P2 E Series - In Stock Yet?

Dan:

Are you indicating your belief that this isn't a download to a SD card like the HVX series firmware?

Oh, my dear, why or why is this a Mac need not apply for a basic firmware update?

Say it ain't so!!!!
 
I don't think there will be any changes on the way we update the cameras.
We have done before trough the SD card using a Mac and it wasn't too hard.
I'm hopeful!
 
Hi David:

To be honest, I don't know for sure. I spent about 45 minutes trying to navigate the PASS site last night in anticipation of receiving my first E card Monday. I have the HPX170 and it is running the 1.05 firmware. There is a 1.06 firmware currently listed on the PASS site and then in the grid for the E series P2 cards, they say, "new firmware coming in June." Okay, fine, so the new firmware is not out yet and may not be out for up to a month.

I was curious to see if I could update my camera to the 1.06 firmware though. When you open the .pdf instructions, it says you must use "P2 Status Logger" which is a PC only application and hook up your camera "to the PC via USB". You and I know that hooking up P2 cameras to Macs is via Firewire only, not via USB. The file is an .exe file, which as we all know is a PC executable file. I read about a bunch of people having major problems updating their HMC150s using Bootcamp and dual boot enabled Macs so I don't think that will work out really well and none of my Macs are dual boot anyway. It appears that there is absolutley no way to update the firmware via a Mac.

It is tough to figure out because the PASS site is a Japanese authored translated to Engrish wesbite so the logic, how it is laid out and what you need to do is all very unclear. Panasonic US should really take the entire PASS website and do an English version, authored from the ground up to be logical and well laid out for English speakers. Even though the PASS site is in Japanese and English, it is not very logical or clear.

I am going to call Abel on Monday to see if they can do this. It will probably cost me a couple hundred dollars but I don't know any PC users who would be comfortable with letting me install various software and my camera to their PCs while I try to do this update.

I shoot VFR all of the time and do occasionally shoot DV and DVC Pro rather than HD and I do shoot a lot of timelapse so these functions need to work seamlessly on my camera with the new E series cards as I am planning on buying two of the 64 GB cards later in the year and I am receiving a 16GB E series next week.

Dan
 
Alex:

Do you have a link to the procedure on how you update firmware on a P2 camera using a Mac? I scanned the PASS site for quite a while and everything I could find related to updating firmware was PC only. You can, of course, update your computer's P2 software for the Mac but for firmware for cameras, I could only find ways to do it with a PC.

Enlighten me, please!

Dan
 
Download the firmware to an SD card and store it in the proper directory (private->....->p2sd->FW). Then when you plug the SD card in the camera and go to the thumbnails screen it'll have an option for "update".

You certainly shouldn't need to go through a Windows system to do that. On the HMC150, you do, but I don't think you have to for the HPX170.
 
Dan, the initial procedure for the HVX200 was downloading a firmware file to a SD card formatted in the cam, and going that way.

Work on a pc or a Mac.
 
Really? This is great news. I will give it a try today and will see if I can do it. Will report back on my results.

Thanks,

Dan
 
Thank you so much Barry, Alex and David. I just did it exactly the way Barry advised and it worked fine. It would be nice if Panasonic posted this exact procedure on the PASS website for poor neglected Mac users. I think that they kind of allude to it where they say you must use a Mac to unzip the file, but they don't really tell you to unzip the card place it in the structure Barry outlined, etc. I am lucky, I have you guys to instruct me about this but what about all of the other people who aren't on this website?

I guess the next question is when Panasonic will issue the new firmware for the E series cards? Hopefully soon seeing as we will have E series cards the day after tomorrow.

Thanks again!

Dan
 
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Does anyone know if it will be possible to mix "A" and "E" P2 cards?
Any firmware conflict?
 
Yes it's possible. But most cameras will need a firmware update to be able to use all their features with an "E" series card.
 
I spoke with Spec-comm yesterday and thy did not get enough cards to fulfill all pre orders. Could be up to another month. Come on panny we need these.....
 
jason.adams said:
I spoke with Spec-comm yesterday and thy did not get enough cards to fulfill all pre orders. Could be up to another month. Come on panny we need these.....
Click to expand...
Spec Comm told me the same thing as well. i canceled my order and ended up buying a 16 gig card at Abel Cine. Abel Cine told me they will be getting another shipment of 32 gig cards on the 22nd of June and should have some left overs that you could order now. Better than July.

To bad Panasonic couldn't get these out fast enough, but they demand is huge I am sure.

Daniel Weber
 
weberda said:
Spec Comm told me the same thing as well. i canceled my order and ended up buying a 16 gig card at Abel Cine. Abel Cine told me they will be getting another shipment of 32 gig cards on the 22nd of June and should have some left overs that you could order now. Better than July.

To bad Panasonic couldn't get these out fast enough, but they demand is huge I am sure.

Daniel Weber
Click to expand...

Yep...I had to cancel with Spec Comm as well and go with Abel Cine. I got screwed with tax but I have a big shoot in july and I can't risk it.
 
I ordered May 4th. I think that was the first day that B&H accepted orders. I called them later and asked what place I had in line. I was third. Give them a call, they are very good at keeping you informed if you ask.
 
I ordered a 16GB from Abel this morning - just got my shipment notice this afternoon. If I need to do any special frame rates before the firmware update comes out for the HPX170, I can just shoot on the card that came with the camera. But, I'm shooting a doc in Texas next week, so I don't think I'll need anything fancy for that, just the ability to shoot for longer periods of time in between offloading cards.
 
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