mcsmooth
10-06-2008, 05:30 PM
I'm guessing there was discussion regarding this with HVX users, but coming from a DVX, and this being the first camera without a tape deck, I was a little surprised to see an hour counter. This counter is on any time the camera is on, even if there is no card inserted.
This bothered me a little bit at first since with the DVX you were only docked for time you had a tape inserted. Kind of like the resale value of your car is effected by miles, not by how long you sat in traffic. But I guess this makes things more fair now and I'm expect to see MUCH higher times on the used market in a few years and it not having as big of an impact on selling price. If Panasonic is confident giving 3 years of warranty, I would expect them to be lasting a lot longer than that even with heavy use.
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In relation to this, I have to say the solid-state only feature is probably the MOST IMPORTANT feature upgrade from the DVX (at least for me). I understand some people prefer tapes for "reliability" and backup, but I am DONE!!! Probably the worst part about the tapes was the damn hour counter and having to baby the stupid thing all the time to keep the deck working and the hours low.
Then dealing with usual crap like this:
-using only the right tapes
-shouldn't reuse tapes
-need a separate player (video cam for most)
-can't see footage until the next day when it's been captured
-painful captures (and having to recapture)
-try to do anything inside tethered to firewire
-tether to laptop to get long times outside or do a decent timelapse
-bla, bla, and more
It feels like this giant weight has been lifted, and that I have been set free. I know this all may sound kind of stupid, but there were just too many times I rushed, avoided or skipped something due to the tape hassle. Now I am having no problems leaving the camera on, testing everything out, playing back clips, deleting clips, using the camera as a card reader, whatever. I'm already at 1/4 the hours of my DVX. While that was a bit scary at first, I'm sure my non-tape DVX hours were probably 10X what the tape hours were (with no firestore). After a few days on the 150, I confidently put my DVX up on ebay. :thumbup:
This bothered me a little bit at first since with the DVX you were only docked for time you had a tape inserted. Kind of like the resale value of your car is effected by miles, not by how long you sat in traffic. But I guess this makes things more fair now and I'm expect to see MUCH higher times on the used market in a few years and it not having as big of an impact on selling price. If Panasonic is confident giving 3 years of warranty, I would expect them to be lasting a lot longer than that even with heavy use.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In relation to this, I have to say the solid-state only feature is probably the MOST IMPORTANT feature upgrade from the DVX (at least for me). I understand some people prefer tapes for "reliability" and backup, but I am DONE!!! Probably the worst part about the tapes was the damn hour counter and having to baby the stupid thing all the time to keep the deck working and the hours low.
Then dealing with usual crap like this:
-using only the right tapes
-shouldn't reuse tapes
-need a separate player (video cam for most)
-can't see footage until the next day when it's been captured
-painful captures (and having to recapture)
-try to do anything inside tethered to firewire
-tether to laptop to get long times outside or do a decent timelapse
-bla, bla, and more
It feels like this giant weight has been lifted, and that I have been set free. I know this all may sound kind of stupid, but there were just too many times I rushed, avoided or skipped something due to the tape hassle. Now I am having no problems leaving the camera on, testing everything out, playing back clips, deleting clips, using the camera as a card reader, whatever. I'm already at 1/4 the hours of my DVX. While that was a bit scary at first, I'm sure my non-tape DVX hours were probably 10X what the tape hours were (with no firestore). After a few days on the 150, I confidently put my DVX up on ebay. :thumbup: