Dan Euritt
June 7th, 2004, 02:14 PM
the staff at mcetech are friendly enuf, and they have promised me a prompt refund.
so the issue isn't in dealing with mcetech, it's too many problems with the quickstream dv itself.
i tested it by recording a one-hour tape to it, and found that the real showstoppers are:
1) when recording in avi mode, the audio stops recording a full 30 frames before the end of the clip, when doing continous recording... the picture continued to be recorded, just no audio with it at all.
2) when the recording on the tape stops, the final clip on the quickstream is so badly corrupted that premiere 6.5 refuses to accept it... you can see the clip play back with windows media player, but the audio is totally out of sync.
3) the quickstream mount was too wide to fit on both my xl1 and my xl1s.
those issues should be present on all quickstream dv's, or at a minimum, all of 'em that use the xl1s to record data from.
other issues include:
4) corruption of both video and audio portions of the files, including one segment where i had nothing but pixellated blocks of garbage data for several seconds, after which the file continued on like nothing had happened.
5) totally dysfunctional on-off slide switch, that is completely recessed beneath the face of the unit, requiring a pin to manipulate correctly... you could use an ink pen, but you'll then have to press hard on the top of the switch to turn it on, so you'll soon compromise the delicate nature of this type of switch.
6) rubber mounting that was way too hard to absorb any shock... this unit should be internally shock-dampened instead, so that when it's mounted on the camera, the hard drive will be protected... there also should be some decent heat ventilation on the case.
7) i was unable to erase the clips on the drive with the erase button... it did not appear to function at all, and there is no way to tell how much room is left on the drive, unless it's hooked up to a computer.
8) the drive defaults to .mov recording mode, which is unfortunately not compatible with a pc running premiere 6.5... the .mov file appears to be a wrapper around raw dv data, but since premiere accepts .mov's, there is something wrong with the quickstream-generated .mov.
9) using the front buttons to change recording formats was a real p.i.a.
in general, all of these types of portable video hard drive recording units are absurdly overpriced for what they offer... when i can get a bare x-drive pro for $119, that comes with a usb port, lcd screen, multiple card slots, onboard battery, mp3 player, etc., you can see where the market should be headed... put in a real-time firewire port instead of usb, all it takes is the right firmware and chipset.
so the issue isn't in dealing with mcetech, it's too many problems with the quickstream dv itself.
i tested it by recording a one-hour tape to it, and found that the real showstoppers are:
1) when recording in avi mode, the audio stops recording a full 30 frames before the end of the clip, when doing continous recording... the picture continued to be recorded, just no audio with it at all.
2) when the recording on the tape stops, the final clip on the quickstream is so badly corrupted that premiere 6.5 refuses to accept it... you can see the clip play back with windows media player, but the audio is totally out of sync.
3) the quickstream mount was too wide to fit on both my xl1 and my xl1s.
those issues should be present on all quickstream dv's, or at a minimum, all of 'em that use the xl1s to record data from.
other issues include:
4) corruption of both video and audio portions of the files, including one segment where i had nothing but pixellated blocks of garbage data for several seconds, after which the file continued on like nothing had happened.
5) totally dysfunctional on-off slide switch, that is completely recessed beneath the face of the unit, requiring a pin to manipulate correctly... you could use an ink pen, but you'll then have to press hard on the top of the switch to turn it on, so you'll soon compromise the delicate nature of this type of switch.
6) rubber mounting that was way too hard to absorb any shock... this unit should be internally shock-dampened instead, so that when it's mounted on the camera, the hard drive will be protected... there also should be some decent heat ventilation on the case.
7) i was unable to erase the clips on the drive with the erase button... it did not appear to function at all, and there is no way to tell how much room is left on the drive, unless it's hooked up to a computer.
8) the drive defaults to .mov recording mode, which is unfortunately not compatible with a pc running premiere 6.5... the .mov file appears to be a wrapper around raw dv data, but since premiere accepts .mov's, there is something wrong with the quickstream-generated .mov.
9) using the front buttons to change recording formats was a real p.i.a.
in general, all of these types of portable video hard drive recording units are absurdly overpriced for what they offer... when i can get a bare x-drive pro for $119, that comes with a usb port, lcd screen, multiple card slots, onboard battery, mp3 player, etc., you can see where the market should be headed... put in a real-time firewire port instead of usb, all it takes is the right firmware and chipset.