50Mbps DVCPRO50 and Hard Drive Space
 

How many gigs of Hard Drive Space do you need for 10 minutes of 4:2:2 50Mbps DVCPRO50 footage?

It's about 30gigs per hour. So, for 10 minutes about 5gigs.

Thanks Jeff. One final question. Do you know how many gigs you would need for 10 minutes of DVCPROHD (I think that's what Panasonic's HD format is called?)

How is dvc pro transferred, via firewire is another method needed, i have heard the term SDI flown around, but i don't actually know what it is.

Zac

SDI stands for Serial Digital Interface, and DVCPRO 50 is just now being able to be transferred over Firewire by Panasonic. There is no word on their new decks that can do this though…as far as I know. What’s exciting to me is that Firewire 2 (1394b) supposedly can transfer DVCPROHD. So now I just want to know how much HD space DVCPROHD takes up.

Glenn, that is interesting about the firewire 2, only thing i see happening is them waiting for Serial PCI or 64 bit pci, like some server style motherboards have, to become a desktop reality before that becomes a big standard, because the throughput can possibly flood the pci bus, and the ide bus.

But it will be nice when it is all nice and working.

Zac

The new FireWire 800 that Apple has on their new PowerBooks and larger Power Macs will handle present needs adequately. But the specs support forward compatibility to 3200mbps. You can have older FireWire (1) devices on the chain and no slow down occurs. It even supports redundancy, you can loop the drive back into the computer for redundancy when performing live.

Apple doesn't run it's FireWire through the PCI bus (at least to the best of my knowledge, I'm no computer engineer). As far as DVCPROHD, Apple has said they are (will?) Supporting it. The sizes are approximately double, so 10 minutes is about 10gigs. It will also depend on how your shooting (24p, 30p etc.).

>>Apple doesn't run it's FireWire through the PCI bus (at least to the best of my knowledge, I'm no computer engineer).<<

Is this a bad thing, or a good thing?

Here's a link to Apple's FireWire page. You can download a pdf document that might answer more of your questions. My understanding is that the PCI bus could never handle the data at the higher speeds.

Jeff,

I guess thats where you get your Apples and Oranges (pc's).

Again, i use mac's sometimes at uni and am always impressed with the interface, but they are slow, even the best of them are slow. Now if i had always used a mac, i wouldn't have this comparison to make, and in my little head i always forget, they ARE fast enough to do anything i want them to do, it is just they are not as fast as my PC at home. Which to workflow would make almost no difference at all.

Alas, the price barrier will always kill me, Mac's in Australia have priced themselves right out the market, the penetration here is so small it is a joke. You really only find them in educational and BIG business environments, even smaller upstart companie's with people of 20 years experience are suiting up with pc's. It's a little known fact but PC parts are cheaper here than almost anywhere in the world, our proximity to Asia and our low tax's on electrical components ( not complete items) but parts are really low. We are around 10% cheaper than singapore or hong kong if you know where to look here.

Ohh to dream of winning the lotto, getting out of my horribly hard uni course and just making movies and owning a small theatrical theatre, one day i will do it.

Btw Jeff i am thinking of pissing off to America and a few other places, got spare part of the floor or couch for me?? :-) (smiley face to show i am not an old fart)

Zac

Your welcome any time Zac. I can't speak for other markets, but the price gap is really narrowing here between Macs and PC's when you compare all the factors.

New processors are due soon (G5?) based on the IBM 970. I think by the beginning of next year you'll see Macs challenging the PC's again, in speed. It may take quad processors but you'll see some pretty impressive machines soon.

But you're 100% right that it's about workflow. I edit on an almost 3 year old dual processor G4 450. It's only starting to show it age against some of the PC's I occasionally edit on. But for personal projects it's more than adequate.

Hey Jeff,

Here in Australia, i got 2x 19" specialised for Graphics CRT flat monitors, P4 3gz, fully loaded motherboard w/ 1gb LAN firewire usb2 SATA+raid Bluetooth 5.1channel, radeon 9500 pro, pioneer a05 burner, liteon 52x cd burner, 2x seagate 120 gig HD's, Antec server case + 420w power supply, 1.5gb ram and a canon printer for quite a bit under $1500 USD.

The imac's basic package (15 inch monitor, 256mb ram, hardly useful for any majoy work basically) start at 1.5k USD here, hard to justify really.

Zac