I'm doing some tests for a possible promo and am wondering if I can use my laptop as a basic monitor via firewire. I don't have any additional software and not sure how the computer will respond. It also has 4 pin which I believe does not have power shorting issues, is this correct?

Thanks in advance, Greg.

I'm doing some tests for a possible promo and am wondering if I can use my laptop as a basic monitor via firewire. I don't have any additional software and not sure how the computer will respond. It also has 4 pin which I believe does not have power shorting issues, is this correct?

Thanks in advance, Greg.
Hi Greg,

Have you considered using HDVRack? It really is a great software for laptop use (PC only).

S.Noe

Hi Stephen,
I plan on getting round to using dv/hdv rack but this test is on Wednesday and I don't have any software. Do you know if I can just connect straight to a pc laptop and use it as a monitor somehow or will I need software of somekind?

Regards, Greg.

Hi Stephen,
I plan on getting round to using dv/hdv rack but this test is on Wednesday and I don't have any software. Do you know if I can just connect straight to a pc laptop and use it as a monitor somehow or will I need software of somekind?

Regards, Greg.
HDVrack has a 10 fully functioning trial. If you are doing a one day test and your laptop meets the specifications, the trial might be the best answer.

The question I have about HDV rack is how much delay is there between the action and the image on the laptop screen? Because I think it would be hard to use it to pull focus unless there is maybe 2 frames or less of delay.

But if that baby is realtime then I think I'm getting one... I only hope I can get it to work with my Mac Power Book (via Boot Camp and all that).

So is there any delay? Anybody here used it to pull focus?

Hi Greg,

Have you considered using HDVRack? It really is a great software for laptop use (PC only).

S.Noe

Do you know of software for the MAC as monitor?

I have been thinking of ditching the big Sony monotor and getting this one for my mac laptop:

http://www.redlightningsoftware.com/Home.html

I have posted a couple of time to find out if anyone has used it and I did not get any replys. It looks pretty nice.

Do you know if I can just connect straight to a pc laptop and use it as a monitor somehow or will I need software of somekind?
You will need some kind of software. The HD100 sends out an MPEG2 transport stream and something on the computer needs to decode that into viewable images.

HDVRack is probably your best bet if you are a PC user. It has a lot of other very useful features beyond just monitoring, so it's well worth the price.

However, if you're only looking for a decent monitor and nothing else, consider getting a Gateway FPD2185W LCD computer monitor. It has HD analog component video inputs that work great with the HD100, and it's been coming down in price (was $799 CDN in April, now $499 CDN on sale this week - not sure about price/availability in the UK, though).

Are you going to shoot DV or HDV?

That Red Lightning Software monitor looks like it only works in a SD mode, not HD. They show an HVX hooked up but from the look of it (4x3 with letterboxing for 16x9) it's running in SD. I could be wrong but I can't find anything on the site that claims it's doing HDV monitoring.

I have tried, with fail, in our studio monitoring HDV with our sony SD monitor and learned the hard way, it's only good for framing, period.


Using a laptop to try and monitor is a bad idea, keep looking. Just an opionion, but you asked. ;)

Are you going to shoot DV or HDV?

That Red Lightning Software monitor looks like it only works in a SD mode, not HD. They show an HVX hooked up but from the look of it (4x3 with letterboxing for 16x9) it's running in SD. I could be wrong but I can't find anything on the site that claims it's doing HDV monitoring.
This page says that the Red Lightening software is SD only:
http://www.redlightningsoftware.com/Download.html

I tried the HDV rack demo and there is a really, really, REALLY long delay even when you set it at lower resolution. You can't operate with it at all as a monitor.

It's still good to light with I guess because of the waveform and I may still buy it, but if you need to lug around another monitor anyway why not just light with that?

I wish the HDV trial was longer. It might have given me a chance to test it more than once and work out some of the issues.

Thanks Eric,

Very interesting. Out of interest what setup did you run the software on. Only asked because I'm wondering if the lag is due to slow processor or something. Doesn't sound to good as a monitor though if you were running it on a suitable system.


Greg

You will need some kind of software. The HD100 sends out an MPEG2 transport stream and something on the computer needs to decode that into viewable images.

HDVRack is probably your best bet if you are a PC user. It has a lot of other very useful features beyond just monitoring, so it's well worth the price.

