Any News on Updated Firmware to allow other brand SxS Cards?

[Steven Thomas]

Things are going to get a LOT better. I predict by the end of next year, the SxS 8GB cards will not be worth much.

[Chris Hurd]

There comes a point eventually where solid state goes beyond just paying for itself. With P2 you compare it to how many $33 DVCPRO HD tapes equals a $900 P2 card... and the answer is, after using a P2 card less than thirty times, it becomes less expensive than DVCPRO HD tape. Same thing applies to XDCAM EX... I suppose its tape equivalent would be HDCAM. Same math in that case... a 16GB SxS card is paid for in less than thirty cycles, and thereafter it's "free" as opposed to everybody else who's still paying for HDCAM or DVCPRO HD tapes.

[Gabe Strong]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

There comes a point eventually where solid state goes beyond just paying for itself. With P2 you compare it to how many $33 DVCPRO HD tapes equals a $900 P2 card... and the answer is, after using a P2 card less than thirty times, it becomes less expensive than DVCPRO HD tape. Same thing applies to XDCAM EX... I suppose its tape equivalent would be HDCAM. Same math in that case... a 16GB SxS card is paid for in less than thirty cycles, and thereafter it's "free" as opposed to everybody else who's still paying for HDCAM or DVCPRO HD tapes.

Well, yes.......and no. I mean, I see what you are saying, but what if you want to actually hold on to (or archive) the footage you are shooting? Well, then you need to spend MORE money.....either for a hard drive, some kind of XDcam or blu ray disk, or 'gasp!' tape to dump it back to. So it's not quite as simple as 30 uses of a $900 P2 card has saved you money over tape because you will likely be spending MORE money to 'archive' the footage somehow if you are using solid state, unless you have no use for holding onto the footage you shoot (and if that was true you could reuse your $33 DVCPRO HD tape if you were tape based)

That being said, there is a BIG attraction to not have to 'ingest' or 'capture' tapes! It is certainly the wave of the future and I am sure that prices will continue to go down on solid state options.

[Chris Hurd]

You're right, I neglected to factor in the cost of archiving... there are a number of ways to store that data, it could go to a hard drive, it could go to an LTO-3 tape drive... so let's call it 40 to 50 cycles then. Ultimately it depends on how much you're recording, and how much of that you're hanging on to besides the finished edit masters.

[Bill Ravens]

I would agree with Chris. If you look at the storage media on the basis of how much you're paying per gig of storage, a 500GB disk is a LOT cheaper.

[Gabe Strong]

Well, don't think I'm bad mouthing solid state....I almost certainly am going to purchase the EX. And you are right, you can reuse the cards over and over, which WILL eventually be a savings. I was just pointing out one extra thing to think of that you probably WILL be spending some money on.....a way to archive the footage. Most people (well, me anyways) are used to just storing their tapes for 'stock' footage.....I keep a tape log, and when I find a project that needs a shot of a bear grabbing a fish out of the river, I can go to 'tape 23, timecode 01:34:15 - 01:42:05' and find exactly the shot I need. So the solid state way of doing things is just NEW.....but once I get used to it, I'm sure there will be no going back!

[Chris Hurd]

Here's an affordable archive solution... the Iomega Rev Pro. One 70GB cart holds the contents of four 16GB SxS cards. The cost of the drive is between $300 and $400 (either USB2 or FireWire, Mac and PC compatible). The cost of a 70GB cart is about $70. So compare that to DVCPRO HD or HDCAM tape... a $400 drive replaces a $20,000 VTR, and the cost to archive that data is less than $20 per each full SxS card.

[Kit Hannah]

Originally Posted by John Vincent

Great points Kit. Now that the lens problem seems to be addressed, the price/work flow of these cards is the only real reason not to buy this camera. I still like tape, but obviously it's not long for this world, at least in the smaller cams.

Thanks John.

