Cineform workstations and hardware suggestions

[David Newman]

Already onto that one. Yes, real-time CineForm compression from HMDI.

[Richard Leadbetter]

I have to admit that I saw the specs for the card and I was absolutely astonished. Blackmagic are looking to redefine the HD capture market - they could have sold the card for double the price and it would still have shifted in large volume. Official CineForm support for it would be a godsend.

As we'd be looking at realtime 10-bit 4:2:2 capture, would this be an addition to Prospect HD? If so, you're welcome to my upgrade dollars.

[Peter Ferling]

David, received my LMD Monitor, but not my HD-SDI input board. While waiting for that, I tried seeing if I could run the HD-SDI preview signal (via Xena HS) to the Canon G1 and passthrough to the LMD's component. No luck, my guess is that the canon's HD-SDI port is output only.

[David Newman]

Correct, the HDSDI on Canon is output only.

[Peter Ferling]

Thanks. I'll have to use overlay via one of the graphic card heads then. There's a PC RGB port on the LMD.

[Rick Geib]

With the arrival in a few days of my firstborn daughter, I have invested much in a Sony HDR-HC3 camera and then another $500 for HD Aspect. But now my computer is just having major problems. The translating of the mp2 to Cineform codec crashes my computer routinely. Now it is even starting to crash in other video rendering applications.

So, I am ready to spend even more money and buy a new computer workstation about six months before I had planned to, and I would LOVE to benefit from the experience of those out there using Premiere Pro and HD Aspect together. I was thinking one of the $2,000 or so Alienware systems.

A few questions: Is it worth it to upgrade to 7,200 up to 10,000 rpm on the hard disk running the operating system and applications?

Is there any specific video card that works better with HD Aspect than others? I was thinking of going with the Standard NVIDIA GeForce7900 GS?

How about for cpus the Intel Core 2 Extreme or the AMD Athlon 64 X2? I would think the former rather than the latter, as the dual core threading would offer benefits, no?

I know many of us want to stay with Windows XP rather than beta test Vista for Microsoft, but would it not be a good idea in the long run to move over to Vista and be ready for two years down the road? When they develop software for it? Go with Vista, as it seems to be the standard in computers sold now?

I am a passionate and fairly knowledgeable amateur and will shoot and HD video in the evenings. I don’t need an external monitor or a RAID or anything that fancy (and expensive).

And I would like to spend around $2,200… and ideas? I already own all the relevant software.

I thank you very much in advance.

[David Newman]

Sorry to hear that your PC is unwell, but congrats on the daughter (I bought my HC1 for the same reason.)

My recommendations : Intel Core 2 Duo 2.66GHz, 2-4GB, a 7200RPM drive for system, 2 x 7200 RPM drives in RAID-0 for your media, most modern graphics card are fine as Aspect HD doesn't need them for acceleration, stick with XP for now.

[Peter Ferling]

Congratulations! I picked up an HC1 for my new son as well. Just last night my 15 year old son was nagging about why his videos were recorded on VHS, and that his younger brother gets hi-def :)