CitiDisk HDV - Now on sale - but nobody is talking about it?
 

How come nobody is talking about the CitiDisk HDV DTE recorder. its small and sleek and very lightweight. It records DVCPRO50 and more importanlty in this day and time - HDV.

The ONEHUNDREDEDGIGABYTE model is only $850 bucks and you can buy it from their website @ http://www.shining.com/products/tota.../citidisk_hdv/

100GB equates to 9 HDV hours. Thats 9 Mini DV tapes!

Looks very interesting and promising. How come nobody is talking about this unit here? Did I miss someting in my absence?

- ShannonRawls.com

Shannon,

It really looks good in the ad. But for the past year I have been tracking the CitiDisk and it dosen't appear to have a very good track record with users. I hope I am wrong because I am really hoping to move up as cheaply as possible to the DVCPro50 format.

Regards,

Mark

I reviewed the site more closely and couldn't find anything on the terms and length of warranty. They say check the owner's manual with the product. That is not so good.

Ahhhhh warranty smarranty.... it's only money!

Buy one and test if for me....so I can see if I should spend "my" money on one. *smile*

- ShannonRawls.com

DV Expo booth
 

Well, they have a booth atthe DV Expo West, Ill go check them out.

Long time no see, I remember seeing this on HD for indies a while ago.

Sounds good, but too bad there is no HD-SDI input - for use with the XL H1.

HD-SDI would be a feather in the cap. If it can do reliable HDV recording and reliable DVCPRO50 recording...that would be monumental in and of itself. Especially for SDX900 users and all HDV users.

and quite frankly...the price is nice! I mean 850 bucks for a 100gigabyte DTE solution for HDV is worth trying...'Cause 19 quality HDV minidv tapes/hours of HDV footage (which is what it will fit) is $200 bucks no matter how you slice it, so even if it only works for two or three feature films and then takes a dump on you, it was worth the try.

I'm just waiting on a report.

- ShannonRawls.com

I recently bought an regular CitiDISK DV 100Gb and I can only say nice things about it. It´s simple and easy to use - just the way I want it. I don´t now anything about the HDV version - but it should be the same as DV.

I almost bought one until I was told that you CANNOT playback anything you just recorded, so if you are in the field and spent a whole day shooting you won't see anything until you get back and load it onto the computer. Tell me if I am wrong, but I spoke to the guys at the DV expo. They didn't seem to know a whole lot, but it sure looks like a mUCH better option than the DR-100U for the JVC HD100U.

You're wrong. *smile*

Quick Play Last Captured Scene and Play All Captured Scences(NEW)

• "QPLAY" last captured HDV/DV/DV50 streams on viewfinder when setting camera to VCR mode.

• Navigating history clips is also possible by "Press-n-Hold" "QPLAY" button for over three seconds.

How do you like them apples? *smile*

That's why I don't understand why people aren't rushing this thing. If it works for 24f HDV with accurate timecode (because i like to use free-run timecode on all my projects), then i'm all over it.

- ShannonRawls.com

I've asking about it too. If you get one please keep me updated.

-Nate

Actually I am not wrong. I spoke to the company at DV Expo and they told me that feature is only available on the DV version, NOT the new HDV version and won'tbe available for a while, so unless you are shooting DV only you CANNOT playback the footage etc until you load on a computer. So much for a potential great harddisc recorder.But time will fix it.

wow, now that would be BLATENT false advertisment and reason to return 100% of their sold units. They advertise that on the HDV version of their product, says HDV in the specs, and even on the forthcoming DVCPROHD version, it says the HDV version can NOW do it...and it says "NEW".

Mybe the people you spoke with didn't know about the software update....but that would be like COMPAQ claiming they have DVD player on the laptops...and when you get it, it only plays CD-R's.

I have a feeling it will do Q-Play for HDV.

- ShannonRawls.com

Well - Just purchased the Citidisk 100 HDV and an external battery. I don't have an HDV camera yet, but I know for me its not too far off.

I should have it tomorrow or wednesday and I am going to run some tests on it to see how it holds up - the biggest of which will be an all day shoot (wedding) in a few weeks. Of course I will be shooting tape as well - but the main reason for me buying this was to eliminate capturing when possible and also have a back up. I use brand new tapes for every shoot - but I think with this I will reuse the thousands of tapes I have that have only been used once (any one think this should be ok? I understand drop outs are more suseptable on reused tapes, but I also understand technically you can reuse mindv tapes 6 or so times before problems should occur...?)

My other goal with this is to create a bottom bracket so I can mount it under my GL2 and then mount a quick release on the bracket...when I get the bad boy and do some thorough testing I will let you know what I think!

-Matt

I don\'t know anything about the CitiDisk, but personally I wouldn\'t re-use tapes. Considering how cheap a blank tape is, why would you want to take any chance for the few dollars it might save? If you really feel the need to recover some money from your "thousands of tapes" you could always offer them for sale.