Total cost of upgrading to HVX

[Thomas Smet]

As much as I do agree with a lot of the statements here, tape is by no means the perfect format either. Tapes can break, get wrinkled, have drop outs, only last up to 10 years and they start to go bad. If you play them to much you can also have problems with them. A deck can jam and chew the crap out of your tape. Tapes can get dirty add suffer from extreme heat or cold. I know these problems are not very common but neither is daily hard drive failure. Most hard drives fail because they are being used over and over and over again with lots of jumping around and stress not to mention damage from heat. For backing up raw footage and storing the hard drive in a safe place it should last for many years since it will not get beat up. Most of us have never seen hard drives like this because how many of us record to a hard drive once and store it in a safe?

I know some people have issues with the way the HVX does HD but it sure beats our other options in terms of quality.(in theory)

If you do not like P2 and HVX200 then here's a thought, Don't buy one! Go out and buy a "superior" HDV camera and shoot on all the tape you want. Leave us foolish morons to use the HVX200 and suffer.

If the HVX200 did record HD to tape the cost of the camera would have been at least double. Then the same people complaining would have been on here moaning about how it is a stupid camera for costing too much and how nobody on a McDonalds budget will be able to buy one.

Panasonic found a way to give us high quality(in theory) HD for the same price as HDV.(I'm talking camera not media)

If you really want to shoot a 3 hour snooze fest with DVCPro HD maybe you should look into a Varicam or the new 1080i camera. Another option would be to buy the HVX200 and a PVCPro HD deck. That would still be cheaper than the Varicam but then you would have your tape. But wait a DVCpro HD deck is expensive. Exactly! If the deck costs that much imagine how much more the HVX200 would have costed with a DVCPro HD deck built on.

Would you rather have the HVX200 with P2 and cost $6,000.00 or have it with a deck and cost $20,000.00? Even a lot of pros would never be able to afford the HVX200 if it cost that much. Now we actually do have the option of shooting DVCpro50 or DVCPro HD for a fairly low cost. Yes there are limitations but then again we are not buying a $70,000.00 Varicam. What do you expect for 1/10 the cost?

Finally just because there isn't the best backup solution right now today does not mean that at some point in the near future there will be. We have a good 5 months until the camera actually comes out. At first mainly the high end pros will be buying it. A few months after that is when the budget people will start thinking about the camera. That will bring us close to NAB again and maybe many options for storing video.

[Peter Ferling]

Neither is daily hard drive failure? How many hard drive failures does it take to ruin a project? I'll tell you: ONE. If you don't have a tape to back it up with, then your done. Finito. Expalin that to your client/boss/whatever how tapeless is the be all to end all when "that" happens.

If a tape get's eaten, you don't lose the whole damn show, just the small fraction at the jam point, (crack the case, splice and dub to a fresh one).

Botton line, I trust neither tape nor tapeless alone, so I use both. Guess it's the mechanical engineer in me, I've learned about the importance of redundant systems in a world ruled by murphys law.

[Peter Ferling]

This is getting off topic. My pitch is that the folks should also consider a redundant method, to recognize the advantage of both tape (for archive and backup) and tapeless for quick to edit. I don't need the HVX to get that.

[Tom Wills]

I really don't see what all the fuss is about. I mean really, if you don't think this camera is any good, don't buy it. I personally have had a few HDs die, but really, how often does that happen when you treat your drives well? Also, even if you run both tape and HD, there is a possibility both will break. There's never a way to be truly sure nothing will break. Having a backup system is good, but let's think about it this way, the Firestore will be your capture device, P2 as a backup, you've got 24 minutes left just in case the HD dies. I know that doesn't sound like a lot, but I can't see what's so wrong with it other than for live situations where it'd be easy to use a laptop.

Radek, most pros either shoot on HDs or Tape. Not both. Why should this be any different? Why does he suddenly need to record to 2 formats? If the shooter's that paranoid he should just use a laptop.

I guess I just can't see what's so inconvinient about it that people need to complain.

[Kevin Dooley]

Originally Posted by Peter Ferling

Neither is daily hard drive failure? How many hard drive failures does it take to ruin a project? I'll tell you: ONE. If you don't have a tape to back it up with, then your done. Finito. Expalin that to your client/boss/whatever how tapeless is the be all to end all when "that" happens.

It should be noted however, that unless you take your HDDs with you to your next MRI appointment, even a screwed up HDD usually has recoverable data on it... and for that matter, as cheap as HDDs are you can always RAID a few of them together anyway... (which was mentioned previously).

[Ash Greyson]

I think we all can agree... upgrading is subjective. Some people may just want the new toy, nothing more. Fair enough...

