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Firewire 800 and Video Editing

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Hi,

I recently bought the new iMac for the purpose of live capturing using wirecast. I have some problems though. I tried to use the firewire 800 port, used a belkin Firewire 800 hub and with that connects to my NV-MD10000 DV camera (iMac--Belkin--DV Camera), but it doesn't seem to detect the camera. Even if i use without the hub, still no positive response.

So i tried the firewire 400 port, with a short wire, no hub. It's worked. Now i bought a 20m Datavideo firewire cable, but with this cable, the camera is not detected.

Question:
Does this firewire port have short limits to the detect a device?

Any suggestions?

Regards,

Edward TH
 
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Looks like you'll have to use the FW400 when you capture footage. No big deal since you must capture in real time anyway. As to what the problem is... it's a Mac! Apple hates conforming to standards and would rather have as less compatibility with everything.
 
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I wonder if your Firewire 800 port is working. Have you connected anything else to it with success? I don't know anything about that camera. Does is have FW800? I don't think that should matter as would expect the iMac FW800 port to adjust.

Using System Profiler, open the Hardware area and click on Firewire while the camera is hooked up via that short FW400 cable. Do the same with your FW800 cable. You should see the camera each time. You can choose View-->Refresh rather than restart System Profiler.

Try connecting a hard drive to the FW800 port.

If the above fails, then I would suspect the port or the cable or the cable adapter if you are using one.

I don't think it is the port that has a limit exactly. It requires the right signal strengths from the connected cable and device. That is what your extender is suppose to help with.

As far as the cable extender is concerned, test it with a hard drive.

You need to do all the diagnoses to know what parts are and are not working.
 
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Here's my partial diagnosis:

FW400: I used a 2meter firewire cable connected to the camera, the sytem profiler showed camera. BUt using the 20meter firewire cable from datavideo did not show anything.

FW800: Tested with short wires but no success.

Edward
 
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Well then, you have some more testing to do. As I said, use a drive, or something else.

You could try using the hardware test from the install disks.

Last resort is to send the iMac in for repair.
 
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Hi,

Tested an external storage with two 6 pin firewire port. Use a 6-9 pin firewire cable. Still negative.

I already contacted the reseller. Hopefully this will be resolved soon.

Lastly, just to confirm--a 20meter cable will not be a problem (signal loss) to connect a DV Cam to an iMac?

Regards,

Edward
 
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Lastly, just to confirm--a 20meter cable will not be a problem (signal loss) to connect a DV Cam to an iMac?
I would expect it to work if the specs for the cable says it should. But did it work with the FW400 port that does work? You are out of my experience with the cable extender.

Is this what you have? Are the 'Active LEDs' on?
 
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Hi,

Yes, that's the repeater that I have a the 20meter Datavideo cable. The LEDs are active.

For the firewire 800, ialso tried this hub

Regards,

Edward TH
 
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Hi,

Thanks for the support, i think it's a hardware problem and I'm sending the iMac back to the reseller to check.

I tested the same cables with my windows machine, and it's working fine even with the 20m wire.

Thanks for all the help.

Regards,

Edward
 
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Hi,

I posted wrongly yesterday.

Anyway, I did test again the iMac and this time the FW800 worked. But I notice that it only works for short wires and in Firewire Bus (system profiler) it shows that Max speed= Up to 800Mb/sec, but the device under it--Panasonic NV-MD10000Unit max speed is up to 100Mb/sec only. Why is this? Does this mean that the firewire bus of the camera is slow/old?

Edward, TH
 
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Look up this post at Macintouch and search for the word throttled. That poster says most cameras only use FW100. So that would be your maximum transfer rate for the camera regardless of which port on your Mac you use. And no, the speed of the camera is not old technology. It is what most DV cameras have.

Given what your goal is; a very long camera connection, you should read this link at wikipedia. The line I find interesting is; "Standard category-5 unshielded twisted pair supports 100 metres at S100". It suggests you don't need a repeater cable, just a quality cable well shielded cable for the lenght you say you have. This is out of my domain of knowledge.
 
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Hi,

veir475: I also tried the camera with the 20meter cable connected to a windows pc, and the computer detected it without problem.

xstep: thanks for the answer. i sent back the iMac to the reseller and hopefully they will fix it.

Thinking of selling it/returning the product and buy a mac book pro instead.

Regards,

Edward
 

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