Sony Announces New AX100 Firmware with 100Mbp/s

[Cliff Totten]

FANTASTIC news from Sony!

Capture every detail of your life in 4K* with compact new... - Sony

Read at the bottom:

"The FDR-AX100 will also support XAVC S 4K 100Mbps high-bitrate recording through a firmware update scheduled for March 2015."

Thank you so much for this, Sony! This is a SIGNIFICANT upgrade to the AX100 and it does need it badly.

You are going to make ALLOT of happy customers for this.

Excellent job!

CT

[Bruce Dempsey]

Hey CT
Your excitement is contagious. I'm getting worked up about that too but Im not sure what the difference will be visually from current ver2 firmware on my ax100. Will it provide more dynamic range?
tks
Bruce

[Cliff Totten]

No, same DR.

Adding 40 more Mbp/s will add more durability to the codec. You will have less breakdown on higher motion scenes. It will allow you to bend it a bit more in color grading and it should hold itself better.

Today, the current 60Mbp/s does OK but breaks appart very quickly if you try to do any grading to it.

If you think of it as 4 HD quadrents. (yes, I know this is not completely acurate) Today, the AX100 is only giving 15Mbp/s per "HD 1080 area times 4"...now it will be giving 25Mbp/s for that same space.

Anyway...no matter how you see it, 100Mbp/s is WAY better than 60Mbp/s. Nobody can argue that.

[Jack Zhang]

Keep in mind guys this is still 8bit 4:2:0, but with more bitrate. Your pictures will have less macroblocking upon close inspection, but it will not have more dynamic range because it is still 8bit.

[Bruce Dempsey]

I like your quadrant point
So 100 Mbps divided by 4 is certainly not overkill

There is a chart here : http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/converge...-bit-rate.html
by Mike Shell which is illuminating

Betcha card upgrade will be needed to U3

[Jack Zhang]

I actually think the AX100 doesn't support U3, so I'm not certain how that will be pulled off. I know for the Sony Pro cameras they're pushing XQD pretty hard.

[Bruce Dempsey]

I have several Transcend SDXC 64GB U3 95MB/sec Read 60MB/sec Write Ultimate UHS-1 Memory Card in use with the ax100. It loves em Just ordered another on Ebay for 38 bucks

[Mark Rosenzweig]

Originally Posted by Jack Zhang

I actually think the AX100 doesn't support U3, so I'm not certain how that will be pulled off. I know for the Sony Pro cameras they're pushing XQD pretty hard.

I think there is confusion about bus and speed class. The AX100 has a UHS I bus. UHS has, right now, two speed classes, which denote minimum read/write speeds (U1 and U3). U3 guarantees a 30 MB/s minimum write speed.

So, the AX100 can certainly take advantage of U3, as it has the UHS bus. I think it is correct that U3 speed class cards will be needed for 100Mbps video.

See: https://www.sdcard.org/developers/overview/speed_class/

[Cliff Totten]

100 mega BITs per second translates to about 12.5 mega BYTEs per second.

That is well within the scope of allot of modern SDXC cards. (Even UHS 1 cards can do that reliably)

CT

[Mark Rosenzweig]

Originally Posted by Cliff Totten

100 mega BITs per second translates to about 12.5 mega BYTEs per second.

That is well within the scope of allot of modern SDXC cards. (Even UHS 1 cards can do that reliably)

CT

No. UHS Speed Class 1 guarantees a minimum write speed of 10 MB/s. That is NOT enough for 100mbps.

Now, many UHS 1 cards may exceed that minimum, but you have no guarantee. So, the safest option is Speed Class 3 (even though the guaranteed minimum far exceeds 100Mbps). Panasonic, for example, says that you need Speed Class 3 for 4K (100Mbps).

[Cliff Totten]

Agreed, no doubt that faster U3 are what you want.

I'm only saying that my U1 Transcend and SanDisk cards are easily pushing a constant 60+ megaBYTES per second in all my sequential write diagnostic tests as well as common Windows copy.

Even my very old SDHC cards push about 30-40 megaBYTES per second with no trouble.

But yes, "officially" it's only guaranteed for 10. So, it's up to you to trust them or not.

Also, on a bit rate analyzer, I have noticed that the current AX100 codec is actually quiet "variable" indeed. In fact, I have seen lows in the 45Mbp/s range with peaks as high 82MBp/s on occasion.

[Darren Levine]

Nice and all, but where's the x70's 4k firmware

[Cliff Totten]

This AX100 firmware update "could" mean good news for the X70.

If Sony is giving this HandyCam 100Mbp/s 8 bit 4:2:0,...than it "might" mean that the X70 could get 8bit 4:2:2 (long GOP) as it's paid firmware update...who know?...maybe 150Mbp/s? (Being that "XDCAM" is a higher brand than "HandyCam")

Just hoping here....

[Mark Fry]

Originally Posted by Cliff Totten

This AX100 firmware update "could" mean good news for the X70.

If Sony is giving this HandyCam 100Mbp/s 8 bit 4:2:0,...than it "might" mean that the X70 could get 8bit 4:2:2 (long GOP) as it's paid firmware update...who know?...maybe 150Mbp/s? (Being that "XDCAM" is a higher brand than "HandyCam")

Just hoping here....

I doubt it. I'd expect the X70 4k specs to be the same as the AX100. 25p/30p 4:2:0 8-bit. If you need 4:2:2, or 50p/60p or 10-bit, you'll need to buy a more expensive cam (X180? X200?) For me, 25p isn't good enough, but then I'm not really an "early adopter"...

[Bruce Dempsey]

Will this near doubling of the bitrate improve the 30p so it's nearly as smooth as 60p ?