As far as media failure? Anything can fail but external HDs are by far the most likely to fail, especially when subjected to the elements in the field. The difference in the direct to hard drive work flow is that you lose EVERYTHING. When you have a bad tape you lose 20 - 60 minutes. Is the data recoverable? In some cases yes but it is SLOW and EXTREMELY expensive.

I dont think we will know for some time about the hard drive reliability in this application. You are pushing constant MASSIVE data in an uncontrolled environment.

If you are doing a shoot in HD, I assume it is going to be a more expensive professional production with appropriate back-up, etc. That is the reason myself and others were saying the upgrade cost would be more.


ash =o)

[Pete Wilie]

<soapbox ON>
HDD reliability is really OT for this thread. But you guys who seem to be paranoid about HDD failure need to educate yourselves. While catastrophic HDD failure may be commonplace in your world it is very rare in the professional IT world. RAID is just one technology you seem to just keep ignoring. Using highly reliable HDD is another. You think the video world requires more bandwidth than anything else? Guess again. There are many other businesses/industries/government agencies that far exceed what you do. IT pros have recognized and developed solutions for this issue long ago. And finally, if you want a system that uses your security blanket tape, then go buy the system that uses tapes, forget about the HVX200, and please quit whining about HDD in the HVX forum.

Having said that, everyone who has critical data should have a well thought-out disaster recovery plan. Don't know what this is? Then hire an IT consultant, or do some research.
</soapbox OFF>

[Ash Greyson]

The subject is very pertinent as HDD storage is being offerred as an alternative to the prohibitively expensive p2 card solution. We are not talking raided back-up on a desktop system, we are talking about a Firestore drive mounted to or linked to a camera.

I have yet to see a single person in this entire thread say anything negative about the camera, we are talking the cost of upgrading and now specifically storage options. I think we are all excited about the HVX and the possibilities it brings.

You actually PROVED the point that myself and others were trying to make. You NEED to have a raid 1 system at least. In this workflow, there is not an option of rebuilding your project from a batch capture list, EDL, etc. If you go with the P2>HDD workflow and re-use your P2 cards (duh) you will have to have a mirrored system because that data will be lost forever with a HDD failure. This will increase your upgrade, you will probably need at least 1 terabyte of storage in raid 1 (so 2 TB total).

If you go with the straight to portable HDD then to desktop HDD, same thing. The only issue there is the potential failure in the original unit which will carry a higher failure rate (still low I would assume) than the P2 media.

As far as conditions and bandwidth? I am not talking giant servers filled with fans and sitting in a dustless climate controlled room. I am talking about a portable HDD attached to a camera or cameraman pulling constant HD footage in a very uncontrolled environment. VERY VERY different...




ash =o)

[Dominic Jones]

Desktop systems no - but you don't need a desktop for a RAID system, and - as I'm sure you know - RAID 1 is the most expensive (in terms of storage per £ or $) by far.

Both RAID 3 and 5 (just so you know Ash, I'm assuming you know this but putting it verbosely for those who don't and are reading this thread) will only require 1.25 Tb for a 1Tb array - at current cost here in the UK that's about £450.

Which ain't much I'm sure you'll agree.

We're not all talking about Firestore style systems either - I doubt I'll ever use one. For long gigs such as events and live shows I'll either (a) use an HDV camera for small gigs or (b) use gear hired by the company I'm working for, which is the case 99% of the time. This is generally HDCam cameras for HD gigs or DSR's or equivalent for SD (although from time to time I'm on DigiBetas).

For short and feature production the addition of a laptop and firewire connected RAID array is no bother and a minor expense.

Now, may I make the plea that all of the relevant information and options have been thoroughly discussed, so perhaps we should let this HDD vs tape vs P2 discussion lie - to each their own, after all, and I find it hard to believe that anyone interested lacks any of the information they need to make a decision. If they don't they can always post a specific question...

[Kevin Dooley]

Originally Posted by Ash Greyson

As far as conditions and bandwidth? I am not talking giant servers filled with fans and sitting in a dustless climate controlled room. I am talking about a portable HDD attached to a camera or cameraman pulling constant HD footage in a very uncontrolled environment. VERY VERY different...

I think it's important to point out that in this very same thread (since both are the cost of upgrading to this camera) both acquisition and archiving have been mentioned in the context of harddrive failure.

Now for acquisition, HDDs do present many problems, though the crop of DTE products on the market have been praised for their ruggedness.

As for archival purposes, HDDs are not that problematic... again, they will be accessed rarely (little to no strain on the drives) and can be raided in a RAID 3 or 5 configuration which will give you reduncancy without having to buy double your intended storage.

