Firestore or 16gb P2 Cards? Advice Please!

L

Leon Trinidad

Active member
Hi, posting here for a friend who needs some advice before some purchases in a couple of days and doesn't have internet access while on a shoot.

I have an HVX 200 with a 4 gig P2 card and an 8 gig p2 card I dump to my G4 laptop and I love it. But I find myself renting 2-4 additional 8 gig cards for big shoots.
I am contemplating buying the Firestore and or buying a few 8 gig cards because I still have not seen any 16 gig cards available.

Can I get some of your feed back from what you guys use and prefer?
If you had a 4 gig card and an 8 gig card would you prefer to upgrade by getting 2 more 8 gig cards or would you buy the fire store?

If you know where I can get a 16 gig card TODAY please let me know.

what i shoot are music videos, commercials and I'm days away from doing very long takes for a feature film, and 1 film that is to be done in 1 solid take, 80 minutes long!
I have heard that the Firestore could possibly run into problems on extremely long takes.
Thank you for any and all information.


HVX SHOOTER
 
as you may have read over at lafcpug. its really a matter of "horses for courses" and of current availability...

the 16 gig cards still arent widely available on an immediate basis. they ARE out there but small guys like us fall behind the big companies sucking up dozens or more of them at a time. so it still seems to be a roll of the dice there.

as far as firestore being sketchy on long takes. from what ive seen its not really any more problematic than spanning two p2 cards. ive read of problems with both. ive done a few long take test shots with my firestore and havent yet had a problem.

until the 32 or 64 gig p2 cards come out. there are some places where the firstores size simply makes it a better choice.

i shoot in the field all the time with just 2, 8 gig cards. shoot to one while the other transfers. and by the time you fill one, the other is ready to go. as long as you dont have a need to shoot individual takes longer than 15 min or so, you could live with just 2, 8 gig cards forever...
 
The firestore is more trouble than its worth. I could go into numerous reasons why but they will all spark on going debates.

A simply put one that can be only slightly contested is that it is battery powered, and the battery has an incredibly short lifespan. Buying additional batteries ends up costing more than buying additional p2 cards. Also for the cost of the firestore you can get another 2 16gb cards. And with p2 cards you dont have to worry about batteries - ever

one more thing is that you can potentially drop frames on a firestore - it aint gonna happen on a p2 card.
 
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