James, thanks for all this info.
On page 9 of the PDF it seems to make reference to this "Synchro" business

It seems that "synchro" would be a more frame accurate method of simultaneous recording to both tape
and card while stopping and starting.

So could it be that the A1 has this "external REC control"
which in turn solved your problem?

Any update on this? Has this become an option to purchase separately from Sony? Got quiet here all of a sudden..heh.

I've been wondering the same thing, only hoping that someone suddenly breakout the good news. I also tried contacting Sony but always end up at the wrong place.

I suspect (hope) we'll hear more during NAB.

Sorry I forgot to post back. It'll be around 1000 bucks (at least in canada) and look for sept-oct for availability. That's what I've been told by sony so far.

A bit more then I would have liked but hey this is sony, but at least the option exists. I'm hoping NAB will have a focus enchancements reverse engineered one for less bread and maybe a second slot.

Came across this by accident on the Canadian Sony support page. At the bottom of the page is a link to some software that apparently will make the .m2t files usable within FCP. Haven't tried it obviously (I don't use Mac), but thought it might be helpful. Take it for what it's worth.

http://www.sony.ca/hdv/support.htm

I used MPEG Streamclip for years now exactly to bring .m2t files to FCP. The important things to consider are: a) you need to select an appropriate codec to preserve you color fidelity. ProRes is not the best choice as you will add data loss to the data loss of 4:2:0 compression. Uncompressed or SheerVideo are better choices. b) if you shot your material at 24fps remember to enter 23.976 as you frame rate in MPSC in order to have the footage converted appropriately.

To use it with fcp instead of mpeg streamclip use this:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showpost....6&postcount=23

I wonder if the bean counters at Canon have considered how many XH-A1 and XL-H1 owners would buy a solid state recorder designed specifically to match these cams? If Canon released a nice SD or CF writer at a reasonable price (say $500-700?) how many of us *wouldn't* buy it?

And of course in addition to selling these to a high percentage of existing Canon HDV customers, just imagine the overall popularity of a solid state recorder if it included a standard shoe mount?

Honestly I don't understand why a company like Focus Enhancements hasn't already come to market with something like this. No cooling fans or other moving parts, no expensive hard disk, etc.... And they could even market a low end unit with a single slot or a high end unit with 2 rollover slots. Oh well...

I think Canon has a thing or two to learn from Red. Very few people were dreaming with 4K Cameras. Red convinces you that you needed 4K then provided the cameras along with a host of other gears. All I'm saying is that Mr. Jannard is a genius, and Canon is not learnig from it.

Well lets be fair now, you could replace "Canon" with "Sony", "Panasonic" or "JVC" and have the same outcome :)

But lets not deviate into a Red vs Canon discussion here (actually, I think there might already be a thread for that).

Hi Phillip:
No intention in making this a Canon vs Red discussion. It's only that Canon plays it too safe when it comes to Video Cameras but not in photography. I was hoping from them a more aggressive approach to innovation. But anyway I'm fully aware of other choices.

Hey guys, I'm currently an HC1 owner looking to upgrade (but not necessarily replace my HC1), and I am bouncing around from thread to thread finding info. After looking around a bit, I started eyeing the XH-A1 as what would be a good next camera. One of the key points being the $3kish price.

But with my next camera, I really would like to be be able to record both to CF and Tape. My main purpose of this camera will be to record myself doing stand up around the DC area; however, when performing, I usually record other people's stand up performances and sell them their performance as a DVD. This works perfectly because it helps me get back some of the money I'm dropping on my equipment.

So that's where recording to CF would be perfect because I'd like to definitely have a hard backup of my performances in full HD, but may not need to get to it for a while. However, for the other performers, I need to get their DVD to them in about 1-2 weeks. So for them, I would just like to record to CF, get their DVD to them, and once everything checks out, delete their footage.

So that being said, if I haven't bought the XH-A1 yet, but really would like this functionality, should I look into something else? Or is there a very good chance that what we're discussing here for the Z7 will be available for the XH-A1 at a fairly reasonable price (although $700+ is still a bit hard to swallow).

In addition to stand up, I would also like to use this camera to work on a short film or similar project one day. I'm still debating on selling my HC1 if I get this camera because I'm not sure how much I would enjoy taking an XH-A1 to personal events as opposed to the portable HC1.

By the way, I think the OP should change this subject to something a bit more related to what we're missing. I skipped over the thread before finally clicking on it to see what it was all about. And it turns out it discussed what I was interested in.

The A1 has an SD card reader built in.

It would be so simple if this one could also be used for video recording purposes. it might be too slow, but, think of it, one minute... if a much cheaper consumer cam can do this, why not the A1? Any reason to think that the internal hardware is so different?

Unfortunately, I share the feeling that we don't have to expect a firmware update anymore, enabling new, magnificent features, but Canon, if you should read this: the Sony Z7 would look like an old camel with its backpack recorder if you could make the A1 record m2t's on SD-cards as well.

Now just upgrade the A1 with 1/2" chips for better low-light performance, and you'd have a killer camcorder.