Fuse vs DC30

[Charles Deenen]

Anybody any comments on wether to get a Fuse card or DC30. I'm hearing rumours that Digi is going to support the Fuse a bit more vs the DC30 with their upcoming fibre-channel network.

Any insights ?

-cd

[maxx]

I'm using the fuse and I'm quite happy with it. I researched the same issue when making my decision and the feedback I got was that the fuse is less expensive, delivers better picture quality and is more flexible as far as adjusting picture input settings while previewing the results in realtime (rather than having to record something and play it back to see what effect your picture adjustment has).

The DC30 has dedicated audio inputs and the fuse does not (if your tape is striped with timecode you can run Pro Tools in the background, locked to picture, and record your tape's audio directly into PT while recording your picture with Premiere or some other video app.). If your tape has no code then it's best to record the tape's audio into your Mac's built-in (Sound Manager) hardware and record the audio as part of the movie. Then export an AIFF from Premiere for imort into Pro Tools (this way you know your audio and movie tracks have exactly the same start time. I believe the Fuse is capable of higher capture rates (9Mps) with a fast computer (G3/G4) and fast drives.

Either way, once you start working with non-linear picture you'll never want to deal with tape again. It's so great not to have to wait for your PT rig to lock to tape or deal with shuttling a video transport back and forth. Wherever you put your cursor you see where you are picture-wise. Nudge a region frame by frame and the picture reflects your position - ideal for spotting musical hits or SFX.

[MGalway]

Hey there me ol' bud...

If I was in the market for any more video cards, I would get the Fuse. I have a Miro in there right now. Contractors I've worked with have the Fuse. The MPEG-A codec works just fine on both. The Fuse is just a more modern card and I believe the support will be better as a result. (and it's cheaper) (and the fact that the Miro has audio I/O is nullified by the fact that it's unbalanced and very bad sound quality - buzzy, hummy etc.) -MG

[Ray Fabi]

Both studios working with Aurora Fuse - so far so good. U can get 9 MB seconds video directly on a n internal IDE drive on a G4... Picture seems better, and like others said, no dedicated audio, but cheaper!



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Ray Fabi
Ton of Bricks Studios Montreal
514-990-2713

[dcornutt]

Aurora also makes the "Igniter" card which is even higher quality and comes with 16/48khz audio. Its based off the same technology as the fuse (drivers) and appears to also work just fine with PT.

This card..base..retails for right at a grand..and its upgradeable (with clip on daughter boards) all the way up to SDI..24fps native film..etc.

The standard card maxes as 13megs a sec..but..they also have an "uncompressed" option that will run somewhere in the ball park of 25megs a second! WARNING..serious hard drives needed for this.

I bought the fuse..and overall I'm happy with it. I think I might have prefered to go spring the extra bucks and get the Igniter though. Trying to use Digi inputs in anything other than Digi products is ..well..frustrating if not impossible.

Ill tell you why the fuse is a better choice than the Miro stuff. Outputs.

Aside from having slightly better output quality..the fuse has all its outputs active..all the time. What does that mean?
It means..that you can use any or all of the outputs simultaneously from any app..like Premiere/PTle..or..quicktime. The miro doesn't have this.

The fuse drivers have been rock solid for me in every app. You can get the fuse bundled with Premiere LE..and upgrade to full for 199. Or..you can find a deal on Fuse with full adobe premiere for about 6 or 700 bucks.

Premiere 6 looks great! You can upgrade to it from full 5.1 for 99 bucks..or..from LE for the same 199.

If you don't need Premiere..etc..then..just take what comes with it (the LE version) and save the bread. I've seen this bundle for as low as 485.00.

Good luck

[meshtheflesh]

I have been told by a Pinnicle marketing dood that the DC30 has been discontinued, because of the 'superior ' DV cards , but i have heard the DV cards only work at one data rate...


mesh

[Charles Deenen]

Thank you all for your reply.

For several years now, we've been working with Doremi V1 video since Fuse and DC30 didn't include some of the better picture sync editing functions from protools. i.e. picture didn't follow during certain editing operations on video-cards, while it DOES follow using 9-pin control with the V1's.

Protools 5.1 will have this (as rumoured) fixed, hence my curiosity as to which video-card to get http://duc.digidesign.com/ubb/images/icons/smile.gif

In these days of high-speed internet it shouldn't be needed anymore to send or receive video-tapes. It's so much easier just to get new picture delivered through an FTP (my wish es for the future http://duc.digidesign.com/ubb/images/icons/smile.gif

Take care, and thanks again !

-charles

ps: does anybody know if it's possible to play DC30 compressed picture with the Fuse ? I'm expecting not, but not sure if anybody has ever tried it.

[RMD]

I am looking at some point to enter the world of video in PT. Can any of you tell me what the differnces are in doing what you're doing with video in Premiere or Final Cut Pro?

Thanks,
Robert M. DiVito
Montgomery Sound

[MGalway]

as I said above, the same codec works fine on both. For some reason the Miro folks call their codec the "MiroMotion JPEG-A" codec, but as far as I can tell, it's just good ol' "Apple MPEG-A". When using Media Cleaner Pro on source video information, turning it into the Apple MPEG-A codec on a Mac or "MPEG-A" on Windows, the files work just fine on both Miros and Fuses. Has to be a quicktime of course. -MG

[charles maynes]

[I am using the Fuse card - (400 bucks off of ebay…)
It works very well, except that the low quality (under 2.5mb per second) captures do not look as good as the DC-30. It is great though sync-wise.

I think that the fuse overall is a better choice.

charles maynes

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[COCO]

Media Cleaner Pro, shall I assume this is not freeware? If so, where to get? I have some Miro captures I'd like to hand off to someone using QT without a card (mine's a dc20).
Thanks in advance,
COCO

[jimlongo]

http://www.terran.com

but I think that your movie will play natively on a mac without any problem. My miroJpegA movies play anywhere.

jim