Turn a MAC Mini into a 400GB disk recorder for ~1200.00

K

Ken_Chalk

Member
I’ve been working with a friend who is a very talented electrical engineer on a DDR for the HVX200. We are using Final Cut Pro, a small LCD screen, a 17’ PowerBook Battery and a fire wire hard drive. My buddy has tweaked the mini to extend the battery life and striped out any unnecessary equipment and built a custom case to keep the wait down. It should be complete by the end of the week…I’ll post pictures when it’s done.


LCD screen $200.00
PowerBook Battery 150.00
Mac Mini 599.00
400 GB internal HD 179.00
FireWire Bus 79.00

Total $ 1200.00
 
This sounds like a great concept. If all goes well would your friend want to make another one for me :) I would pay of course :costumed-smiley-047
 
We will defiantly share the design and help you build your own, however not sure we want to go into the DDR business. -Ken
 
Ken_Chalk said:
I’ve been working with a friend who is a very talented electrical engineer on a DDR for the HVX200. We are using Final Cut Pro, a small LCD screen, a 17’ PowerBook Battery and a fire wire hard drive. My buddy has tweaked the mini to extend the battery life and striped out any unnecessary equipment and built a custom case to keep the wait down. It should be complete by the end of the week…I’ll post pictures when it’s done.


LCD screen $200.00
PowerBook Battery 150.00
Mac Mini 599.00
400 GB internal HD 179.00
FireWire Bus 79.00

Total $ 1200.00
Click to expand...

I'm all for DIY projects but if you add the price of FCP suite into there you are far exceeding the Cineporter and the Firestore. Now I understand this can still be used for other things and has more capacity. But how do you record? Do you have to literally load FCP up and initiate a capture session? For each and every clip? Or have you found a way to tie it into the record button on the camera?

Let us know. I am not dogging it.....I am just wondering what it will do exactly!
 
Right now you would need to initiate capture for each clip. We are working on a fpc plugin that starts and stops capturing with the camera and adds a new reel number. Its buggy but works...any programmers interested in helping us out?

PS I'll post some photos midweek.
 
This seems pretty cool... How portable will this be? Do you need an intel mini for this to work, or will a g4 work (I know where to get those cheap). I'd like to see this as a poor-person's firestore... To do that, it would need to be able to stream without clicking capture now. Maybe some kind of macro, activated by a usb device, like the metal knob thing that was popular for a little while...
 
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icicle22 said:
I'm all for DIY projects but if you add the price of FCP suite into there you are far exceeding the Cineporter and the Firestore. Now I understand this can still be used for other things and has more capacity. But how do you record? Do you have to literally load FCP up and initiate a capture session? For each and every clip? Or have you found a way to tie it into the record button on the camera?

Let us know. I am not dogging it.....I am just wondering what it will do exactly!
Click to expand...

You could re assign some of the short cut keys for log and capture to an external numkey pad and velcro it to the tripod.
 
Good News and Bad News

Good News and Bad News

First the bad news. The new Intel Mac Mini has only one firewire 400 port. Even if it had 2 firewire ports, having the HVX and a hard drive on the same bus would result in dropped frames, even for DV let alone DVCPRO50 or DVCPROHD.

The good news is that the new Mac Mini has a SATA interface, which means you can swap out the 2.5" drive for a larger and faster 3.5" one though it'll use more battery power.

Check out these links for some ideas on turning the Mac Mini into a portable.
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/addonics/mini/
http://homepage.mac.com/peter_green/MMP_MkII/index.html

The Apple Store also has refurbs on some 15" and 17" Powerbooks starting at around $1549. May be worth the extra $350 just buying a refurb and be ready to go.

Looking forward to seeing the finished product.
 
THIS WOULD BE PERFECT FOR ANDROMEDA REEl-STREAM!!!

People are long searching for the most portable solution to use Juan's mod in the field.

Keep us updated! We need one!
 
Interesting idea, I look forward to seeing the pic's as well as hearing about how it actually works in the field. (I'm really interested to see how you get the powerbook batery to power the thing ...)
 
This is a custom set-up I built for an Andromeda/DVX:
Mini Mac, one external HDD, monitor and two batteries (underneath). The Mac, HDD and the monitor could have been placed anywhere else around the camera. What you see was done to achieve a weight and function balance. (Mac mounted on the camera plate would have made camera rear heavy, and the monitor on top of the camera, top heavy stressing the hot shoe mount on DVX, etc). Comments welcome.
 
I like the pic's. Definately does not look liek something you would want to use in a run & gun situation. How are you powering everything- is it via those bateries? If so, what kind of run time are you getting out of them? And what monitor are you using?
 
Thank you. As a matter of fact, when someone needs 444-out and shallow DOF, the shoots require a bit more attention and planning than r&g projects (I am not saying it does not look a bit awkward but....all in all, you can plug in cables, change tapes and batteries, the components have enough cooling air around them to avoid malfunctioning and the overall weight is balanced for pan/tilt).The two batteries (LiIon) are under the (xenarc?) monitor and the owner bought two of each (monitor and Mac). (one in use, one on charge).
 
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