I'm returning my Quickstream DV today. at DVinfo.net

Dan Euritt · June 7th, 2004, 02:14 PM

the staff at mcetech are friendly enuf, and they have promised me a prompt refund.

so the issue isn't in dealing with mcetech, it's too many problems with the quickstream dv itself.

i tested it by recording a one-hour tape to it, and found that the real showstoppers are:

1) when recording in avi mode, the audio stops recording a full 30 frames before the end of the clip, when doing continous recording... the picture continued to be recorded, just no audio with it at all.

2) when the recording on the tape stops, the final clip on the quickstream is so badly corrupted that premiere 6.5 refuses to accept it... you can see the clip play back with windows media player, but the audio is totally out of sync.

3) the quickstream mount was too wide to fit on both my xl1 and my xl1s.

those issues should be present on all quickstream dv's, or at a minimum, all of 'em that use the xl1s to record data from.

other issues include:

4) corruption of both video and audio portions of the files, including one segment where i had nothing but pixellated blocks of garbage data for several seconds, after which the file continued on like nothing had happened.

5) totally dysfunctional on-off slide switch, that is completely recessed beneath the face of the unit, requiring a pin to manipulate correctly... you could use an ink pen, but you'll then have to press hard on the top of the switch to turn it on, so you'll soon compromise the delicate nature of this type of switch.

6) rubber mounting that was way too hard to absorb any shock... this unit should be internally shock-dampened instead, so that when it's mounted on the camera, the hard drive will be protected... there also should be some decent heat ventilation on the case.

7) i was unable to erase the clips on the drive with the erase button... it did not appear to function at all, and there is no way to tell how much room is left on the drive, unless it's hooked up to a computer.

8) the drive defaults to .mov recording mode, which is unfortunately not compatible with a pc running premiere 6.5... the .mov file appears to be a wrapper around raw dv data, but since premiere accepts .mov's, there is something wrong with the quickstream-generated .mov.

9) using the front buttons to change recording formats was a real p.i.a.

in general, all of these types of portable video hard drive recording units are absurdly overpriced for what they offer... when i can get a bare x-drive pro for $119, that comes with a usb port, lcd screen, multiple card slots, onboard battery, mp3 player, etc., you can see where the market should be headed... put in a real-time firewire port instead of usb, all it takes is the right firmware and chipset.

Daniel Kohl · June 9th, 2004, 02:42 PM

Unfortunately, the problems aren’t just limited to PC users. The media viewing software included with the Quickstream, designed for Mac OSX crashed on my G4 as soon as there was media there for it to read. I don’t know if that was due to the corrupted media that the, clearly defective, Quickstream produced, or if there is a problem with the viewing software.

It’s a bummer being a guinea pig. I guess I’ll be asking for my money back as well.

Dan Euritt · June 10th, 2004, 11:46 AM

the real question is whether or not the data files are recognized by your computer, without the software... they should be no different than what you'd normally capture off of tape, directly to the computer, without the quickstream.

it seems obvious at this point that mcetech should have devoted their engineering resources to the quickstream itself, instead of spending time working on software that isn't needed.

i agree with your comments on the other thread regarding the bogus microphone mount... did it even fit on your camera? the point where the threaded post intersects with the actual camera mounting point is unnecessarily machined way too thin on the bottom... why compromise strength when you don't have to?

assuming they do refund my money like they promised, i'm out at least ~$25 in shipping costs, just to demo a product that's clearly not ready for prime time... and i feel quite betrayed by all of the glowing reviews the quickstream has been getting... have any of these people really tried to use it?? good grief!!

the latest bit of mis-information is in the current issue of dv magazine, via a bruce johnson review of this product... apparently he plugged it into a canopus system, and it recognized the data files, but i guess that he never bothered to actually check the files to make sure that they weren't corrupted to begin with.

Daniel Kohl · June 10th, 2004, 04:11 PM

The microphone shoe adapter did fit into the slot on my XL1. They must be having them made in divers sweatshops, where there is no central quality control. I don’t understand why the microphone mount is so poorly conceived while the belt clip is really well thought out. I wouldn’t mind a clip like that for my palm pilot case.

And your right about loosing money on postage – that’s going to cost me even more, especially if I end up having to pay duty fees.

The one thing that makes me angry about the situation is; is what did we do wrong as consumers? How can we avoid making this kind of mistake again? I would at least like to learn from my mistakes. I guess we just bought too quickly, we were too greedy for the latest technology. All the bad reports are just coming out now. That’s the risk you take by being at the front edge of what is available. Sometimes you get lucky, and you are the first one on your block, and sometimes you’re the jackass, who fell for the ploy.

