Modern solid-state recording options for HD-100

[Lisa Bennett]

I'm looking for a way to record to a hard drive for HD100. Any options available? Is the Firestore no longer working with this model? Options other than recording to a computer?

[Paul R Johnson]

As with the other thread you started - the old drives were great - but you're really looking for an ancient product, so as firewire has been retired and the old camera protocols gone, it's not too surprising nobody produces a new drive for an old product. however, there are lots of them out there and drives can always be replaced, until the technology replaces those too. The good news is that the old FE kit gets cheaper. mine's very elderly now but perfectly functional, bar, as I said, the worn out connectors!

[Derek Heeps]

Originally Posted by Earl Thurston

Hi folks. Although I recently purchased an URSA Mini 4K, there are still times I'd like to make use of the good-old GY-HD100 we've had since 2006, mostly because of the ENG-style lens and great physical controls.

That said, has anyone had success with any modern (i.e. circa 2016-2017) options adding solid-state recording to this camera? For example, something that could take the HDV (not likely) or component analog (more likely) output and record to SD cards or SSD drives.

I've toyed around with getting one of those "game recorders" that record component video to H.264, but just wondering if anyone has found a good solution for this in the modern era.

Not exactly solid state , but I have three Firestore FS4-HD recorders which , with a bit of experimenting with settings can be made to work at least with my GY-HD251

[Derek Heeps]

Originally Posted by Alex Humphrey

The obvious choice is to hit Ebay for the no longer produced Focus Enhancements Firestore Firewire HDD recorder and probably could disassemble and replace the 60-100g HDD with a new larger SSD but I don't promise it will work. I have one, still works, but using it to recapture a lot of old footage. The problem with the older Firestore HDV drives is that FCPX and Quicktime can't read the footage... luckily while Focus Enhancments before they got bought by Vtech had a free app that you would drag the footage in your browser on top of the app and it would do it's wizardry (takes less than a second to adjust 100g of file footage) so Quicktime would be allowed to read it. But remember it would only be HDV still, just ready to edit when you get back to the office. Be sure to get the Firestore drive that has HDV 720p 24p/30p reading encoding capabilities. I think they all did, but they did make the one for JVC that also talked back to the camera and relayed information on your viewfinder.

V-Tech came out with some replacement gear that was similar and used SSD drives, but I don't think they make them anymore.

Other than that you need either a laptop and a analog to thunderbolt $199 Blackmagic type of box... and record to laptop while camera in live view to HDD to get pre-compressor footage. PAIN. My results where not worth the effort. Or a Blackmagic portable Component to HD-SDI or Component to HDMI portable box ($250 plus power tap) then any Atomos type recorder. Then your in the field recording a better codec and can still have tape as a lower quality backup.

IF you had I think the HD250 and better it had a HD-SDI output already and it would probably make more sense to get a used HD250 and then just get the Atomos or similar recorder to plug into the HD-SDI.

But you could certainly test the the benefit of a better codec by getting a $30 component to HDMI desk top converter and plug any of your HDMI recorders, then point the JVC HD110 out the window and live record in a less compressed format (before the built in encoder) and see if the JVC is worth the effort. I did and I was under whelmed, even though I do have the better Fujinon 17x lens... just old and clunky.. I gave up and picked up a JVC LS300 and haven't looked back (though metering with a cine meter since I still can't get anything reliable out of histograms)

I have three Firestore FS-4HD recorders , all were originally fitted with the smaller internal drives , but I eventually found higher capacity IDE drives for them , can't remember what size now as it was years ago I upgraded them , but all eventually gave at least 10 hours record time - since I record a lot of conferences these were ideal to just start in the morning and let them run all day .

While I have used them with my GY-HD251 camera ( it is a bit of a faff with the settings on both devices , and there remains audio sync issues , because they are not the JVC dedicated version ) I bought them primarily to use with my Sony HVR V1e , with which they work seamlessly , and using Edit Ready , clips can be transcoded and joined seamlessly into a single long recording ready to drop on the timeline ( for my conferences where I just want a continuous recording of a two or three hour long session , this is so handy , rather than manually joining up clips of seven minutes or so with always a couple of frames overlap between each ) . Edit ready also converts MXF files to other formats ( for me to .mov since I still use FCP7 , but have been shooting XDCAM HD for a while ) .

The Firestores certainly got me away from connecting my JVC camera to my mac Pro , but then I picked up a BRHD50 deck , which alongside my Sony HVR-M15AE allows me to ingest just about any flavour of DV or HDV tape I come across ; still also have S-VHS , Lo-band U-Matic , Hi-8 decks and just got a PDW-F70 XDCAM HD deck so can work with a wide range of formats .

I'd think for an HD100 , a Firestore would be the best option , but even when I got mine about 5 years ago the clip on batteries were well past their best . I do have mains adaptors for each of them , but I ended up making cables to power them from the D tap outlet on my PAGLOK adaptor , and for my V1e , I bought a cage that fits under the camera and made up a PAGLOK plate which gives me a power supply - one L95 battery will run the Firestore all day .

[Dave Barnes]

Hey Derek - glad to see you are still using your JVC HD251 , along with the BR-HD50 deck. Still use mine also.

Finding tapes is getting a little harder lately. :)