Originally Posted by Joe Lawry

By the sound of things solid state might not be for you, i'd suggest you look into the full size XDCAM HD range, discs are cheap, and then you'll also get 2/3" ccds which will improve your lowlight levels.

Solid state is EXACTLY what we need. We need faster turnaround times and less labor costs ingesting everything. I think the full line of XDCAM stuff is awesome, but it's way out of our league cost wise. Spending $125k just on heads and lenses is not something that we can afford. It just makes sense that if Sony is going to offer a camera of this caliber at this pricepoint, they need to be realistic with who is going to be buying it and what they can afford. I don't think it's good business sense to "fool" people into thinking that this is going to be a less costly way to go, because when you really start getting down to the nitty gritty, purchasing the camera and say 10 hours worth of cards puts you back up not too shy of a 330 price wise. I just think they need to get the updated firmware out so that this camera can truly be one of the most successful cameras in history.

Just a note: the 355, 335 and 330 are 1/2" ccds, not 2/3". The EX1 has 1/2" cmos chips, which I like even better because of the newer technology and it seems like everything is going that way.

[Andreas Johansson]

Originally Posted by John Markert

What would motivate Sony to allow competitors to take away express card business from them? Manufacturers have lost business (e.g., tape decks) because of new technologies that are faster and cheaper.

I'll be surprised if Sony will allow other companies to get their foot in the XDCAM door.

The SxS card standard is a Sony/Sandisk collaboration. I would guess it's more Sandisk than Sony. And Sony has said from the beginning at NAB 2007 where they first showed the EX 1 mockup that as long as the cards follow the SxS specs and speed requirement they will be usable. But it's still up to Sony to implement new cards in the firmware and that might take time because they want to cash in on the card sales in the beginning.

One motivation to let others in could be to get a much lower price on SxS than P2 since there is only P2 cards from Panasonic and they have a two year sales advantage for Sony to catch up to. A low card price would generate more camera sales in my opinion. I have seen P2 cards from other manufacturers than Panasonic but pana doesn't seem to like when others make and sell cards.

Sandisk might be number two out on the market and then probably followed by others, I have heard about TDK wanting to make SxS cards

And just to clarify it's XDCAM EX that is card based. XDCAM and XDCAM HD are disc based systems and there are disc from Sony, TDK and Fuji and probably some more manufacturers so they have already let others in the XDCAM door. And would probably keep it so even for XDCAM EX, but time will tell.

[Joe Lawry]

Ah yes,,, of course, they are 1/2" cameras, you are correct, it was far to early for me to be posting anyway, hadn't had any coffee at that point yet.

I think you need to rule out archiving on professional Solid state media for the time being, its just not viable right now and I personally don't see Sony bastardizing their own cards in favour of letting us use cheaper non-sony cards. I don't care what they've promised.. but i for one don't trust sony.

and if they do.. well awesome, it will be another reason for me to buy the camera (which yes i will be doing after teething problems are over) I reckon they will be other manufactured cards.. but pricing wont be to far from the sony ones.

Currently if you want to archive, the best way to do it is hard drives.. they are so cheap.

Although i've just been testing out dual layer blu ray discs.. and i might even switch to doing it that way.

[Eric Lagerlof]

Kit, I understand wanting to shoot at the HQ rate all the time, but it seems like shooting really long events at the 25 Mb/s rate on firestore, at least until the cards get cheaper, isn't a totally awful alternative.

I know, when parents watch my videos of their kids performing in plays put on by the local performing arts school that the first thing they say is; "Oh my goodness, that silly man is recording at 25 Mb/s and not 35!" " Whatever shall we do...?"

[Kit Hannah]

I understand where you're coming from, Eric, but you make it sound like that's all we do. Although we do a lot of that, there are much more critically demanding projects that we do as well. The whole point of getting this camera is to have something better than what we have had in the past. We've done the Firestore thing for a long time and have not always been happy with their workflow. The thing that bugs me the most about the FS-4 is that it is way too cumbersome, hard to mount, and we'll have to deal with the m2t files in some way...again. I was really looking forward to working with something else.

