Saw a Media Composer demo live tonight

[Vito DeFilippo]

Originally Posted by Perrone Ford

I suspect this is because I used the Mpeg2 option.

I suspect that's it as well. I've never had success trying to import mpeg2 with Avid.

I looked at the Mac instruction booklet (it's different than the PC one) and it appears that there are specific FCP drivers much like the Avid ones. So you can actually do your normal capture from inside FCP using the Matrox box. That should let you choose whatever codec you'd like.

I've just checked out the manuals as well. Looks like in Windows it won't work, cause the MXO2 captures to *.avi, which doesn't work with AMA, I think. In Mac, it will capture to Quicktime, but using the Matrox codec, if I'm understanding the manual correctly. But if Avid's claims are correct, AMA should work on these files.

Thanks for the info, Perrone. It's much appreciated.

[Perrone Ford]

I took some time and did another capture, but in uncompressed 8bit. That didn't work in Avid either. So MC4 is ignorant of the Matrox codecs.

I would LOVE to see someone do this in a quicktime file though and see if AMA will pick it up. If that works, I am going to scream loudly at Matrox since once again, Macs will be getting something the PCs aren't, and for no reason at all.

[Peter Moretti]

Shaun, I know you've thought a lot about this, but I don't want someone else to read this and get the "wrong" idea.

Nitris DX is NOT the only capture box that will work natively w/ MC. Mojo DX will as well. It's by no means cheap, but it's also substantially cheaper than Nitris DX.

[Peter Moretti]

Originally Posted by Perrone Ford

I took some time and did another capture, but in uncompressed 8bit. That didn't work in Avid either. So MC4 is ignorant of the Matrox codecs.

I would LOVE to see someone do this in a quicktime file though and see if AMA will pick it up. If that works, I am going to scream loudly at Matrox since once again, Macs will be getting something the PCs aren't, and for no reason at all.

Perrone, I know Cineform has a utility program called HDLink that can convert AVI to MOV by rewrapping (no transcode). Not sure if it only works w/ Cineform encoded files or any AVI.

[Perrone Ford]

Originally Posted by Peter Moretti

Perrone, I know Cineform has a utility program called HDLink that can convert AVI to MOV by rewrapping (no transcode). Not sure if it only works w/ Cineform encoded files or any AVI.

It's no biggie. I've got tools to do a transcode if I need it.

[Shaun Roemich]

Originally Posted by Peter Moretti

Shaun, I know you've thought a lot about this, but I don't want someone else to read this and get the "wrong" idea.

Nitris DX is NOT the only capture box that will work natively w/ MC. Mojo DX will as well. It's by no means cheap, but it's also substantially cheaper than Nitris DX.

ABSOLUTELY. Just comparing the full I/O options of the Matrox MXO2 box against the same/similar feature set in AVID hardware and one needs to jump to Nitris IF one needs/wants ALL the same connectivity.

For my needs/wants for my NEXT box, I would feel more comfortable having an "anything in/anything out" solution (minus of course 2k/3k/4k) and with out a doubt, that comes with a price. I am seriously looking at "jumping ship" but it needs to work on several fronts; affordability being one, workflow and reliability being significant others.