Good luck next time.

Mark Williams · June 10th, 2004, 04:48 PM

Daniel,

Don't feel too bad. The specs and hype for the Quickstream in my opinion were a masterpiece of advertising. Also, some intial reviews on other forums were very favorable. If anything, by posting here you have saved others from investing in what appears to be a flawed product. I and I hope others on this forum are very gratefull to you.

Regards,

Mark Williams

Dan Euritt · June 23rd, 2004, 02:36 PM

just an update... it appears that mce did refund my full purchase price, including the shipping and tax.

Daniel Kohl · June 23rd, 2004, 03:50 PM

At least that.

I hope they do the same for me.

It looks like I'm going to go for the Citi Disk. It looks like I can get one here in Germany.

Josh Brusin · July 1st, 2004, 11:01 AM

that citidisk is kind of expensive, no?

Daniel Kohl · July 1st, 2004, 03:55 PM

As far as I can tell, the Citidisk is going to cost me less than the Quickstream would have. And I am buying it from a handler who is letting me test the thing before I purchase it. He is asking €750 for the 80GB version. I would have been paying $729 for the 180 minute Quickstream (60 GB) and $99 for the external battery pack (which didn't impress me much from it's design). Plus around $30 shipping.

I should have shopped around more in my own backyard. But who knows how things were three months ago, I don't know how long this retailer has had the Quickstream he's offering. Anyway I hope that it will all have a happy end for me.

I'll post how the Citidisk works after I have used it. I pick it up on monday.

Arthur To · November 29th, 2004, 01:13 AM

are the problems u mentioend resolved in the 2nd gen or quickstream?

-arthur

Daniel Kohl · November 29th, 2004, 03:07 AM

Oh!

I forgot about this thread. Sorry about that.

The Citidisc I got, had a lot of problems, which I think had mostly to do with the battery system. In any case, it didn't record the DV coming out of my XL-1 reliably, which was my main concern and seems to be an issue with my old XL-1. It did, when connected to a wall power outlet record DV coming out of my Sony DCR TRV 900, but in too small of files for my liking and with some wacky creation date. I sent it back a few times to have it "repaired" and basically gave up on the device after the third attempt to get the internal battery to work properly. I'm assuming that I just had bad luck with the device I had. I have not since tried a newer generation Citidisc, I'm really waiting for the FS-4 to become available.

It's strange that there doesn't seem to be any posts from anyone who has had a good experience with either the Quickstream or the CitiDisc... There must be someone out there!

Arthur To · November 29th, 2004, 03:11 AM

i mean the problems with the quickstream mentioned in the first post.

are they gone in the 2nd gen quickstreams?

also.

im debating between fs-4 or quickstream.

can anyone persuade me to one side?

-arthur

Daniel Kohl · November 29th, 2004, 03:21 AM

The biggest problem with the FS-4 at the moment is that it doesn't exist!

So, any speculation about what it can or can't do ... is just speculation. But if the FS-4 can do all it promises to, then it should blow the Quickstream out of the water. But I'm not a salesman for either product - if you want a sales pitch, then ask Matt Mc Ewen in the Firestore thread. Be sure to ask him when the bloody thing is going to be available! (I think I've asked too often).

If you compare the tech specs on the web pages from these two products, you should be able to make an intelligent decision yourself - the differences aren't small.

Unfortunately you will not find any personal experience stories with the FS-4 yet, because as I said before no one has one, yet.

Matt McEwen · November 30th, 2004, 06:46 PM

Hi Daniel, Hi Arthur,

We are still planning on shipping the first FS-4 units next month (December). As for FS-4 user experience, it is essentially a FireStore FS-3 or DR-DV5000 in a smaller package. Both FS-4 an its larger cousins are based off the same core system. You can read some reviews and user stories on the FS-3 web page at:

http://www.focusinfo.com/products/firestore/fs-3.html

Hope that helps,

Matt McEwen

Daniel Kohl · December 1st, 2004, 02:33 AM

Hi Matt,

The page you linked delivers this message:

"Sorry, the page or file you requested does not exist on this site.
You should be able to find the desired page from one of the above links.
Please contact the webmaster at webmaster@focusinfo.com, should you require
further assistance."

Maybe you should look into that.

