Apple Firewire Missing ????

[Steve Nunez]

Hello everyone.
I am running a G5 Dual 2.5GHz with 2.5GB Ram. I've recently upgraded to Tiger OS X and when I start FCP HD I get a message saying "Unable to Locate Apple Firewire Dv NTSC" something like that and I lost the video preview when capturing- but still retain log and capture control. I've trashed the prefs and still no preview- anyone have a clue as to what's going on?

[Boyd Ostroff]

Lots of problems reported with FCP 4.5 on Tiger. Have you downloaded the latest update:

http://www.apple.com/support/downloa...macosx104.html

Unfotunately, over at Apple's support forums people say the update still doesn't fix a variety of things. If you don't get a response here you might want to read about some of the problems there:

http://discussions.info.apple.com/we...2mT.1@.ee6bcd7

Personally I'm staying away from Tiger until I have time to deal with all these issues, which might be late next fall. Let us know if you find a resolution to your problems.

[Steve Nunez]

Boyd, thanks.......checking out those pages now.
The ProApp download did nothing to fix the problem......FCP refuses to use my trusty mini DV camcorder that has worked with FCP 1.0 and up- Tiger has absolutely destroyed FCP HD for me- funny thing is iMovie has no problems at all using the same camcorder- I tried it for kicks but don't use iMovie at all.....

.....i'm a big MAC fan but this has certainly put me off a bit....most frustrating!!!!!!

(Note: none of my older FCP projects can be read- it says the file seems to be corrupt!!!!!! Tiger doesn't seem to be as good as they're making it out to be- I hope APPLE doesn't start going the Microsoft route rushing out programs, etc that aren't ready or stable!)

So for now my fancy Dual 2.5GHZ G5 is nothing more than a glorified iTunes computer- I got into Macs for video editing and if my premier app FCP is dead- the G5 is dead to me also!

[Boyd Ostroff]

Something sounds wrong there, I haven't heard of the file corruption problem before. Not that it's any consolation (more like insult added to injury), but Apple has never claimed FCP 4.5 was Tiger-compliant. Hopefully you'll find a solution over on Apple's forums, there are some pretty sharp people there.

Everyone... please be sure you have plenty of time before contemplating a Tiger upgrade, and keep a backup of your old, working system in case you have this kind of problem.

[Steve Nunez]

Boyd,

I've thoroughly researched this issue all night on the Apple Forums- it seems TONS of people are having this same problem along with a slew of other problems as well. There is a fix that works but it's not pleasant: it seems everyone who is experiencing the problems I have, are people who elected to "upgrade" their OS X to Tiger via the "Upgrade" option (which is the most popular option by far) rather than do a complete HD reformat and complete new Tiger install- which seems to be the only option that allows FCP to work as usuall......this is of course a big problem for most users and would mean a complete primary HD backup and probably hours and days of application reinstalls. I have tons of small apps and would HATE to have to get all the installers back and re-install everything again- not to mention updates etc.....

.....Apple has to address this as TONS of posts are out on the Pro Forums discussing this apparent problem with upgraded Tiger installs and FCP as well as a few other pro apps which are not behaving the same (Garageband has some serious problems too).
My research has shown tons of threads regarding miniDV capture, Sony FX1 HD problems, timeline problems etc.....

....so be warned either delay your Tiger "Upgrade" or be prepared to do a complete HD reformat and fresh install of Tiger on the primary HD- otherwise problems will likely surface........good luck to all.

[Steve Nunez]

I will likely buy a 400GB SATA drive and try a full Tiger OS install on that HD to see if the problems go away......this is not the ideal "fix" for most users- Apple will have to address this flaw eventually.

I'll post the results when I get the new HD in and Tiger installed.

[Boyd Ostroff]

Hopefully you'll find a setup that works, I can imagine how frustrating this must be for you. I've tried to caution people about this before: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=43833

Why are you so determined to use Tiger? Personally, I need FCP and Motion to work much more than I need "widgets" (and if you think you're having problems with FCP, visit Apple's Motion forums). I have learned the hard way not to upgrade until a new version matures. I didn't even upgrade to 10.3.9 because of the problems I've read about. I wouldn't dream of upgrading without reading user feedback at Apple's site. Each new version of Quicktime and MacOS X has created a number of issues.
Another important thing is to turn off automatic updates in your software preference pane. This can bite you when you least expect it (you might find a new, incompatible version of Quicktime without warning for instance).

