Dropouts using the FS-100

greggyb

greggyb

Member
I posted this to the Technical & Harware sections as well. Here is the text of the original posts:

The FS-100 has so far performed better in most respects than i thought it might given the harsh environment of Pt. Hope Alaska. I have kept it inside my jacket to keep it warm and used the belt clip to give the fan a little breathing room. The battery has lasted as long as they said it would - about 90 minutes. The interface and offloading of clips is ok.

The big Killer is the dropouts. I put some sticky velcro tape in two spots on the camera, one just above the battery in the back, below the Audio level controls; and the second - straight up from the 4 pin 1394 jack. I used two rip-ties attached to the 1394 cable to keep a snug connection to the camera and still - drop out that is bad enough that I have stopped using the unit. The unti was not subjected to shock of any kind during recording. The 6 pin 1394 connect on the FS-100 seems very secure and so i have not modified it in any way. Anyone else having any luck with the FS-100?:crybaby:

dropout.jpg
 
Wow... I feel your pain.. What glorious scenery you must be seeing and taping. I don't have any experience with the HVX firestore, but this weekend we had major issues with the JVC firestore. It did something similar to our clips and wasn't playing back the video on certain sections....

For some weird reason I get a similar file for a second when I open up FCP... I know I'm of no help, but I hope everything gets sorted out...


On other news.. any chance of seeing this glorious footage?
 
Panasonic, release bigger p2 and lower your poo pooing prices already!!!
 
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I have seen these dropouts with footage I was importing into FCP on my Powerbook and Desktop. I was recording to P2. The files on my P2 were clean. The imported files had drop outs. I had to install a seperate Firewire card in my desktop to get rid of the problem (put the camera and HDD on to seperate buses). It seems to be a firewire/HDD issue. That is not good! I'm sorry, man.
 
I don't have personal experience with the Firestore but I have seen similar things as well in transferring footage. My personal experience was caused by a hard drive error but is could also be due to communication problems via firewire.

The HVX comes with a ferrite core that is supposed to be placed on a firewire cable to filter out interferance. There are instructions on how to snap it onto the cable in the manual. Try using this on the firewire cable leading to the Firestore and see if it helps. - It can't hurt.
 
the ferrite core is intended to suck up RF that might be injected from the RF leakage of cables or other devides that might be laying close in paralell, the 1394 cables (and most computer related cables) are shielded well, but it's a "just in case" thing. On location there is very little worry of that much RF being a problem, even in a big city much less a remote area.

I would tend to think that this issue is a result of the cold somehow. Perhaps it got really cold once while not being used? When you think of how a hard drive works and how often, it is truly amazing that they are as robust as they are, still...
 
thats the exact type of drop out ive was having with the fs100. starange the last batch of footage we shot yesterday was clean, no drop out, every thing prior was exactly the same as your pic. i did a system reset, and reformat and it came in clean. have you sent this off to focus yet? i sent them an email and a few screen shots, still waiting to hear back from them.
 

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toddeastman said:
I have seen these dropouts with footage I was importing into FCP on my Powerbook and Desktop. I was recording to P2. The files on my P2 were clean. The imported files had drop outs. I had to install a seperate Firewire card in my desktop to get rid of the problem (put the camera and HDD on to seperate buses). It seems to be a firewire/HDD issue. That is not good! I'm sorry, man.
Click to expand...
ok i am having the exact problem. Now my mac store guy wants to know what firewire brand seems to work the best since he says i have a few options to order.
 
im going to get a high end firewire cable this week, then fill the drive and wipe it 3 times. just so theres data thats been run through the whole drive. then reformat it, and do a test shoot. hopefully that will fix it. after the reformat, factroy reset, and a few small things, i was able to capture clean, i didnt have any more drop out. ill post an update again next week.

make sure to tell both focus and panasonic about the problem, so they see it, and can fix or patch anything that need be.
 
oh boy! what a nightmare! sounds like another technical headache. i'll wait for these panasonic mofos to drop their p2 prices, before I attempt to mine the landscape of $2K apparently drop-out laden, capturing alternatives.
 
Well, itll be a while, with panasonic selling the fs100, and by years end having a 120 gig p2 card. prices wont get super low anytime soon, the new hd cam has 8 p2 slots on it.
 
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