Cheers,

June 7th, 2004, 02:14 PM	#1
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	I'm returning my Quickstream DV today. the staff at mcetech are friendly enuf, and they have promised me a prompt refund. so the issue isn't in dealing with mcetech, it's too many problems with the quickstream dv itself. i tested it by recording a one-hour tape to it, and found that the real showstoppers are: 1) when recording in avi mode, the audio stops recording a full 30 frames before the end of the clip, when doing continous recording... the picture continued to be recorded, just no audio with it at all. 2) when the recording on the tape stops, the final clip on the quickstream is so badly corrupted that premiere 6.5 refuses to accept it... you can see the clip play back with windows media player, but the audio is totally out of sync. 3) the quickstream mount was too wide to fit on both my xl1 and my xl1s. those issues should be present on all quickstream dv's, or at a minimum, all of 'em that use the xl1s to record data from. other issues include: 4) corruption of both video and audio portions of the files, including one segment where i had nothing but pixellated blocks of garbage data for several seconds, after which the file continued on like nothing had happened. 5) totally dysfunctional on-off slide switch, that is completely recessed beneath the face of the unit, requiring a pin to manipulate correctly... you could use an ink pen, but you'll then have to press hard on the top of the switch to turn it on, so you'll soon compromise the delicate nature of this type of switch. 6) rubber mounting that was way too hard to absorb any shock... this unit should be internally shock-dampened instead, so that when it's mounted on the camera, the hard drive will be protected... there also should be some decent heat ventilation on the case. 7) i was unable to erase the clips on the drive with the erase button... it did not appear to function at all, and there is no way to tell how much room is left on the drive, unless it's hooked up to a computer. 8) the drive defaults to .mov recording mode, which is unfortunately not compatible with a pc running premiere 6.5... the .mov file appears to be a wrapper around raw dv data, but since premiere accepts .mov's, there is something wrong with the quickstream-generated .mov. 9) using the front buttons to change recording formats was a real p.i.a. in general, all of these types of portable video hard drive recording units are absurdly overpriced for what they offer... when i can get a bare x-drive pro for $119, that comes with a usb port, lcd screen, multiple card slots, onboard battery, mp3 player, etc., you can see where the market should be headed... put in a real-time firewire port instead of usb, all it takes is the right firmware and chipset.

June 9th, 2004, 02:42 PM	#2
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	Unfortunately, the problems aren’t just limited to PC users. The media viewing software included with the Quickstream, designed for Mac OSX crashed on my G4 as soon as there was media there for it to read. I don’t know if that was due to the corrupted media that the, clearly defective, Quickstream produced, or if there is a problem with the viewing software. It’s a bummer being a guinea pig. I guess I’ll be asking for my money back as well. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

June 10th, 2004, 04:11 PM	#4
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	The microphone shoe adapter did fit into the slot on my XL1. They must be having them made in divers sweatshops, where there is no central quality control. I don’t understand why the microphone mount is so poorly conceived while the belt clip is really well thought out. I wouldn’t mind a clip like that for my palm pilot case. And your right about loosing money on postage – that’s going to cost me even more, especially if I end up having to pay duty fees. The one thing that makes me angry about the situation is; is what did we do wrong as consumers? How can we avoid making this kind of mistake again? I would at least like to learn from my mistakes. I guess we just bought too quickly, we were too greedy for the latest technology. All the bad reports are just coming out now. That’s the risk you take by being at the front edge of what is available. Sometimes you get lucky, and you are the first one on your block, and sometimes you’re the jackass, who fell for the ploy. Good luck next time. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

June 23rd, 2004, 03:50 PM	#7
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	At least that. I hope they do the same for me. It looks like I'm going to go for the Citi Disk. It looks like I can get one here in Germany. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

July 1st, 2004, 03:55 PM	#9
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	As far as I can tell, the Citidisk is going to cost me less than the Quickstream would have. And I am buying it from a handler who is letting me test the thing before I purchase it. He is asking €750 for the 80GB version. I would have been paying $729 for the 180 minute Quickstream (60 GB) and $99 for the external battery pack (which didn't impress me much from it's design). Plus around $30 shipping. I should have shopped around more in my own backyard. But who knows how things were three months ago, I don't know how long this retailer has had the Quickstream he's offering. Anyway I hope that it will all have a happy end for me. I'll post how the Citidisk works after I have used it. I pick it up on monday. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

