C200: New (ish) Firmware Observation

[puredrifting]

Today was my first shoot with my C200 since Canon had it in for repairs and updated it to the new firmware.

Observations
1. I wasn't planning on updating the firmware, so I forgot that when you update it, the camera loses all of your settings. Didn't have my SD card settings backup with me on the shoot but no big deal, I had only customized a few of the custom settings and mapped a few of the buttons. It only took me about 5 minutes to do so, but another good warning for those of you who drag your feet with firmware updates and may not have upgraded your camera, save your settings beforehand.

2. Looking at the footage I shot, I daresay that Canon gave us an extra 10Mbps in the XF-AVC codec. My 256GB SD cards went from 227 minutes for .MP4 UHD to 212 minutes when I switch to XF-AVC. Looking at the XF Utility verifies this, the C200 shoots 150 Mbps in .MP4 and 160 Mbps in XF-AVC. Interesting, wonder if it was to off set some sort of loss in XF-AVC versus .MP4?

3. It takes the C200 five times longer to format CFast cards since the firmware update, compared to before the firmware update.

4. It would have been nice if we had the option to record a 1080 .MP4 proxy on the unused card at the same time as we record a UHD XF-AVC signal

 

[Run&Gun]

3. It takes the C200 five times longer to format CFast cards since the firmware update, compared to before the firmware update.

Maybe it's automatically doing a Low Level Format, now, as opposed to a quick. I know on my Canon still cams, at least with SD cards, you can pick a quick or LL format.

 

[puredrifting]

Maybe it's automatically doing a Low Level Format, now, as opposed to a quick. I know on my Canon still cams, at least with SD cards, you can pick a quick or LL format.

You're probably right, the old firmware formatted a 256GB Cfast in like, a second, always seemed weird to me when it took like :20 to format a 256GB SD card.

 

[Barry1908]

You're probably right, the old firmware formatted a 256GB Cfast in like, a second, always seemed weird to me when it took like :20 to format a 256GB SD card.

I know it’s a dead topic but the increase in data rate makes me wonder if they might increase the bitrate...

 

[Dustin Svehlak]

Looking at the XF Utility verifies this, the C200 shoots 150 Mbps in .MP4 and 160 Mbps in XF-AVC.

View attachment 132383

I believe it's been stated that this increase in bitrate is nothing more than the metadata with the XF-AVC codec. Not sure if I've read that from Canon directly or from anecdotal accounts here on DVX. That said, I shot in XF-AVC earlier this summer for a project and was very happy with the quality of the video.

Also, there are updates for the XF-Utility, Canon Raw Development and the Final Cut Pro X Plug-in available. No idea if any of these resolve the 120p issue in Final Cut- I still haven't really found a reason to shoot above 60p (I'm boring).

 

[puredrifting]

I know it’s a dead topic but the increase in data rate makes me wonder if they might increase the bitrate...

Don't hold your breath