Awesome news for canon users

[Richard Hunter]

If the wobble is at the start of the shot, it should be easy enough to trim it off. The problem is that in cache mode, the wobble could happen after the shot has become interesting, and it would look strange to chop out a section at an important moment.

Richard

[Annie Haycock]

Yep, that sums it up nicely.

[Thanh Nguyen]

I just got this from Sony on how to check the firmware on your HVR MRC1K. Im going to post it up here just incase someone need it

1. Turn the Recorder off
2. Turn the Recorder on
3. wait untill the "welcome" show up in black
4. Untill you see a "welcome backlight" turned on hold the "stop" and the 2 "rec" button you will see your firmware. My firmware is 01. According to Sony tech this is not the latest. So i'm goint to send it in to update mine and will let you know what going on. My recorder freez a couple time that why i need to send it in and also update the firmware.

[Stelios Christofides]

Originally Posted by Thanh Nguyen

... Untill you see a "welcome backlight" turned on hold the "stop" and the 2 "rec" button you will see your firmware...

Thanh
You are not very clear here. Do you mean to press the "stop" and the "rec" button together before the "welcome backlight" is turned on?

Stelios

[Richard Hunter]

Originally Posted by Stelios Christofides

Thanh
You are not very clear here. Do you mean to press the "stop" and the "rec" button together before the "welcome backlight" is turned on?

Stelios

I think he means press stop and record when the welcome message appears. (i.e. wait until welcome appears, then press stop and record).

Richard

[Stelios Christofides]

It doesn't work for me. I can't get it to see the firmware

Stelios

[Lou Bruno]

Got it to work. Older version. Now what?

[Stelios Christofides]

Originally Posted by Richard Hunter

I think he means press stop and record when the welcome message appears. (i.e. wait until welcome appears, then press stop and record).

Richard

Do you press stop and record together (at the same time)? Maybe it doesn't work with the new version.

Stelios

[Richard Hunter]

Originally Posted by Stelios Christofides

Do you press stop and record together (at the same time)? Maybe it doesn't work with the new version.

Stelios

Hi Stelios. I just tested this for myself and it works, but the procedure wasn't so clear. This is how to do it:

1. Set the power switch to ON.
2. You will see Welcome without backlight. Just wait.
3. When the Welcome text backlight turns on, press and hold Stop and the 2 Rec buttons (Red and Black).
4. You should see the firmware version.

Richard

[Stelios Christofides]

Richard
Thanks for clarifying this. Now I got it to work. My firmware version is 01. According to Thanh Nguyen (Sony told him) this is not the latest firmware but my unit works 100% with my Sony Z5. So, as the saying goes,"If it's not broken don't fix it".

Stelios

[Richard Hunter]

Hi Stelios. Mine is also Version 01, which seems to work OK. Even assuming an update is available, I will hold off until I hear what would be the benefit.

Richard

[Thanh Nguyen]

So sorry guys for the confusing heheh. From what they told me the change is some bug fix that all they didn't tell me anything else even i asked. You know at first when i talked to the guy he treated me like an idiot after some talk and he finaly agree that i'm about his level or maybe smarter. I ask them is there some kind of firmware in the recorder that i might have a later fimware that it not working correctly with my camera which is A1 he said that is not something that the end user can do to find out. I have to send it to sony and they plug it into the system to know which fimware. Then i convince him that there is a way to find out the firmware before i ship this out for a require update or not. He put me on hold and come back with the solution to check the firmware.

The reason why i call them is because the recorder keep connect to my A1 as a computer and it had fail me on july 4th wedding. So i got the recorder to get out of the computer mode but then it only record 1 frame everytime i hit record. After sometime that day it work but it keep freezing on me that why i call them to see if there is a solution to it. I don't trust this anymore i mean i love it with one battery it can run a whole day without turn it off. But if i put out money it better work

[Stephen F. Bodi]

Hello Everyone,

This is my first forum post on DVInfo. After doing a lot of research it was this forum thread that actually cemented my decision to purchase the MRC1K for my XHA1. A lot of the information I am posting in this reply has been covered before in a few different posts. Chunks of it will be redundant.

My Setup:

Canon XHA1

Canon HV30 (havent thoroughly tested it with MRC1K yet)

retractable 4pin to 6pin 1394 cable

SONY's MRC1K plugin for Final Cut Studio

ClipWrap . It puts handles on m2t files without any conversion and makes them .mov files. Costs $49 dollars and works very well and is fast. If there is a free utility that works as well I haven't found it yet.

2 NPF330 batteries. I get a bout 3 to 3 1/2 hours of run time for each. I am planning on purchasing 2 more batteries (npf570's or off brand equivalent)

3 kingston 133x 16gb compact flash cards. I will be purchasing more would prefer to get 32gb but will research their performance/reliability first.

Macbook Pro 2.4 ghz with a expresscard 34 compact flash reader.