[Steve Nunez]

Boyd,

True- very true- 100% agreeable.
Well honestly, Tiger was such a success and so much was hyped about it- I fell into the category of people who assumed it was 100% compatible with all of Apple's top apps (such as FCP, Motion, Garageband- the whole iLife suite etc...) and i've never had issues with QT's progressively newer versions that I thought Apples newest OS Tiger was going to work flawlessly with everything Panther.....what a mistake that assumption was.

And funny thing is- you're right about the widgets- they are a cool app and work nicely and seems like a major "point" Apple advertises and I thought was just the tip of the iceberg in Tiger advancements- but aside from the Widgets- not much else "looks" different- so I was a bit disappointed in the new interface (or lack thereof)....I know there are tons of changes and so called "refinements- but for me just "headaches" and frustrations.

Let me go check Best Buy and CompUSA for SATA drives and make sure I have $400 or so laying around (hahah) to fix Apple's newest "Lion" OS.

Thanks for the input- as usual you're right on the money!

[Boyd Ostroff]

Originally Posted by Steve Nunez

Let me go check Best Buy and CompUSA for SATA drives and make sure I have $400 or so laying around

Fuuny, that's exactly what I did when I got my dual 2.5 three months ago. Best Buy didn't have anything larger than 200GB. I ended up getting a 250 GB Maxtor at CompUSA for $180, which was the largest SATA drive they had. I was surprised that neither store had much of a selection of SATA drives; maybe they have more now? I'm sure you would have a lot more options if you bought online, but it sounds like you're like me and need that "instant gratification" fix. ;-)

BTW, under FCP 3 several versions of QT caused strange problems and I ended up having to downgrade to an earlier version (FCP originally shipped with QT 5), which isn't easy. More recently, if you had software update set for automatic then it would have taken you up to 10.3.9 and QT 7, both of which are problematic with FCP 4.5.

I hope you get everything working again!

[Craig Terott]

I guess I should be glad that there are plenty of people out there willing to jump right into a new OS. It paves the way for people like me to have a smooth transition in JAN06 or later. I've heard "oh, you'll always have issues with a new OS and it's expected." ...for you maybe. I know of many people that have wasted days unistalling re-installing to try to get their workflow back on-line. All you have to do is look at the message boards for Tiger to see what's going on. I can wait.

[Zach Mull]

Has anybody else tried with a clean install? I did a clean install on my PowerBook at home (I always test these things at home before putting them to work), and FCP 4.5 works perfectly, as do all my other applications. I also want to say that Spotlight, not the near-useless, RAM-freeloading dashboard, is the key feature in 10.4. Automator is nice, but I suppose users more powerful than me already used its functions through scripting. But Spotlight makes all my time on the computer, including FCP time, much faster and easier. It is worth the upgrade for that. I can't wait until it's reliable enough to use at work, but I suppose, as you all say, that won't be until next year.

[Steve Nunez]

Well I've found a solution that allows my G5 to have Tiger installed with every app working as it should!

What I did was purchase a new SATA HD and left the old original OEM Mac HD installed with Tiger running.....I then put in the Tiger Install DVD and it prompts you for a choice of instal configurations- I selected "Full Tiger" install and luckily there is a choice to allow the new setup to copy settings and apps from a previous version on a network, Firewire HD, USB HD or another partition.......luckily I selected "copy from partition" and it detected the original OEM HD and copied all the apps and settings and after the install everything from FCP HD to Garageband, etc all works perfectly.....

...so I can now safely delete everything off the OEM Mac HD and use it as a media drive- so I have the dual internal SATA setup I was going to do initially anyway- so in the end it all worked out perfectly.

Anyone in my predicament could buy a cheap HD and copy the old setup to it then reinstall Tiger with the Full Install option (reformatting the new HD)...then you can have Tiger copy the old apps to the new OS and all should work fine.

For now I'm 100% satisfied and could have gone without this hiccup- I just feel bad for the tons of people that don't figure this out and have some semi-functioning apps......

Happy computing everyone!

[Boyd Ostroff]

Great to hear that everything works, and that the fix was actually pretty straightforward. Steve, if you don't mind I'm going to take you last post and turn it into a "sticky" to help others figure out the correct way to install Tiger.

[Steve Nunez]

Not a problem at all- just forgot to mention" don't upgrade to QT7- stay using 6.5.2 until 7 is verified to work with FCP- the problem will revert otherwise.

Good luck.

[Michael Westphal]

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=301852

After suffering with this problem for the last month, I got desperate today and found this solution.

Removed the receipt files, rebooted and my DV device returned.

So it seems that firewire problems and seemingly missing devices were caused by an interaction with older QT releases and QT7???