigiDesign who suggested it might be one of the cards and as it turns out, take out the KONA card, all is well with Pro Tools. Put KONA LH back and crash.

I did a very serious bit of work with the DigiDesign people on my system, over an hour on their Pro Axcess Line.

Ultimately, for me, I don’t have the right combination of product. And while it’s disappointing, I am sure that a newer KONA card or if DigiDesign (an Avid Company) decides it wants to address it, there’ll be a fix one day.

In the meantime, I run Pro Tools 7.4 on a G4 at another work station and import files the old fashion way.

Mike Maloney

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

That’s a good concept. Two boot drives. I guess the question arises: how did you come to that decision? I’m going to try your application.

I’ll be back!

Mike Maloney

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

Since you asked, I made that decision not based upon Final Cut, but rather Pro Tools. I’ve had a litany of issues with the software and it was decided that the best work around was to start with a fresh OS platform. FCP has run fine. No one ever wants to reinstall things from the ground up, least of all me.
But, after repairing disk permissions, deleting preferences, uninstalling, reinstalling, etc., ad infinitum,
the Pro Tools tech and I both agreed a fresh system might solve some of those issues. Turns out, however, it’s hardware related.

MM

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

Just when you think you’ve got this beast collared, Quicktime changes it’s mind. Thanks for the suggestions, I’m going to try a reinstall of DVDSP without running the upgrade. It was on the original version of Studio 2, otherwise I would have never found it to begin with.

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

My breakout box on my KONA LH card began glitching audio yesterday. After about 3 minutes of extremely positive dialog with Hector, we isolated the issue. RMA issued, new box on the way from FEDEX today. Simple, quick, positive and professional.

I had a problem with JVC HD-BR50 earlier this week, talked with JVC tech and still no response back.

When I need another video card…there’s no question about where I’m going. Can’t say the same about video decks and cameras.

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

I guess I’m answering my own post and after doing some research (and reading more forum business) it’s starting to become clear I also contacted JVC just to see what their tech support had to say.

A) I rehooked up the firewire to thee G5, set the capture codec to Apple Pro Res and let it capture on the fly. Worked okay. So that tells me that the glitch (at least in 24 frame capture) is not within the KONA set up and my old MEDEA SCSI’s kept up with the capture without any problems. This again is on a BR-HD50. The real issue is that with a large project, this is not a very convenient way to capture clips.

B) JVC was not sure why all the other errors though and since I’m using JVC tape, it ruled out foreign issues with their compatibility. I’m still dubious of the issue of “unthreaded tape” with the RS-422 and component hookup. However, it was nice to be able to talk with a JVC tech and I did learn how to reset the machine (didn’t do any good, however.)

I’ll keep forging along.

Mike Maloney

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

True enough. The Medea cranks just slightly over 100 MB/sec. The internal SATA drive does not quite hit 90 MB/sec. The AJA white paper suggests 150 MB/sec is necessary to push HD, so I’m apparently back on a course to duplicate Richard’s system with the SATA controller and a different Raid configuration. Time for the old system to retire.

Thanks for the wisdom.

Mike Maloney

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com
beartoothrecording.com
mmg.bz

[Mike Maloney]

Thanks for the white paper from KONA, that’s precisely what I was looking for in the research.

Of course, and it’s an Apple thing, providing some additional support in the firewire domain would be very helpful.

All the best,

Mike Maloney

Mike Maloney
Maloney Marketing Group
maloneymarketinggroup.com