Still using DVX100 Andromeda?

Zack Birlew

Zack Birlew

Veteran
Hey, guys, just had a passing curiosity about the old DVX100 Andromeda system recently and from what I can see it's almost like it was never there. The old forums are gone and hardly anybody is selling theirs on auction sites or even in the Marketplace sections of various filmmaking messageboards. I was just wondering if anybody was still using the Andromeda system for anything or if anybody knew where to look for some sort of usergroup site I could look into. It's strange, during my search I did come across an auction site where one sold for about $300 and it was just one of those "Aw man!" moments, if only I'd noticed a couple years ago! XD

I just wondered how the system held up with today's technology and new developments like high end tablet computers and SSDs. Even though the resolution was only 720p it was still RAW 4:4:4 from a quality videocamera.
 
Zack Birlew said:
Hey, guys, just had a passing curiosity about the old DVX100 Andromeda system recently and from what I can see it's almost like it was never there. The old forums are gone and hardly anybody is selling theirs on auction sites or even in the Marketplace sections of various filmmaking messageboards. I was just wondering if anybody was still using the Andromeda system for anything or if anybody knew where to look for some sort of usergroup site I could look into. It's strange, during my search I did come across an auction site where one sold for about $300 and it was just one of those "Aw man!" moments, if only I'd noticed a couple years ago! XD

I just wondered how the system held up with today's technology and new developments like high end tablet computers and SSDs. Even though the resolution was only 720p it was still RAW 4:4:4 from a quality videocamera.
Click to expand...

Wow! Blast from the past!

No idea on current state, but I remember thinking about sending mine in for the conversion at the time, but went with an HPX500 instead.

let us know what you find out! : )
 
YOu talkin about that ReelStream thing? The passion project by the site member/engineer guy? I thought I heard it immediately got bought by some other company and they tanked it?
 
No, he was hired by Panasonic and they absorbed all of the IP.

There are a few of them around, and even one or two of the HVX200 experiments he started. But the one's I know of are all locked away or sitting on a shelf. Some are probably tossed by now.
 
Actually, there was one HVX200 "Hydra" camera that went on sale on eBay. It was mentioned on DVXUser and the board is buried back in the archives but it still shows up if you search for it. The end cap of the board was that a guy knew who bought it and the report was that the extra connector for the 2K uncompressed video was all but useless as it was a proprietary connection of some kind. Without the cable and software to utilize it then the camera was nothing more than a standard HVX200 with an odd extra port. I believe it went for around $5,000 and I remember considering it heavily not only for the historical value of it but also because I really wanted an HVX200 at the time lol! I wouldn't be surprised if it was actually the same camera I handled at NAB when it was first introduced and was still very much in early development stages at the time. It's a shame that the all important cable wasn't available to utilize the uncompressed connection but even then the software was the key and that hadn't been fully developed as far as I know by the time ReelStream got bought out.

I would imagine that people would have their Andromeda cameras just sitting on the shelf as novelty items more than anything. I admit, even though I'd love to own one I'm not sure I would have much practical uses for it aside from playing back DVX100-recorded Mini-DV tapes and the occasional test. Still, it'd be interesting to see what you could do with a tethered Andromeda camera with today's mobile solutions. Until then, if anything interesting turns up, I'll be sure to post about it.
 
Last one I ever saw on sale was in 2011 on a Vimeo forum.

CALLING ALL DVX100 ANDROMEDA USERS THAT STILL OWN THEM OR ARE ALIVE FOR THAT MATTER; 2006 WAS A LONG TIME AGO

If anyone happens to have one still, why not open it up? The DVX100 is dirt cheap these days, and anyone who can deal with a LARGE amount of differently sized philips screws can crack one open.