However, if you're only looking for a decent monitor and nothing else, consider getting a Gateway FPD2185W LCD computer monitor. It has HD analog component video inputs that work great with the HD100, and it's been coming down in price (was $799 CDN in April, now $499 CDN on sale this week - not sure about price/availability in the UK, though).

Hey Earl,

Where's the sale?

Hey Earl, Where's the sale?
The sale's on at Futureshop (http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?sku_id=0665000FS10066952&catid=22335&logon=&langid=EN) until the end of October. It says "Clearance" in the index so they may not be around long.

Thanks Eric,

Very interesting. Out of interest what setup did you run the software on. Only asked because I'm wondering if the lag is due to slow processor or something. Doesn't sound to good as a monitor though if you were running it on a suitable system.


Greg

It was a 2GHz Pentium M notebook running win XP. I'm getting a new notebook in another week or so - probably an Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0 GHz which should be slightly better. I doubt it will make much difference in usability as a monitor to operate from but I plan to test HDV rack again anyway. I'll post results then.

I should also say that I was testing HDV rack in HDV mode. I didn't test DV.

2gig P-M is really scraping the bottom for this app. Yes dual-core (AMD or Intel) will help a lot. Also make absolutely sure it has ATi or Nvidia GFX, don't go for anything else regardless of how cheap. And the faster the better. I also recomend turning off all of the HDVrack racks that you do not need. There is also a huge amount of speed to be gained by reducing the mpeg2 level. I frames only ect.. It really helps, and your still getting great rez compared to most field monitors. De-frag your drives! And preferably use a 2.5" 7200rpm external(fully USB powered).
VideoLan's VLC player is a freeware product that does stream capture. Its a great zero budget laptop monitor solution and capture. Woks on all platforms.

Hi Eric,

Well your setup certainly sounds like it souldn't present a problem for The Rack software. I will be interested to hear your results when you upgrade but as you said I can't imagine that making a significant difference. Although it would be great to get the HDV signal I do have a tv tuner module for my laptop and I'm now wondering if I could just get a signal into that via s/video. Component would be better of course but to get componenet in I would imagine I would need a hardware bridge of somekind (Kona/Blackmagic) which I believe are pretty expensive. Anyone familiar with this stuff

Regards Greg

You can use your svideo in as a TV-tunner monitor, but it will be in SD of course. But if you really need real time, that will work.

no one has ever given a satisfactory explanation of what dv rack does that most nle's can't. I used edius 4 for live capture. seemed to do everything dv rack can do. I tried using dv rack's monitor and it was really hard t calibrate.

Daniel, Please do share WHY you feel using a laptop to try and monitor is a bad idea, I am exploring setup options for an upcoming shoot and have been considering a computer monitor.

Using a laptop to try and monitor is a bad idea, keep looking. Just an opionion, but you asked. ;)

Daniel, Please do share WHY you feel using a laptop to try and monitor is a bad idea, I am exploring setup options for an upcoming shoot and have been considering a computer monitor.

Malcom,
It's only an opinion and personal preference. My experiences have just not been as consistant going that route. We tend to try everything first using existing tools, so I know where you are coming from. And we have some beefy laptops so we went that route for a short while. A lot of guys around here use HDVRack with good results, just not for us.

In a pinch, with nothing other than the cameras view finder or LCD to monitor from, I might use HDV Rack. But if I could carry only one, a laptop or an LCD with component inputs, I'll take the pixel for pixel monitoring of the component device any day. I have had both the joy and frustration of editing enough of my own footage to know what provides me with the type of feedback for the best results consistently (that being the key word). Besides, when the shoot dictates my not using a good source for monitoring (say via component), more times than not the laptop is equally unfitting.

Sorry, I know it's not always easy to compare everything first hand before you invest in one route or another, but I feel that this is one of those type of things that you should experience first hand, in order to make a decision that works best for you.

Remember to share your findings, you may go a different route with a whole new set of preferences. ;)

The biggest problem with using a laptop and HDV rack is the lag. Besides the normal firewire delay there is a minimum 2 GOP delay in decoding and presenting the MPEG2 stream to the screen. On the JVC that's 2 x 6frames or half a second. On the sony that's 30frames.

The feedback on this forum seems to be that HDv rack is a great tool for capturing and lighting and setting levels (including audio), but as a "live" monitor for tracking action and pulling focus it would not be usable in HDV.

In standard DV I believe it is purely the firewire delay.