I would first like to preface that I am a regular at a few forums and I know how much it bothers people when nobody searches. I did search but I am not sure if I am just being an idiot or if this really is a unique problem.

With my XH-A1 I would like to capture HDV. I have done this before a few times since I can not afford a HDV deck yet. I know its bad but hopefully soon I'll have another option. What changed is that I let a friend borrow the camera to capture footage from it that I shot in HD for his company. He needed it to be down converted and I figured the best way would be for the camera to do it out of the firewire port.

Anyway, I plugged the camera into my computer (Mac Pro 8x3.0ghz) and tried to capture into final cut pro (6.04) and I can not capture any video in HDV from it. I can't get it in DV either. I don't know what I did, but even though it says HDV on the camera I can't communicate with the deck in HDV, I can communicate with it in DV but I don't get a picture.

I desperately need to solve this problem, I am hoping I am not being stupid and if somebody could help me that would be most appreciated.

Louis Maddalena

I think you might have searched every A1 forum on the planet and not find this issue.

Did your friend connect anything to the firewire port? If he plugged in the camera then plugged a 6-pin connector cable into a computer he might have cooked the A1's port. What makes this scenario somewhat unlikely is that if you fry a port it's generally dead (wrapped in plastic).

You might try to connect the cam to another computer. If it can see the A1 and capture DV complete with picture then the cam's not the problem. And since I'm a PC guy I couldn't help you troubleshoot your Mac.

If you cannot capture to another computer, try a different tape. If the new tape captures but the old one doesn't, then it's a tape problem.

I've been mucking about with finicky technical kit long enough to know that the best way to figure out the source of a problem is to swap out everything you can. That will narrow the number of bits that could be causing problems.

(Did anyone catch the obscure "Twin Peaks" reference? I digress because I can.)

(Did anyone catch the obscure "Twin Peaks" reference? I digress because I can.)

Sorry, I didn't catch the quote, it was too wrapped in plastic. Anyway, the owls are not what they seem.

Yeah... you caught it. Like Jacoby locked onto a fly ball. :p

I’ll throw in hear. I’ve spent the last 2 hours trying to capture HDV into PP2 and Cineform 5.4.3. Worked a few weeks ago, but not today. One thing of interest. When I flip to record mode (to set HDV/24F), I have complete device control. When I flip the dial to VCR/Play “Capture Device Offline”. Am I missing something, or should I just go to bed?

P.S. – Capture with SD 30F still works so the Fire wire port is fine.

I will have to go back and find out what my friend did to the camera. I'll also test everything to do with the camera and swap out computers and tapes until I find what is wrong. Thanks for the advice.