Next week's firmware update for the nanoFlash will include one unannounced feature - 280 Mbps I-Frame-only! Our new Compact Flash I/O algorithim has provided about a 25% improvement in read/write speeds, so we can now bump up the top bit-rate to 280 Mbps.

So far, we have qualified the Sandisk Extreme, Extreme Pro and Extreme IV cards. The Lexar 300X 8/16 GB cards also work well. The PhotoFast 533x 32/64 GB cards are limited to 220 Mbps, but we feel confident the 533X Plus cards will be qualified for the 280 rate (we will confirm next week).

The nanoFlash firmware has auto bit-rate back-off, so if your card is too slow, the bit-rate will automatically be lowered to the next lower rate, until you can record successfully. So, you you can now test any card to determine it's performance, by starting at the top rate and watching the box auto-adjust down to the highest possible.

At 1080p24, using the 280 Mbps, the individual frames are about 1.5 Mbytes in size. This should be sufficient for any single image frame grabs and a wonderful rate for time-lapse work. Also a great rate for cinematography.

NLE testing looks very positive, as the files play fine in FCP and Avid. We plan to test all the NLEs over the next day or so. We will also post some test footage early next week.

We have not moved this code to the Flash XDR yet, but feel confident it should also work without any major issues.

Best-

Dear Friends,

We hope our friends are pleased with today's surprise. This sets a new high quality standard for I-Frame Only (IntraFrame) recording.

We will continue to add additional features to the nanoFlash and Flash XDR over time.
We will add this new feature to the Flash XDR as soon as possible.

We have a very substantial number of Flash XDR's and and nanoFlashes in the field and they are being used on professional shoots quite frequently.

I recently saw footage recorded by the Flash XDR for National Geographic. This footage was shot by using the Flash XDR, before the first nanoFlash was delivered.

The quality of the footage, between the Flash XDR and nanoFlash is identical for any given mode and bit-rate.

I guess it's not a secret anymore. Wooo hoo!

Hi Friends:
280 Mbps Intra ! Yes ! We're marching forward men ! Let us march to 440 Mbps and we win ! - HDCAM SR resolution should be reachable soon :-) I hope the new 90 + Mega Byte per second Sandisk CF cards will afford even higher data rates. I was hoping for a 330 and a 440 rate. Still, this is pretty amazing, because I think the 220 Intra looks as good as Long GOP 100. I am dreaming of a carl Zies Distagon adapted to the front of my XL H1 and to record at 440 Mbps or uncompressed 10 bit (oops ! Sorry ! There goes my obsession again !)

You joke Mark about putting a Zeiss lens on your camera but when I went to buy my XDR, they had an EX3 with a $20,000 Digiprime on it, and I had my camera with a $1,000 Canon ENG lens on it. We had a good laugh about that.

Very cool. I've been asking about uncompressed frame grabs, and this is just getting closer and closer to that.

You joke Mark about putting a Zeiss lens on your camera but when I went to buy my XDR, they had an EX3 with a $20,000 Digiprime on it, and I had my camera with a $1,000 Canon ENG lens on it. We had a good laugh about that....I wasn't joking ! P.S. I would love to put the 20 K digi-prime on my H1 - why not ?

Very cool. I've been asking about uncompressed frame grabs, and this is just getting closer and closer to that....Gints used the un....... word ! :-)

Dan, are both the Long GOP and I-Frame only datarates limited mostly by the write speed of the flash media? Is there an upper limit in the spec for your encoder chip?

Dear Gints,

Yes, there is an upper limit on the Sony Encoder Chip.

And yes, there is a limit imposed by the CompactFlash cards themselves.

And, for reliability purposes, we test very high bit-rates, then back off some.

Reliability under a wide range of conditions is our utmost concern, so it makes sense for use not to be the edge of what works.

We need a certain maintainable speed, but then when we are closing one file and then opening another we need more speed. And when we enable Pre-Record buffer, we need some extra speed.

In any case, when we add a new speed, we do extensive reliability testing.

Is the Sony encoder implemented on a Sony chip or is the encoder code programmed into one of your custom chips? Just curious. If it a trade secret issue, I'll understand.

Dear Aaron,

We purchase a module from Sony. This module contains two of Sony's latest and greatest, sixth generation MPEG-2 encoder and decoder chips.

Each of these chips is a marvel in engineering.

In addition to the Sony module, we have a very capable, high performance FPGA that does quite a bit of work.

Then we have a microprocessor for other tasks, such as working with the user interface and LCD.

