Today I tested Capturing of DV (PAL) from JVC's BR-HD50, set to DV. I have set up Media Composer with two deck alternatives,

1. Deck controled via Firewire port
2. Deck controled vie RS422, video/audio via Firewire.

Case 1. only worked, after I changed the driver for the tape-deck. It was automatically installed from the Windows operating system as "standard A/V device", and this one did not communicate with MC. I have then manually chenged the driver and selected JVC and JVC A/V tapedeck. After having done that, MC communicated properly with the deck.

Case 2. worked immediately.

I have then captured video from a DV-tape (PAL) some video which has in-printed timecode. Importing this video allows to check frame accurate capturing. With case 1. (above), the captured video was immediately frame accurate. In case 2. it was initially two frames delayed. So I corrected this by entering in the setting "Deck Preferences" a value of -2 in the field "Capture offset". After doing so, the next capture was frame accurate.

I have then run a more critical test with case 2. I unlinked the captured clips, marked the unlinked clips in the bin and started batch capture on them. All unlinked clips were now re-captured. They were all frame accurate. BTW, MC does this very clever. If the clips are taken with consecutive timecode, e.g. clip 1 ends at 00:59:24 and clip 2 starts with 01:00:00, then MC just captures both clips with one tape run, i.e., no interuption between the two clips.

During my tests I once closed MC and re-opened it. To my surprise MC re-started with a 2 1/2 minutes delay, i.e., when I started MC, the grey MC screen opened without the usual AVID logo-field. It then stayed in this mode for 2:25 minutes. Then the AVID logo shows up, which displays the various loading states. The project selection window came up after 3:05 mimutes. During the period of the grey MC-window, I observed heavy LAN activity, as if there is some network activity. The task manager showed, that MC was in an idle state (0% load).

I have then de-activated the network (LAN) port. and tested the start delay again. This time MC started normally, i.e. the grey wndow opened, after some 8 seconds the AVID logo appeared, and after 30 s the project selction window shows up. I have then repeated the test after having re-activated the network (LAN) port, and I got again the long delay of 3 minutes. Why???

As I did not have this dely the day before, I re-thought what was different the other day. The other day I had my computers and my NAS-store actively connected to the local LAN. So I switched on my Laptop and the NAS storage unit. Now I repeated the start-up test of MC, and it started within 30 s, without extra delay. After this experience I swithed off the Laptop and the NAS-storage unit and repeated the test, no extra delay this time.

So actually I am a little confused what really caused the extra delay. It was definitely caused by the local LAN, but I do not know why it disappeared finally. Has anyone an idea?

Right, finally successfully updated the nVidia driver through Update and all is well! Proper playback, inc full screen. Feels nice and responsive. Mojo however is still not happy. Anyone got one to work? It appears in device manager but claims that a driver is not loaded.

camoscato:

lmerino:

I get the "cannot use Avid with desktop compositing on" when I try to launch MC... does this happen in Vista?

Yes, that happens in Vista, too.

FYI, this has been fixed in MC 3.5.  The first time you run it, you get a warning about disabling desktop compositing, with the choice to continue, and a check box to supress future warnings.  Check the check box, then click continue, and the next time you start MC, you won't get the warning, it'll just disable desktop compositing and go on its merry way.

Thanks, Avid!

Carl

fiendish:

Right, finally successfully updated the nVidia driver through Update and all is well! Proper playback, inc full screen. Feels nice and responsive. Mojo however is still not happy. Anyone got one to work? It appears in device manager but claims that a driver is not loaded.

Getting the Mojo to work is something I've been working hard to figure out but no success so far.  Even though the installer indicates that the Mojo, Adrenaline and DX 64-bit drivers were successfully installed, I cannot get MC under W7-64 to find the Mojo.  When I first set up W7-64 and the first thing I loaded was MC (3.1.1 or 3.1.2 at the time), the Mojo did work.  At some point later, I started having driver problems generally with W7 (not just with MC/Mojo) and had to reinstall (overwrite) W7-64 as a clean install.  I was never able to get the Mojo to work with that same version of MC and I haven't gotten it to work with 3.5.  After I reinstalled W7-64, sometimes the device manager would show the drivers and that they were installed.  Sometimes it would show the Mojo as an unknown device.  Now, the device manager shows the drivers but says the drivers are not installed.  It has been frustrating knowing that it worked originally and won't anymore.

