ADS Pyro DV Drive for direct to disk recording
 

With very little fanfare, ADS Tech has released to market their direct to disk capture for DV cameras. Here's the features they list at their website www.adstech.com :

Easy, one-button capture to hard drive
Capture digital video directly to disk in the field
Capture to your DV camcorder and PYRO DV Drive
Simultaneously record and backup
Ultra Portable 30 GB 2.5” IDE hard drive
Rechargeable via 6-pin 1394/FireWire port
Compatible with editors supporting DV format
Save hours of capture time
Two hours rechargeable lithium ion battery
External Power Supply Adapter
Pocket-size, leather belt pouch inc

and at $700, a damn sight cheaper than the FS-3 or CAPDIV systems

It's called the Pyro DV Drive....

Looks quite interesting. I'm wondering whether this will work
WITHOUT tape as the FireStore does.

Anyone seen any reviews on it? 30 GB isn't much for $700 though,
these things are still too expensive for my taste.

Rob....

I took delivery on one about two weeks ago and have been using it on shoots with my XL1s. I fabed a mount for it so it sits right on my MA100. It's functions are really pretty simple. Hit the "record" button and the disk begins recording the video stream from the firewire port. No need to hit the record button on the camera, so this device works as long as the camera is turned on and the drive record function is enabled. It can be inconvenient to hit the button while one is looking thru the fiewfinder, but, with a little practice, it becomes second nature.

Plugged into the computer 1394 port, it looks like a removeable drive and you can access the recorded AVI's instantly. The drive gives you the option of storing as AVI, Quicktime, or raw DV.

The data thruput is a little low for a modern IDE drive, but, DV doesn't need that much anyway. I tested about 25 Mb/sec.

Extremely convenient and NO head wear.

So that means it doesn't support the DV link mode when we tell
the XL1s a recording device is connected and it start recording
when you hit REC on the XL1s?

That would be a real bummer and miss if they haven't included
that. I know not every camera supports it, but it's just a
protocol that they would have needed to implement.