The Flash XDR has two FPGA's so that we can support 4 CompactFlash card slots. The nanoFlash needs only one. This helps reduce the power requirements on the nanoFlash.

In addition their are many other chips or custom circuits for other functions, such as audio.

The more I learn about the XDR/Nano, I realize that these boxes are probably capable of many more things. I pray that you guys continue to sell enough of these to finance adding a whole slew of cool features.

This could easily be the best portable recorder ever.

Hi Aaron:
So far it is the best portable solid state digital recorder ever. Mine will be when it comes out. If I live long enough ;-) I'm hoping and praying and patiently waiting for CD to turn on everything that's in the XDR. This would be sweet. Can the XDR and Nano screen's produce any sort of different colors ?

Hello Dan & Mike,
Well done on the new bitrate looks the search for 1TB cards will on now.

Ok Mike. I'll go ahead and test the 280Mbps for you. Feel free to go ahead and send it over.

Thanks, Aaron.

In addition to the 280 Mbps I-Frame Only, we have decided to add 180 Mbps Long-GOP to the upcoming firmware update. Long-GOP has been found to be about 2X to 3X more efficient I-Frame only. So 180 Mbps Long-GOP roughly translates into 400 Mbps I-Frame.

It's not uncompressed, but you get 99.99999% the quality at about 1/6 the data-rate of uncompressed. Most importantly, you get it in a palm sized, low-power, camcorder mountable package that's available today.

Best-

Hi Mike:
You wrote: "It's not uncompressed, but you get 99.99999% the quality at about 1/6 the data-rate of uncompressed."....This is really great Mike. I thank you for this generous update. This is yet another wonderful progression in the evolution of the Flash XDR/Nano Flash products. Now, if you could get to just a slightly higher Long GOP that would be equal to 440 Mbps I - Frame, then we're in HDCAM SR territory ! This is great news.

For some realistic comparison, a Sony HDCAM SR VTR rents for about $2700/week + tape stock. That is about the cost to own a Nano Flash.

Deckhand Video (http://www.deckhandvideo.com/newdeck/deckhand_sonySRW5500.htm)

And this VTR is far from the portability of the Nano.

I think we looking at a comparison of 2 very different animals here. Although I do understand and appreciate the desire to have the Nano and the XDR in such a lofty realm; and I think we are already pretty darn close; and in some ways such as portability and data wrangling we already far exceed.

Hi John:
Agreed.

Dear Aaron,

We purchase a module from Sony. This module contains two of Sony's latest and greatest, sixth generation MPEG-2 encoder and decoder chips.

Each of these chips is a marvel in engineering.

In addition to the Sony module, we have a very capable, high performance FPGA that does quite a bit of work.

Then we have a microprocessor for other tasks, such as working with the user interface and LCD.

The Flash XDR has two FPGA's so that we can support 4 CompactFlash card slots. The nanoFlash needs only one. This helps reduce the power requirements on the nanoFlash.

In addition their are many other chips or custom circuits for other functions, such as audio.

Dan,

Was there/is there any looking at using DNxHD chips? I have to think that Avid makes DNxHD chips, as their DX hardware encodes/decodes DNxHD. Of course these might not be remotely appropriate for the requirements of your hardware, but I've felt that DNxHD is a very good codec that could be used an acquisition format.

... Thinking about it some more, Ikegami's Editcam records DNxHD 145. But how about 175 and 220 8 and 10 bit varieties?

Dear Peter,

The heart of the nanoFlash is the Sony module.

The Sony module does not do DNxHD, sorry.

What cards can handle the 280 I-Frame and 180 Long GOP?

Dear Paul,

The following is preliminary information, subject to change:

SanDisk Extreme 3 32/16/8 Gb CF cards for bit rates up to and including 160 Mbps
SanDisk Extreme 4 16 Gbyte CF cards for bit rates up to and including 280 Mbps
SanDisk Extreme 32 Gb CF cards for bit rates up to and including 280 Mbps
SanDisk Extreme Pro 64/32 Gbyte CF cards for bit rates up to and including 280 Mbps
Delkin UDMA 16 Gbyte CF cards for bit rates up to and including 160 Mbps
Lexar 8/16 Gbyte 300x CF cards for bit rates up to and including 280 Mbps
PhotoFast 533x 32/64 Gbyte�CF cards for bit rates up to and including 220 Mbps

Excellent info thank you Dan.

I look forward to doing some Long GOP test between 100 and 180.