June 10th, 2004, 11:46 AM	#3
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	the real question is whether or not the data files are recognized by your computer, without the software... they should be no different than what you'd normally capture off of tape, directly to the computer, without the quickstream. it seems obvious at this point that mcetech should have devoted their engineering resources to the quickstream itself, instead of spending time working on software that isn't needed. i agree with your comments on the other thread regarding the bogus microphone mount... did it even fit on your camera? the point where the threaded post intersects with the actual camera mounting point is unnecessarily machined way too thin on the bottom... why compromise strength when you don't have to? assuming they do refund my money like they promised, i'm out at least ~$25 in shipping costs, just to demo a product that's clearly not ready for prime time... and i feel quite betrayed by all of the glowing reviews the quickstream has been getting... have any of these people really tried to use it?? good grief!! the latest bit of mis-information is in the current issue of dv magazine, via a bruce johnson review of this product... apparently he plugged it into a canopus system, and it recognized the data files, but i guess that he never bothered to actually check the files to make sure that they weren't corrupted to begin with.

June 10th, 2004, 04:48 PM	#5
Mark Williams Trustee Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Deep South, U.S. Posts: 1,526	Daniel, Don't feel too bad. The specs and hype for the Quickstream in my opinion were a masterpiece of advertising. Also, some intial reviews on other forums were very favorable. If anything, by posting here you have saved others from investing in what appears to be a flawed product. I and I hope others on this forum are very gratefull to you. Regards, Mark Williams

June 23rd, 2004, 02:36 PM	#6
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	just an update... it appears that mce did refund my full purchase price, including the shipping and tax.

July 1st, 2004, 11:01 AM	#8
Josh Brusin Major Player Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Chicago, IL Posts: 439	that citidisk is kind of expensive, no?

November 29th, 2004, 01:13 AM	#10
Arthur To Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Cerritos, CA Posts: 78	are the... are the problems u mentioend resolved in the 2nd gen or quickstream? -arthur __________________ xL1s

November 29th, 2004, 03:07 AM	#11
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	Oh! I forgot about this thread. Sorry about that. The Citidisc I got, had a lot of problems, which I think had mostly to do with the battery system. In any case, it didn't record the DV coming out of my XL-1 reliably, which was my main concern and seems to be an issue with my old XL-1. It did, when connected to a wall power outlet record DV coming out of my Sony DCR TRV 900, but in too small of files for my liking and with some wacky creation date. I sent it back a few times to have it "repaired" and basically gave up on the device after the third attempt to get the internal battery to work properly. I'm assuming that I just had bad luck with the device I had. I have not since tried a newer generation Citidisc, I'm really waiting for the FS-4 to become available. It's strange that there doesn't seem to be any posts from anyone who has had a good experience with either the Quickstream or the CitiDisc... There must be someone out there! __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

November 29th, 2004, 03:11 AM	#12
Arthur To Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Cerritos, CA Posts: 78	hi i mean the problems with the quickstream mentioned in the first post. are they gone in the 2nd gen quickstreams? also. im debating between fs-4 or quickstream. can anyone persuade me to one side? -arthur __________________ xL1s

November 29th, 2004, 03:21 AM	#13
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	The biggest problem with the FS-4 at the moment is that it doesn't exist! So, any speculation about what it can or can't do ... is just speculation. But if the FS-4 can do all it promises to, then it should blow the Quickstream out of the water. But I'm not a salesman for either product - if you want a sales pitch, then ask Matt Mc Ewen in the Firestore thread. Be sure to ask him when the bloody thing is going to be available! (I think I've asked too often). If you compare the tech specs on the web pages from these two products, you should be able to make an intelligent decision yourself - the differences aren't small. Unfortunately you will not find any personal experience stories with the FS-4 yet, because as I said before no one has one, yet. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

November 30th, 2004, 06:46 PM	#14
Matt McEwen Focus Enhancements Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Campbell, CA. Posts: 508	Hi Daniel, Hi Arthur, We are still planning on shipping the first FS-4 units next month (December). As for FS-4 user experience, it is essentially a FireStore FS-3 or DR-DV5000 in a smaller package. Both FS-4 an its larger cousins are based off the same core system. You can read some reviews and user stories on the FS-3 web page at: http://www.focusinfo.com/products/firestore/fs-3.html Hope that helps, Matt McEwen

December 1st, 2004, 02:33 AM	#15
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	Hi Matt, The page you linked delivers this message: "Sorry, the page or file you requested does not exist on this site. You should be able to find the desired page from one of the above links. Please contact the webmaster at webmaster@focusinfo.com, should you require further assistance." Maybe you should look into that. Cheers, __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1