Custom Bracket brand camera bracket and a shoe mount adapter. This give me a flexibility for mounting the unit to the XHA1 i different situations. I had thought of velcro as an option. I already have 2 velcro attachment points on ymcamera that I use doe my wireless mic's and the MRC1K would be cumbersome on those points. I also have a cavision rail system shoulder rig that I have velcro attachment points on as well. Velcro seems awkward.My first shoot using it went well and by some trial and error I found out how to best set up my workflow. I had volunteered to videotape parts of a martial arts crosstraining event/workshop hosted by one of my instructors. I decided to record both to flash memory and tape at the same time. At one point I ran out of tape and couldnt switch to new tape because I was shooting hand held and was in the middle of shooting something that I couldnt stop in the middle of. The MRC1K continued recording after the tape ran out and I didnt lose anything. My battery ran out near the end of the shooting day (i hadn't acquired my second battery yet) but since I was recording to tape as a back up, nothing was lost there either. I hadnt gotten my expresscard 34 CF card reader yet, so i was using a cheap USB card reader (which was slow) . I ended up using all 3 cards and offloaded footage off of one so I could re-use it if necessary. The USB 2.0 CF card reader was very slow and I ended up transferring directly from the MRC1K to the laptop through Final Cut Pro's log and transfer ( I had not gotten ClipWrap yet). That first trial shoot was a learning process. Here is what I learned :

USB 2.0 CF card readers mostly suck

Log and transfer in Final Cut can be temperamental. When I tried to transfer footage from one of the cards later I got and "Unknown Error" and it wouldn't recognize any of the clips as having any data. When I transfered them directly to hard drive they were fine.

If your shooting by yourself with no help, stopping during a break to transfer footage is annoying so next time I will have enough CF cards to do the whole shoot without having to "recycle" any plus have a spare.

Transferring footage took about 4 to 5 minutes per card per hour of footage direct from MRC1K to external hard drive on laptop. Will do 1 hour of footage transfer test with the express 34 CF card reader and a firewire CF card reader in the next day or two.

The first few frames on record start sometimes were glitchy. Not an issue for me because I always do about 5 seconds of pre-roll and post roll on everything I shoot. I haven't tried the unit on cached mode yet.

The unit worked very well in 24f mode and I was very happy with it. I was also able to playback video back through the camera when I switched it to VCR mode.

I had no audio problems or dropped audio.

Having a retractable firewire cable is nice because it's always exactly the right length no matter how I mount the unit to the camera. its seems a little fragile though so i getting spares (retractable and non-retractable)

Overall I was actually surprised at how well the unit worked with the XHA1. It would be nice of canon were to come out with a similar product, but it would have direct competition fro the sony unit. There is also a possibility that Canon might integrate a solid state/tape hybrid system in the next generation XH/XL cameras. The workflow that I will be using will be to record to tape and CF at the same time. Having a tape archive and backup makes a lot of sense.

Basic Workflow I Came Up With:

record to tape and CF simultaneously.

use tape as archive/backup

transfer from CF card

Use ClipWrap to put handles on m2t files

and edit in FCP.

I freelance for a company that shoots mainly with Panasonic HVX-200's . I will do research on whether the MRC1K will work with the HVX in DV mode. They are interested in trying to make that work because it would be more cost effective than using P2 cards. Sorry for the long winded first post from me but I hope this helps some people out.

I used the setup process quoted below (except that I record to tape as well) , previously posted by Evan C. King

Originally Posted by Evan C. King

For anyone wanting to know the exact process of making it work with the A1 here it is:

So record to card only this is my process:
- In the A1's menu so "System Setup ---> DVControl ON"
- Connect the firewire cable between the A1 and the MRC1K
- Turn on the MRC1K throw in your CF card (it won't let you get to the MRC1K's menu without a card in it) and go press the MENU button
- Now go "SETTING ----> CAMLINK SEL"
- Choose "SYNCHRO"
- Now on the A1 you should see a green box next to "DVCONTROL"
- Your now able to control the recording with the A1's record buttons and don't need to shoot tape at the same time

That's all there is to it. Once it's set once you don't need to do it again. Just connect the two and turn the MRC1K and you're ready to go.
I may to a little youtube vid about it or something.

[Chris Duke]

I got my MRC1K last week in anticipation of finding a XHA1S in stock, and finally did this week. I got the camera on Friday, and hooked everything up over the weekend.

I just want to say thank you to everyone in this thread for your help in making my decision and setup so easy. It didn't take me more than 5 minutes to set up the MRC on my camera and have it working. I also got ClipWrap and was blown away how fast it takes the files off the CF card and turns them into .MOV files that can be immediately dropped into FCP7.

Just simply blown away by this!

I also took the tape out and recorded directly to the CF in the MRC without any issues, but I think I'll buy a stockpile of tapes just to record for backup. It's great to be able to just press the record button on the camera itself and have the MRC record on/off. I don't have to touch the MRC other than to just turn it on! I love it!

The thing is, I was almost going to buy a camera I didn't want just to have the MRC functionality built into the camera. But then I'd have to sacrifice all the benefits of the A1... with this little ditty (which I bought on eBay for $700 -- new!) I have all the benefits of the camera, as well as the benefits of a memory recording device. This is awesome!

[Mike Quinones]

Chris.
I'm with you there. I was thinking on buying another camera just for that same reason until
the MRC1 came my way. One thing I have done is set to sleep mode if there is no firewire signal after one minute. No more dead battery on the morning if you dont turn it off the night before.
This MRC1 has extended my camera life at least a couple of years.