But here's the difference. "I" care about what our product looks like. I want it to be better than the next guy's product because that's what keeps us working. Mom & Pops may not notice the difference, but many of our clients will. That's who's ultimately keeping me in business - it's just an added benefit that the parents stay happy.

It's not an "awful alternative" as you put it, but finding a solution to this will keep us a step or two ahead of our competition.

[Raymond Schlogel]

Wow ...

"I don't think it's good business sense to "fool" people"

Would someone drop almost 7k on a camera and not find out how much the media is? Really, I just don't get the borderline hostility in these posts and frankly it's a bit perturbing.

If you care about what your product looks like, and if you want to be better than the guy next door, sorry but thats going to cost a bit more. If it didn't the guy next door would have em! I may be alone but that makes perfect sense to me. It just seems to me as though the slights toward Sony are more than a little unreasonable and completely unfounded. Again, early adopters ALWAYS pay a premium. How much was a flat screen HD TV two years ago? Or closer to the topic the P2 cards? Or hard drives. It's like this, things start out expensive, then they get less expensive but when they do there are new things that we want that are more expensive, thats the cycle of life, or at least technology.

- Ray

[Stu Holmes]

Hi Kit

I'd think that if you're going to do a shoot with 5 EX1s, recording each for 5hours, you're probably going to get good enough revenue for that event to be able to afford to have one ("junior"?) person dumping SxS cards to a laptop or external hard drive from the 5cams.

Maybe i'm missing something here, but surely you would only need two 16Gb cards per EX1 - whilst one is being recorded to, the other (at some point during the 50minutes "window") can be dumped to laptops/external hard-drives and then the card is cleared and ready for the next 50minutes. The EX1 cam seamlessly switches from one card to the next once the first one is full.
- You're going to need a 400Gb+ hard-drive space to accommodate 25hours worth of footage anyway.

The person doing the card dumping really doesnt need any "skills" at all - its just a repetitive procedural thing. I wouldnt think the cost to pay someone to do that would be much at all. Maybe one of the production people has a teenage son or something who'd be happy to do it ?? just an idea.

In this way, even if you use all 5 EX1s on that event, you'd only need 5 x 2 cards = 10 cards of 16Gb each.
Still a large cost, but if you can afford USD33,500 for 5 EX1s (plus battery costs & other bits & pieces etc for all 5 cams - the 10 U60 batts alone is going to be $2340), then you'll be able to afford the USD9000 for the 10 16Gb cards i'd imagine. At least that $9000 is a one-off capital-expenditure cost and not a consumable item.

Personally i have never needed to record more than about 3hours on a 1-cam 1-day event shoot, so my guess is, with every respect, that the 5cams for 5hours = 25hours of footage would be at the top-end of (timewise and cam-count wise) what you might need to shoot on an event. The editing alone for 25hours of raw footage would be really very onerous if one had to do that magnitude of editing too often..!

I do really think that within a relatively short space of time (a few months) these card prices will drop substantially. If the firmware update happens that will help a lot for sure, and Sandisk have now said that they are going to release a card that works for the Ex1 (so i read in another post).

just my thoughts on that.

[Kit Hannah]

Originally Posted by Raymond Schlogel

Wow ...
"I don't think it's good business sense to "fool" people"

Raymond, TCO - Total cost of ownership (realistically) - you have to admit it's a little deceiving..... It's like getting the deal of a lifetime on a car and having to spend 3 grand a pop for each tire, but you can't buy the other brand's tires. But it does include a couple of spares to get you rolling down the road....

Originally Posted by Raymond Schlogel

Would someone drop almost 7k on a camera and not find out how much the media is? Really, I just don't get the borderline hostility in these posts and frankly it's a bit perturbing.

We have not purchased the cameras yet....What I am currently doing is called research. No hostility, just looking for opinions and answers.

Originally Posted by Raymond Schlogel

If you care about what your product looks like, and if you want to be better than the guy next door, sorry but thats going to cost a bit more.

