"Luis, you're mixing up DVCPro tape formats. When Chris said DVCPro, he meant DVCPro25. You're expecting that to mean DVCPro50."

No, I'm not mixing up formats.
I guess I should have clarified and said DVCPro25 so that there was no confusion.

You can see the difference between the formats here:
http://www.adamwilt.com/DV-tech.html

DVCPro25 uses MP tape and runs at 33.82mm/sec, while DVCam runs at 28.215mm/s, and DV runs at 18.81mm/s.


I'll be really suprised if we can record DVCPro25 to a miniDV tape.

My bad... I learned something new, so thanks. I agree, I'd be surprised if miniDV tape could handle that tape velocity too. My confusion came from thinking of the data rate (25mbps) without considering the tape's speed.

Is anyone else a little disappointed that a P2 card isn't included with the camera? Having to put down another $2000 for one 4 gig card sours the taste a bit for me. Even a 2 gig card would sweeten the deal.

"My bad... I learned something new, so thanks. I agree, I'd be surprised if miniDV tape could handle that tape velocity too. My confusion came from thinking of the data rate (25mbps) without considering the tape's speed."

No problem, these things get really confusing sometimes.
Especially when discussing 3 different 25mb/s formats that are essentially exactly the same except for the way they are laid to tape.

Is anyone else a little disappointed that a P2 card isn't included with the camera? Having to put down another $2000 for one 4 gig card sours the taste a bit for me. Even a 2 gig card would sweeten the deal.

Well, I don't think they are even making the 2GB cards anymore.
But, keep in mind that by the time the camera is released, the 8GB cards will be available, and Panasonic has said those cards will run $1700 (the price of a 4gb card today). So, it's safe to assume a 4gb card will be less than $1000 when the camera is released.

Either way, I think the camera is very competatively priced.
I suppose they could have priced it at $6995 and included a 4GB P2 card...
but as they say...6 of one, half a dozen of the other.

Is it safe to assume shooting in DVCam or DVCPro modes are usually louder than regular ol' DV?

BTW - I'm very excited by all the news so far.

"Is it safe to assume shooting in DVCam or DVCPro modes are usually louder than regular ol' DV?

First off, just so there is no confusion, this camera does not shoot in DVCam.
DVCam is a Sony format.

A DVCPro camera is not any louder than a DV camera as far as I know, I'm assuming you mean because the tape transport runs faster?

I don't think it really makes any noticable difference in terms of sound.

I'm sure there will be two bundles when the cam is released. One with cards, and one without. One for $6k, and one for $10k.

Including a card would raise the price, and I'm happy with getting into HD slowly, rather than have to jump in at $10k.

Hey! I know my formats! ;P

Yes, I meant because of the speed. Is it even possible to run MiniDV tape at 33mm/sec?

EDIT - Duh....I guess we don't know for sure yet...Maybe they'll (Panny) come out with their own $20 MiniDV stock made just for the cam.

Great work Luis - it's looking really good. A nice little one stop shop so the rest of us don't have to run around the whole of cyberspace trying to pick up a new smidgen of information

Thanks!

Thanks Josh.
Sorry it's so disorganized...but like I said, I'm just throwing stuff up there as soon as I find it.


by the way, you should be able to get to the same site now by going to:

www.videoindie.com

I read on dvxuser that any old firewire drive would work hooked up to the camera. The camera basically just writes video files to the P2 cards so it can easily write the same files to a hard drive. This means you could get a very cheap external firewire drive and shoot HD. I know this isn't very easy to haul around especially if it isn't battery powered but at least we could use HD on the camera. This should also work hooking up to a computer as well.

As for people saying Panasonic should add more to the price and include a small card. How is that different than you just buying the camera at it's current price and buying a small card at the same time? The price would be the same. You just don't get it in one nice box.

If Panasonic bundled a card, they could give it to us cheaper - maybe even at cost. Then the price wouldn't go up that much. Seeing as we may have to buy them, we need to pay retail. I think if we saw the numbers (What it cost them to make, VS what they sell for) we'd be saving a packet - this is pure speculation of course.


What I'm interested about is the rumour that Panasonic have had it working into an iPod. Now *that* is nice - something that small, attached to a camera would be perfect.

Aaron

If Panasonic allowed people to record to regular hard drives, that would be more shattering new technology then P2 is, in my opinion!

and a sure fire seller!

- Shannon W. Rawls

Jesse is correct. If you stick with the original $10,000 price (actually $9995) you get two 8-gig cards included with the camera.

If you buy just the camera itself, that's what costs $5,995.

camcorderinfo.com says that it only records 8 minutes on the miniDV tapes. Ouch.

and why is it that adam wilt's website says:

HDV records high-definition video on DV tapes:
* 720p is recorded at roughly 19 Mbit/sec while 1080i records at 25 mbit/sec.
* In 720p, the luma sampling matrix is 1280x720, square pixel, exceeding DVCPROHD's 960x720 sampling.
* In 1080i, the sampling matrix is 1440x1080, with 1.33:1 pixels; this is the same luma sampling used in HDCAM and exceeds DVCPROHD's 1280x1080 sampling.

Is recording 100MB/s on DVC Pro HD the crucial difference to give a better image ?

I'm all so confused with the scary world of HD.