Other than that, I've had no problems with MC under W7-64 other than the same problem some of you had when you decided to try the updated 64-bit Nvidia drivers.  It's misleading that the installer says "Windows 7 Driver Installation" when after you run MC, you can't play video.  The only reason I tried the updated drivers was so I could control dual-display properly.  There are times with the drivers from Windows Update that there's a problem getting the proper display as primary and also getting the two displays cloned.  I'd rather be able to play video in MC than have dual-display so I went back to the Windows Update drivers pretty quickly.

Joachim Claus:

So actually I am a little confused what really caused the extra delay. It was definitely caused by the local LAN, but I do not know why it disappeared finally. Has anyone an idea?

Joachim,

Could you have had MC looking at network drives as media drives when you closed it and it was still set to look for them when you reopened MC but for some reason the drives were not still available on the network?  I don't know for sure if that would explain it but maybe it would.

Occasionally, I've set MC to look at "alldrives" as media drives.  Sometimes I've made the setting permanentl so MC will see network drives as media drives each time I start MC.  I have media on various drives since I use MC on both a desktop and a laptop at various times.  The media isn't always stored on the computer where I want to edit.  When I don't want to use network drives for a while, I turn that setting off again.  Your problem made me think of something like this as a possible cause.

Windows can seem to hang/lock up while the host process is getting all the networking set up again after something in the network has been shut down.  In XP while the networking is getting set up again, I've seen the CPU usage go to 100% for 1-2 minutes or more depending on the speed of the CPU.  That could certainly cause the sort of effect you saw in MC (hanging or not responding for a few minutes).

Scott,

thank you for your message. I have continued to look for the reason of the delay, and I think, I found it.

In the settings, there is an entry: "PortServer". This was by default set to: "Autoconnect-to LANshare at Launch" being enabled. I de-activated it and re-started MC 3.5 again -> no extra delay any more.

Joachim

I have to correct my previous message. The delay is back! Possibly in my previous test I started MC immediately after I switched my Laptop off. So, may be a system table was not already changed in my workstation, when I started MC. It had normal delay between hitting the MC icon and the start window to appear.

A few minutes later I ran down MC, switcfhed my tape deck on and re-started MC. Now the long delay of two minutes is back. It is not caused by the tape deck, as I repeated the test without the tape deck being switched on. So no solution so far.

Joachim

curiosity:

Okay I bit the bullet and set up a system to try this out. Windows 7 (Beta7000) - 64bit Ultimate - formatted the hard drive and installed really quickly (much quicker than XP).

Avid MC 3.1.2 installed with only a couple of errors (I got a illegal function call error during the install - but I was unable to determine what is was in reference to.) I dismissed the errors and completed the installation.

MC loads fine - and basic functions (capturing video, playback to a deck/client display), basic edits, all work correctly.

can i run MC 3.0.5 or higher( upto 3.5.4) on windows 7

i have currently HP xw8000 PC XP sp2 MC 3.0.5 Adrenaline DNA 3.5 gb mem matrox perhelia(can be upgaded to NVidia quadro fx 3300 or 3500)

pls suggest!

charan:

can i run MC 3.0.5 or higher( upto 3.5.4) on windows 7

I can't tell you if the older versions will install or run without (or even with) changing compatibility settings but as long as you haven't deactivated your dongle, you can try running the older versions.  I don't think there'll be any harm in trying unless you have registry settings (as is the case with Vista) that cause trouble when going back and forth between versions.

If you've read my earlier posts, you'll know I've used some earlier versions successfully but I also understand how to handle the types of problems that can be encountered.  How to handle potential problems is not always easy to explain to others or easy to understand by those who haven't already had the experience.

The situation is that you're mostly on your own when trying "unsupported" congifurations.

Hey Curiosity, did you find changing the screen display to basic worked? I've tried changing this but am still having the same trouble.