External Recorders: HDMI + SDI - which products?

M

mcbob

Veteran
To the best of my research, only the NanoFlash and Pix240 currently have HDMI in and also HD-SDI in. Both are reported to work with remote triggering on the AF. Am I correct, or am I missing another choice?
 
I use SDI triggering on mine with an AF100, works great. I've seen one report here of issues with the current beta DNxHD with the .mov container. Haven't seen it myself but I generally run uncompressed.
 
The Samurai with it's new software update is looking very good. Although it's SDI only, you can get a battery add on that also gives you HDMI
 
Is there really any benefit the Nano has other than being smaller and using less power? CF doesn't seem much cheaper than SSD these days...
 
does it remote trigger over SDI?

Price looks identical to the NanoFlash... any comparative differences?

EDIT: After a little research, it seems like the KiPro "Mini" is very much not, looks larger than even the Pix240.


So recapping thus far (correct where necessary)
- HyperDeck is by far the cheapest, but needs a large external battery and only records uncompressed or .mxf - not ProRes reliably
- Pix240 has 24-bit XLR in (yay) and records in a ton of formats, but costs more than my first three cars combined; monitor lets you know you're recording something, which is handy.
- NanoFlash is most compact and power-thrifty (will work off my Swit batteries), but a bit on the expensive side
- KiPro Mini is not mini and needs a large external battery, but will do 24-bit audio; seems to have reports of overheating problems; a bit expensive for what you get
- Samurai can do both via extra accessory plate; Samurai 2 (assuming it's updated like the Ninja 2) may be able to take the place of a monitor in addition to serving as recorder
 
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Go with the NanoFlash. $2000 ($1000 off org. price) easy to use and excellent quality. Hot swapping is great and low power consumption. I have been using mine on the AF100 since the camera came out...no problems what so ever.
 
mcbob said:
Is there really any benefit the Nano has other than being smaller and using less power? CF doesn't seem much cheaper than SSD these days...
Click to expand...
Well, the way I see it, I can use my CF cards in my Canon. Also you can adjust the Mbps of the recording to suit your needs, thus increase or decrease the recording times. Fortunately there are a lot of options out there, the Nano just works better for me. I've had mine for over two years now...so far no failures other than a bad HDSDI cable.
 
I just ordered the Blackmagic Hyperdeck (II) with DNxHD. We are an all AVID house, so it makes sense. With the attachment bracket, cables, SSD drive, it's about $600, so pretty reasonable. I will record SDI in and use the HDMI out to a monitor. I was hoping Panasonic would come out with a low cost HD SDI P2 recorder. (We have a lot of P2 cards.) The SSD's aren't bad about a dollar per gig.
 
The AJA Ki Pro Mini is roughly the same external dimensions as an Anton Bauer brick and half as thick. (You're going to need a battery brick to power any of the external recorders.) And yes, it triggers from AF100 HDSDI. Mine has never overheated and they keep adding features with new firmware - they just added Avid dnx codecs.

If the cost of one recorder vs. another is a factor, you don't need an external recorder. An external recorder adds little to the quality of the image - you'll almost never see the improvement over AVCHD except in extreme motion or green screen and even then it's not a big deal. The reason to get an external recorder is for workflow. If you need a recorder, get one that records in a format that matches your workflow.
 
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