So while you, Ash, may be talking about that acquisition, not everyone in this thread has been...

I don't think any of us would debate either of your points... HDDs are great for archival and can be dicey for acquisition... Can we move on now?

[Ash Greyson]

I wont use a firestore drive either... it was brought up as a lower cost alternative to P2.

As far as HDD for achival? I think it is a terrible medium. I do a lot of work in the music industry and they are already having lots of problems with nice high end scsi drives failing after only a few years of controlled storage... that however, IS another topic =o)



ash =o)

[Bill Pryor]

Somebody said tape only lasts 10 years. I have Betacam tapes that are 20 years old and still play with no trouble. Some DVCAM tapes are approaching 10 years old with no problems. I have had hard drives die that have never been moved or mistreated. They just quit. Expensive drives too, some costing $2500. And some cheap firewire drives have died.

I think P2 is great for TV news, or for a shoot where a person can have a second set of cards and an extra person with hard drives to download the first set of cards as he shoots with the next set, and then back up what's been downloaded to a second drive or computer. Somebody compared the P2 card to film magazines, but it's not the same. You do have spare magazines loaded, and an assistant to unload and reload the ones you're not using. That part is fair. But when the film is processed, you have your original film. When the P2 card is downloaded and erased, all you have is the hard drive, which can fail a lot easier than a tape or film can be damaged.

I think Sony is on the right track to a tapeless world with the optical disc drive. The discs are cheap enough that they can be stored just like tape. Maybe P2 cards will come down in price and up in capacity to compete with optical discs, and if that happens, then the world will be a better place and if that happens I will be in line to say P2 is better than Bluray discs.
I guess my ideal small camera would be the JVC shoulder mount one that uses real lenses, with the capability of recording Panasonic's DVCPRO HD onto Sony's Bluray optical disc. Oh yeah, and I'd like it for about $6K, thank you.

[Peter Ferling]

After some reflection, I guess this whole issue of tapless vs. tape is on topic. After all, it's the main selling feature of the HVX.

My 'paranoia' for capturing with both formats is justified. I shoot alot of medical device training in the OR for corporate work. Most of these are on patients whom agreed to have it filmed. After tallying up the cost in fees for paying the docs/facilities and support and total human effort, even simple mistakes cannot be tollerated.

For the record, in my opinion, tapes simply outlive Hard drives.

First. I have a drawer full of firewire drives with multiple projects. I mark the format date on each one, and usually when they get about 2 years of age, things get noisy, and files become corrupt.

Second. About once a month I have to fire up my recovery software and perform a raw scan of hard drive that simply quit working. Then I transfer the files that survived to a new drive. The process usually kills an entire day. So, I've leaned to backup up support files to DVD, and simply recapture from tape. Saving many hours of watch and wait.

Third. Every year I have to swap out the drives in my scsi array, as one usually goes down. I had a media array once, and within the first month, had to send it in for a recovery, and lost a week on the project.

So I can only go by what I've learned. Don't get me wrong. I don't have a $120K avid and $80K cameras. My entire investment comes in at about $25K. I just learned to adopt workflows from the pros. Some folks here relish technology and embrace it wholly on it's novelty. Yet, hollywoods vaults are bursting with decades old media that survives the test of time. The HVX is a great concept, and I hope it proves itself well. I plan to rent one to see for myself. But until then, I'm going with what I know works.

[Laurence Maher]

It's siimple man,

If you're doing videography, you won't need the freaking camera for a while anyway, because most clients (from my experience) won't care a dime's worth. Get the next generation in a few years.

If you're doing high-quality features or shorts the camera and upgrading isn't as expensive as you think, assuming your work flow really won't be much faster to begin with. Features/shorts of quality are done like a movie set. If you're moving at that speed, you have time to dump footage each night or whatever, or even on the spot. Barry Green has got the right idea. So admit that the camera is a positive thing to your craft, sell older, lower-quality stuff, upgrade for a minimal cost considering what you're getting, and get on with your shoot.

[Simon Wyndham]

Nothing is simple, yet. We need the camera to be released before anything can truly be said about workflow or costs.

As it stands at the moment, if you have a Mac and FCP you are fine. Getting DVCpro50 or HD into a PC unless you have a high end editor is quite another matter. But it is also not just a case of your editor being able to read DVCPro files. It also needs to be able to decode the wrapper MXF format files that the HVX stores the footage in.

So if you are on a Mac with FCP 5 you will not have much to worry about editing wise. On a PC you could be in for an expensive software upgrade.