"SanDisk Extreme 32 Gb CF cards for bit rates up to and including 280 Mbps"

Thank you for the flash card update. As a confirmation, the card above is the "60MB/sec (400x)" model?

"SanDisk Extreme 32 Gb CF cards for bit rates up to and including 280 Mbps"

Thank you for the flash card update. As a confirmation, the card above is the "60MB/sec (400x)" model?

Hi Gints-
Yes, this is correct. We have one of these cards in the lab, they perform very well.

Best-

I have to say I have sat on the sidelines watching these discussions and I can no longer contain myself. The nano and the xdr seem to me to be amongst the most exciting products in any field of technology that I am aware of. I am hugely impressed with the progress I have witnessed on these pages over the past few months. I don't own one (I don't even own a camera) but the product concept, the support and development, when taken as a whole, looks astonishing when viewed from afar. Best of luck to Convergent Design, excellent work.

Jonathan you are correct Convergent Designs is the best company I have worked with in my 25 years of shooting. The best product development, best updates on the product (free), and best staff.

Jonathan now you need to buy a HD camera with HD-SDI or HDMI out and enjoy the ride while it pays the bills.

Mike,

So at this point there is no need to buy the Extreme Pro card? Except for the 64GB size.

Dear Paul,

If one wants to purchase a SanDisk card, and get a 64 GB card, then the Extreme Pro is the one currently available. They do not have a 64 GB card in the Extreme (non-pro) line.

Yes, a 60 MBps card is enough for all of our current bit-rates. But, we can not predict the future. Also, there are advantages to having very fast cards, but one has to justify the extra expense.

One should also consider the PhotoFlash 533x 64 GB card. Note that this card is limited to 220 Mbps speeds.

Dear Jonathan and Paul,

Your very kind and public words are greatly appreciated.

Yes, a 60 MBps card is enough for all of our current bit-rates. But, we can not predict the future. Also, there are advantages to having very fast cards, but one has to justify the extra expense.


With USB2 topping out at 480 Mbits/second, the advantages of a read speed faster than 60 MBytes/second are not seen with even the best USB 2.0 readers. Firewire800 or ExpressCard readers are necessary to take advantage of the fastest CF cards. I haven't seen any USB 3.0 flash card readers, although there are some very recent announcements for USB 3.0 PCI-E cards.

So, the remaining current advantage of 90 MB/sec Extreme Pro is that it would write the recording cache and catch up to real-time faster. Are there other advantages to justify spending more for Extreme Pro other than 64 GB?

With USB2 topping out at 480 Mbits/second, the advantages of a read speed faster than 60 MBytes/second are not seen with even the best USB 2.0 readers. Firewire800 or ExpressCard readers are necessary to take advantage of . I haven't seen any USB 3.0 flash card readers, although there are some very recent announcement for USB 3.0 PCI-E cards.

So, the remaining current advantage of 90 MB/sec Extreme Pro is that it would write the recording cache and catch up to real-time faster. Are there other advantages to justify spending more for Extreme Pro other than 64 GB?

Hi Gints-
No real advantage using the Extreme Pro 64GB card. If you want 64GB, I would recommend getting the PhotoFast 64GB card ($299). It has a write speed sufficient for 220 Mbps and a read speed which is very close to the Extreme Pro card.

Best-

Dear Friends,

The USB 2.0 card readers are not the fastest.

One should use Firewire 400 or Firewire 800 if available.

The ExpressCard 34 slot card readers are the fastest. Some are limited to the Mac, so ensure that whatever one you purchase works with your computer.

Jonathan you are correct Convergent Designs is the best company I have worked with in my 25 years of shooting. The best product development, best updates on the product (free), and best staff.
.

And with the best customers of the world:-)

The XDR/nano have been developed with the aim of using existing cameras. But those devices had arrived right in a moment when the concept of "camera" and "camcorder" are changing.
As I see, the last trends point to work with a "lens-captor" system (RED, SLR,..) with uncompress OUT and an independent recorder.
Is a great philosophy and the XDR/nano are really pioneering this area.
rafael

Hi Friends:
When it comes to the Flash XDR or the Nano Flash, I think we all want the same thing. I think we are all dedicated to making the XDR & the Nano the best product it can be, with the coolest features possibly imaginable. I think we the customers, and they, the folks at Convergent Designs, are dedicated to a great SSDR. I think there isn't one person whatsoever in this forum (No matter what their feature request maybe), who's motives are any less than sincerely wanting to improve the products overall. We all put our cash on the table, because we believe in the product. Just my 2 cents worth.

Respectfully,