Remember guys, the Andromeda mod was a test of how two Purdue students can capitalize off of non-engineering-savvy filmmakers:

1. Electrical engineering students solder some wires where the DSP is in some spot to bypass the A/D converter.
2. Wires are ugly and uncontrollable so they made an ASIC so they could effectively install and ship their mod.
3. Here's where it seems dead simple: the ASIC simply grabs raw data from the system board and aligns the data to a USB bus.
4. A USB port jutting off the side after some dremel work is attached.
5. Write proprietary software that knows how to deal with the data and turn the data into a TIFF sequence.
6. Charge $3000.
7. Get jobs from Panasonic in lieu of a lawsuit, dissolve your company, and disappear off the face of the earth.
 
It would seem the hvx200 could do the same with its component video out passed to a modern recorder.
 
Al MacLeod said:
It would seem the hvx200 could do the same with its component video out passed to a modern recorder.
Click to expand...
No - there's a fundamental difference between the DVX100 and the HVX200.

The DVX100 was limited mainly by recording format and codec - the HVX200 was limited mainly by the front end. Put another way, the DVCProHD recording in the HVX200 could capture pretty well everything the front end of the camera could produce anyway, (unlike the DVX and Andromeda) so this sort of mod then made little sense.

In the case of the DVX100, remember it was tape, Standard Definition and NTSC DV codec at that - the front end was capable of much more than that could record, hence Andromeda.

I remember saying at the time that I didn't see how the Andromeda technology could be applied to an HVX200, for the basic reasons above, so didn't see how "Hydra" could be worthwhile. It's therefore little surprise to me that Hydra never came to anything.
 
Good point. The improvement might not be on the scale of the DVX on Andromeda, but full raster capture at 10 bit does polish the video to a degree.
 
Al MacLeod said:
.......... but full raster capture at 10 bit does polish the video to a degree.
Click to expand...
Maybe - it's a long time ago and I can't remember exactly what was proposed now. The raster of DVCProHD in 1080p mode was more than enough for the 960x540 chips of the HVX200, and 10 bit recording doesn't NECESSARILY mean an improvement - it all depends on the s/n of the output signal, or whether something like RAW is being recorded, not a processed signal. (And for RAW you'd really need a greater bit depth than 10 anyway.) I suspect such would be beyond the practical technology of the time, as would the needed storage, and my memory is that Hydra was supposed to record a video signal (??). In which case, from the HVX200 with 1/3" chips, I doubt 8 or 10 bit would make a lot of difference because of the noise figure - and remember at the time 8 bit was seen as good enough for even the highest pro HD cameras of the era, with DVCProHD and HDCAM the dominant formats.

You have to ask yourself if the money spent on an HVX200 plus Hydra, if it had come about, could have been put to better use on simply getting a better (more expensive)camera of the time than an HVX200 in the first place. I suspect the answer to that is a definite "yes".
 
Andromeda was kind of a trendsetting concept...there a a couple of cameras around now that need an external recorder to realize their full signal potential. With all the hacking of dslrs, a hacked HVX200 allowing a codec like avc ultra would be something.
 
Al MacLeod said:
With all the hacking of dslrs, a hacked HVX200 allowing a codec like avc ultra would be something.
Click to expand...
No, it wouldn't. All AVC-Intra (or any Ultra variant) could offer over the DVCProHD that the HVX200 already had would be full 1080 raster and 10 bit versus 8 bit recording.

Full raster recording is only relevant if the front end of the camera has the resolution to do it justice - the HVX200 didn't. It had 3 960x540 chips with pixel shifting, with gave a luminance resolution of about 1150x650. This was fully recordable by DVCProHD in 1080 mode (which was 1280x1080).

And as stated above, if you're recording a coded signal, there's no advantage in 10 bit over 8 bit unless the noise figure of the camera is very low - that is not the case with the HVX200 (or any camera of that class at the time).

The real beauty of the HVX200 was that (for the first time) it offered a real, true, full professional HD codec in a camera of this price point. Up to the HVX200, unless you paid vastly more, HD recording meant HDV. Cameras like the Z1 arguably had better front ends (certainly sharper) than the HVX200 - but the HVX200 won on the codec front. Well, sort of.......