Well, in this case A LOT more

Originally Posted by Raymond Schlogel

It just seems to me as though the slights toward Sony are more than a little unreasonable and completely unfounded. Again, early adopters ALWAYS pay a premium. How much was a flat screen HD TV two years ago? Or closer to the topic the P2 cards? Or hard drives. It's like this, things start out expensive, then they get less expensive but when they do there are new things that we want that are more expensive, thats the cycle of life, or at least technology.

I understand business and technology trends quite well, but if we're comparing TVs now...been shopping for one of those too. Sony TVs are still still way overpriced...LOL


Ray, I'm not trying to be hostile towards anyone. I welcome your opinion as well as anyone elses. Just trying to spark some discussion here.

Originally Posted by Stu Holmes

I'd think that if you're going to do a shoot with 5 EX1s, recording each for 5hours, you're probably going to get good enough revenue for that event to be able to afford to have one ("junior"?) person dumping SxS cards to a laptop or external hard drive from the 5cams. Maybe i'm missing something here, but surely you would only need two 16Gb cards per EX1 - whilst one is being recorded to, the other (at some point during the 50minutes "window") can be dumped to laptops/external hard-drives and then the card is cleared and ready for the next 50minutes. The EX1 cam seamlessly switches from one card to the next once the first one is full.
- You're going to need a 400Gb+ hard-drive space to accommodate 25hours worth of footage anyway.

But that means that EVERY time we do a shoot, we have to have someone dumping things. Sometimes we have multiple shoots going on in the same day, so then we'll need more people. We'll also have to lug around extra laptops, cabling, etc. Then we have to take all those back to the shop and set them up, transfer everything over again, etc. It's just a very bulky workflow that could be easily addressed by having more cards, which brings us back full circle to square one.

Originally Posted by Stu Holmes

The person doing the card dumping really doesnt need any "skills" at all - its just a repetitive procedural thing. I wouldnt think the cost to pay someone to do that would be much at all. Maybe one of the production people has a teenage son or something who'd be happy to do it ?? just an idea.

I definitely don't want to trust the transfer of our footage to someone that doesn't know what they are doing.

Originally Posted by Stu Holmes

In this way, even if you use all 5 EX1s on that event, you'd only need 5 x 2 cards = 10 cards of 16Gb each.
Still a large cost, but if you can afford USD33,500 for 5 EX1s (plus battery costs & other bits & pieces etc for all 5 cams - the 10 U60 batts alone is going to be $2340), then you'll be able to afford the USD9000 for the 10 16Gb cards i'd imagine. At least that $9000 is a one-off capital-expenditure cost and not a consumable item.

True, but it's really just not going to be efficient.

Originally Posted by Stu Holmes

Personally i have never needed to record more than about 3hours on a 1-cam 1-day event shoot, so my guess is, with every respect, that the 5cams for 5hours = 25hours of footage would be at the top-end of (timewise and cam-count wise) what you might need to shoot on an event. The editing alone for 25hours of raw footage would be really very onerous if one had to do that magnitude of editing too often..!

You are correct, This is an extreme situation, but one we run into multiple times throughout the year. There are many times we are running multiple events as well, maybe having a camera or 2 somewhere and a few cameras doing something else. Typically in a 5 camera live setup, we'll switch it live and record to computer & tape. But there are a few things we do every year that require us to have multiple mobile cameras for most of the day, such as some of the emergency training excercises that we do.

Originally Posted by Stu Holmes

I do really think that within a relatively short space of time (a few months) these card prices will drop substantially. If the firmware update happens that will help a lot for sure, and Sandisk have now said that they are going to release a card that works for the Ex1 (so i read in another post).

just my thoughts on that.

I sure hope so, for everyone's sake.

Thanks to everyone for chiming in, this has been great. I know there are other ways of doing things such as DTE drives, etc, which may suffice for the time being. I just really hope that there are some other alternatives coming out in the near future.