I say "sort of" because although DVCProHD was undoubtedly better than HDV in quality terms, it came with workflow issues as implemented in the HVX200. Namely P2, at the cost it was at the time. Which meant either having a small fortunes worth of memory, or frequent field downloading to do much filming - and the latter was fraught with potential problems.

I've said it before, I'll say it again. The HVX200 should have had the OPTION of DVCProHD to P2 cards, *AND* HDV to tape, not just Standard Definition to the DV tape deck. Not doing that - restricting it to P2 only for HD - was a huge marketing and strategic mistake by Panasonic, and one which resonates to this day. Users of the day were faced with EITHER going for the Z1 (HDV, but no recording time issues - just get more tapes!) *OR* the HVX200 (much better codec and no possible tape drop out - but a problem if you wanted to record for very long). Everybody's needs were different, and the HVX200 suited some extremely well - but it was well outsold by the Z1.

If it had been hybrid - DVCProHD AND HDV - I'm sure it would have been very different. Why on earth buy the Z1 when the HVX200 did all it did, AND had the P2/DVCProHD option as well!?! It would have swept the board, and given the whole P2 system a far greater initial kick start. I remember countless discussions of the day about which was better between the Z1 or the HVX200. At the end of the day, each had it's strengths and weaknesses, so the arguments were generally dictated by individuals personal needs. ("I need DVCProHD quality" "I need the flexibility that tape running times give me.") If Panasonic had made it hybrid, there'd have been no argument - it would have been the unqualified winner. And it had the tape deck anyway, for heavens sake!

But that's a digression. It's water under the bridge. The whole point is whether an external recorder will give an improvement to any camera over what is bought over the counter. Andromeda did because the limiting factor had been NTSC DV recording. Hacking of DSLRs did because they were primarily sold at that time as stills cameras, and manufacturers didn't want complaints due to users using too slow memory. RAW makes sense as not all buyers might need it, so why build the expense in for people who weren't going to use it?

But because the P2/DVCProHD option in the HVX200 was so good relative to the front end, Hydra never made much sense. Which is why it's no surprise it never came to fruition.
 
That was a good read...thanks! In the spirit of Magic Lantern and Nikon Hacker, I've run the HVX 200 through a Black Magic card that allows the component video at whatever resolution that provides, and captured the result as 10 bit prores and dnxhd at a high bit rate. I have no calibrated monitors, but the result appears to be an improvement, banding in sky shots in particular. Does it propel the camera to the head of the pack...no. It does squeeze a tad more out of an old piece of equipment though. It would be nice not to have to lug a laptop along to be sure.
 
hardrive, that was a great post (as many of yours are).

I fully agree with everything you said. It sure was a shame Panasonic didn't give the HVX200 an HDV option since it already had the tape drive. I was one of the people back then that P2 was a major problem for due to short record times/major expense. It could have really been a widespread hit, continuing the success of the DVX100. Granted the HVX sold pretty well anyway, but nothing like it would have!
 
Anyone interested in Area 51 or conspiracies can read my post on DVX from about 2 years ago where even Barry Green agreed that it likely seemed quite evident that RED bought up bought Juan Pertierra's technology.

Mainly after I had reviewed patents held by RED I discovered many references, connections, and common links to Juan's work and more specifically Andromeda.

Regardless of the tin-foil hat talk, my bet is that all stray DVX100's or HVX200's have been silently acquired by men in black.

:cool:
 
starcentral said:
.......it likely seemed quite evident that RED bought up Juan Pertierra's technology.
Click to expand...
I believe Red had as a patent the concept of recording more than 23 frames every second as RAW data, or something like that?

RAW capture was obviously not patentable in itself, neither was image capture at more than 23 fps (all video cameras do it!!) - but combine them together.....?

In which case, Andromeda may well have been an obstacle, as it could have been an exception which would have blocked the patent. So buying up would indeed be a way to get round that. But that's not quite the same thing as is usually inferred by "buying up the technology". The latter infers that the buying up company needs the technology to progress in a technical sense - I suspect that wasn't the case with Red, they were already there in that respect. Reading RAW off the sensor and capturing such is a fairly basic process in essence, especially for a manufacturer, as opposed to someone hacking an existing product.

The question remains just how much benefit did Andromeda or Hydra promise? As already said, the real benefit of Andromeda was bypassing NTSC DV recording, which was putting 24p in a i30 stream, colour sampling to 4:1:1, limiting resolution to 720x480, and that's before we even start to think about DV compression. A lot of scope for improvement, though I remain unconvinced that the luminance resolution improvements were all some people claimed. The spec for the DVX100 claims 3 380,000 pixel chips with pixel shift, so I'd assume 720x480 for the NTSC version? If the pixel shift was purely horizontal, that would give a max hor res (before DV coding got to work!) of about 1100, with the vertical figure still 480. Better, yes, but well short of what we'd call HD now.

Hydra may have given some performance improvement to the HVX200 - but the "is it worth it?" would have made it far, far less viable than Andromeda to the DVX. And that's mainly a complement to DVCProHD being so much of an improvement on what had been the norm before (DV and standard definition). The weakest link was again no longer the codec.

And so it would stay until we started to get cameras with full 1080 raster chips.
 
yes, in my link it mentions that the patent specifies capturing RAW at more than 23 frames per second.

Remember owning such a patent also means profits when other companies also want to record "RAW at more than 23 frames per second" and since RED obviously patented it first before ReelStream (Juan's formed corporation offering services to modify DVX/HVX cameras to shoot RAW) then Juan would have had to either pay licensing fees or face a law suit if he continued.

So the option was 1.) pay licensing fees 2.) proceed without licensing and get sued 3.) sell the company to whoever was making on offer.

Quite obviously Juan went with option #3 and also there was a thread on REDUSER.net where Juan himself announced that the program was ceasing its operation and people were quite upset about it. Remember that even as remarkable as a camera like RED was at that time which could shoot RAW with a 35mm sensor it was still $17,500 ++ and for many with a lower budget they were willing to stick with 1/3" CCD's if they could get RAW-like images from them. (not to mention cheap 35mm adapters were also really starting to flood the market from Redrock, Cinevate, etc..)

Hence RED melted this snowball before it could could even roll downhill an inch. The one thing RED could not prevent however was Canon incorporating 24fps on their DSLR's which sparked the beginning of the DSLR revolution many have come to grow and love.
 
Last edited:
starcentral said:
Remember that even as remarkable as a camera like RED was at that time which could shoot RAW with a 35mm sensor it was still $17,500 ++ and for many with a lower budget they were willing to stick with 1/3" CCD's if they could get RAW-like images from them.
Click to expand...
Hmm, but there are RAW images and RAW images..... And I'm not so sure RAW from 1/3" sensors would mean the same as RAW from s35..... I still come back to the original point. If you're going to hack your camera - spend a lot of money and void any warranty - you want to be sure the improvement will be worth it. If the improvement is marginal, then why bother? Why not just use the money towards buying a better camera in the first place?

All I've heard is that for the DVX/Andromeda the answer is a probable "yes", for an HVX/Hydra...... maybe not. I just wonder if Juan himself was beginning to realise exactly that at the same time the options you mention were happening?
Hence RED melted this snowball before it could could even roll downhill an inch. The one thing RED could not prevent however was Canon incorporating 24fps on their DSLR's which sparked the beginning of the DSLR revolution many have come to grow and love.
Click to expand...
I don't understand that - they obviously couldn't stop Canon doing RAW for stills (including burst up to 23fps) but why didn't any 24fps mode break the Red patent?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top